Suffrage victory

Produced by Virginia Maynard and Charles Levy.

On the battle for women's suffrage.

From Pop Up Archive »Pacifica Radio Archives - see https://www.popuparchive.com/collections/925/items/6793 for audio + an automatically generated transcript

♪I've been down to Madison
To see the folks and sights;♪

♪You'd laugh, I'm sure, to hear them talk
About the women's rights.♪

♪Now it's just as plain as my old hat,
That's plain as plain can be♪

♪That if the women want the vote,
They'll get no help from me.♪

♪Not from Joe, not from Joe;
If he knows it..♪

Looking back today,
it's somewhat difficult to understand

the violence of the opposition
to woman's suffrage.

Conservative opinion in the country was
of course almost universally opposed

to the idea of women voting.

The Church was divided in its position.

While some denominations
and individual clergymen

were among the most zealous
advocates of the movement,

others took the stand that women's
political emancipation would mean

the beginning of the end
of the social morality

which constituted
the moral strength of the nation.

The enfranchisement of women,
it was feared

would result in the dissolution
of the home and family

and the destruction
of the institution of marriage.

The most pessimistic of the prophets
predicted that the very act of

women's going to the polls and mingling
with the rough crowds on election day

would plunge the country into moral chaos.

Professional politicians and certain
powerful big business interests

were just as violently opposed
to vote for women,

if for very different reasons.

Political leaders felt that they knew
how to manipulate men for party purposes

but manipulating women
was an unknown quality

which they wished to avoid
as long as possible.

The organized liquor industries,
with their fear of women's influence

on the prohibition issue, spent
countless thousands of dollars

lobbying against women's suffrage, which
they felt threatened their very existence.

Add to these elements the fact that
most men of the country

were understandably reluctant to forego

their traditional position
of sex superiority,

which was in a sense symbolized
by their power to vote

and the fact that many women were quite
as unwilling to give up

the protected position in which men's
chivalry had placed them

and perhaps we can understand why
the battle for woman's suffrage

was inevitably a long and stormy one.

After the disheartening failure to obtain
the franchise by federal amendment

at the close of the Civil War, when the
Negro was admitted to the vote,

the suffragists changed their tactics and
began to concentrate their main strength

on a policy of winning the suffrage
state by state.

By the turn of the 20th century the
National Woman Suffrage Association

was a powerful organization with
headquarters in New York

and an efficiently functioning machine in
almost every state of the Union.

Four states in the far West had already
granted women full suffrage as a result of

the Association's work and by 1914 almost
all the states west of the Mississippi had

joined the ranks of the suffrage states
and the Association was turning its forces

to the conquest of the traditionally more
conservative East.

Sinclair Lewis in the novel 'Ann Vickers',
published in 1932, has left an amusing

account of one of these state suffrage
campaigns during this period.

In the following incident from this work
one Dr Melvina Wormser of New York,

purportedly Chief Surgeon of the Manhattan
Hospital for Women,

President of the Better Obstetrical League,
author of 'Emancipation in Sex',

Doctor of Science of Yale and Vassar and
an officer in all known birth control
organizations,

is interviewed by the press in advance of
her scheduled speech at a suffrage rally

in a city called Clateburn, Ohio.

The professional suffragist, says Lewis,
had been cautioned about talking to the

press since the reporters, or at least
their editors, were always on the alert

for something scandalous from suffrage
headquarters, some hint that it was a

free love colony or (what was nearly as
good, says Lewis) a frenzied zoo of

manhaters, anarchists, atheists,
spiritualists or anything else

eccentric or discreditable.

The workers for the cause might attack the
water or gas departments,

the city orphanages, President Wilson or
even the Allies in the Great War,

but they must do so only as Christian
gentlewomen and solid taxpayers.

They must convince others that the vote
will not lead to moral laxity

but would immediately end prostitution,
gambling and the drinking of beer.

But Dr Melvina Wormser of New York,
as guest speaker,

was outside headquarters discipline and a
law unto herself.

Here the young suffrage workers in
'Ann Vickers' stand by in shocked silence

as Dr Wormser delivers her opinions
to the delighted reporters:

[Dr Wormser, do you believe in free love?]

Do I believe in free love? What do you
mean by that, young lady?

How can love be anything but free? If
you mean, do I believe that any authentic

passion, not just a momentary itch in the
moonlight, is superior to any ceremony

performed by some preacher, why of course,
don't you?

[What do you think about birth control?]

[Do you think women are brighter
than men?]

[Do you think there's any field women
should not enter?]

Oh, one at a time please! Let's see: do I
believe that women are brighter than men?

Tut tut, what a question! Not brighter --
just less mean. But don't try to get me to

riding men. I'm a folorn old maid, but I
adore 'em, the darlings.

What do you suppose men doctors would ever
do without their women nurses

and secretaries? I know! I was a nurse
myself, before I became a doc.

And now my chief satisfaction in life is
that I don't have to stand up when a

surgeon enters the room!

Silly customs like that -- just what a man
WOULD institute -- poor lambs, we have

to take care of 'em and their little egos!
That's why we need the vote, for THEIR
sake!

[Do you think there will ever be a woman
President?]

How do I know, young man? But let me point
out that women rulers -- Queen Elizabeth,

that lovely rakehell Catherine of Russia,
the last Chinese Empress,

Maria Theresa of Austria, Queen Anne, and
Victoria -- were better rulers than any

equal number of kings OR Presidents!

[How soon do you predict women's suffrage
will be the law of the land?]

You boys and girls might as well know that
I don't believe in hedging and pussyfooting.

This is going to be a long struggle. Not
just getting the vote.

That's a matter of a couple of years.
Then we've got to go on.

Birth control. Separate apartments for
married couples, if they happen to like them.

What women need is not merely the vote but
something more up here, in the head.

Don't need just exterior opportunity but
something interior, with which to grab the

opportunity when we get it, and use it.

Freedom's no good to a pussycat, only to a
tigress!

And women have got to stick together. Men
always have had the sense to -- drat 'em --

Sex loyalty. We ought to lie for one
another and sneak off and have a good drink

together, like the men.

[Do you want to rival men?]

[Do you think there's any field that should
be closed to women?]

I believe that there is no field that men
control now that women can't enter,

completely. Medicine, law, politics,
physics, aviation, exploring, engineering,

soldiering, prize-fighting, writing sweet
little rondels -- only I hope women'll be

too sensible for either the prize-fighting
or the rondels, which are both forms of

male escapism, and singularly alike if you
look at 'em!

Only I don't expect women to imitate or
try to displace men in any of these fields.

I'm not one of the gels who believes that
the sole difference between males and

females is in conception. Women have
special qualities which the human race has

failed to use for civilization.
I know a woman can be as good an architect

as any man -- but she may be a different
sort of architect. I bring something to

medicine that no man can, no matter how
good he is.

[Well, how about the army?]

Well, if you think women can't go to war,
remember what the Teuton tribes, marching

with their women along, did to the
beautiful, virile, professional men

soldiers of Rome! But the pig-headed
masculine world forgot that lesson for

fifteen hundred years and never discovered
it till Florence Nightingale happened in

and bullied the masculine British War
Office into some of the common sense that

any normal girl would have at seven!

[Do you want to rival men?]

No, I don't want to rival men. But I don't
want to be kept by the tradition of

feminine subjection from the privilege of
working eighteen hours a day.

I'm not much of a democrat. Believe
inferiors ought to be subjected,

if they ARE inferiors! But if a girl
secretary is smarter than her male boss,

let HIM be HER secretary.

Listen! In 1945, maybe you'll have to go
to England -- that's where they invented

this Inferior Women myth, so men could
have their clubs -- maybe you'll have to

go to England to find anybody so benighted
that he'll even know what you're talking

about when you speak of considering
candidates for a job as male and female,

or on any other basis except
their ability!

[Why 1945, Dr Wormser?]

I speak of 1945 because I have a hunch
that after we get the vote we'll be less

ardent feminists. We'll find that work is
hard. That jobs are insecure. That we must

go much deeper than woman suffrage --
maybe to Socialism; anyway, to something

that fundamentally represents both men and
women, not just women alone.

And a lot of suffragists that pretend to
hate men will find the dear brutes are

nice to have around the house. We'll slump.
But then we'll come back -- not as shadows

of men, or as noisy professional females,
but, for the first time since

Queen Elizabeth, as human beings! There!
You ought to be able to get sufficient out

of what I've said to make trouble enough
for me to satisfy even a suffrage speaker!

Good-day.

[Oh, thank you, Dr Wormser!]
[Goodbye, Doctor, and thank you!]

This goes on Sinclair Lewis's Ann Vickers
as what the newspapers made of Dr. Wormser's

interview the next morning: "Love is
nothing but a temporary itch caused by

moonlight. But even so, it is more
important than lasting marriage.

Because marriages are performed by
ministers who are all childish. Free

love-that is, taking any sweetheart, any
time you choose is not only permissible

but necessary for any free woman. Men are
much meaner than women. Men doctors boss

their nurses around and treat them simply
terrible. The next president of the United

States will be a woman and she will be
lots better than any man. Marie Louise of

Russia was the greatest king who ever
lived. As soon as we get the vote, then

we're going on and advocate birth control
socialism, and atheism. All married

couples will live in separate apartments
and women will imitate men and sneak off

and get drunk together. Women must lie
about one another's whereabouts to fool

the men. Women will make better soldiers,
prize-fighters, engineers, and poets than

men, and men are fit only to be the
secretaries and servants of women. I know

that talking frankly like this will get
me into trouble, but all suffrage speakers

love publicity and I guess I'll get plenty
on this." Dr. Wormster's interview had the

effect of selling out the house for the
suffrage meeting that evening, with

hundreds more trying to get in.
(Crowd sounds) The crowd was threatening

and snarling. ["I oughta ride them out on
a rail!" "Bunch of floozies, all of them

crazy, that's what they are!" "I
wouldn't have a woman doc for a sick cat!'

"Free love! I'd like to show em some free
love..with a club!" "Bunch of crazy

anarchists!"] But there were enough
sympathizers with the movement to keep

down violence. Backstage, before the
meeting, the suffragists were nervous and

apprehensive. "Oh, those cursed newspapers!
Will some of you explain to me why every

single reporter and editor on a paper can
be a liberal or perhaps a Red and the

paper itself is conservative as the
measles? Oh, don't worry Dr. Wormser, I

have my Dudley and my two large brothers
out there. They've stopped at the club

for a drink and by this time they'll be
equal to handling at least 300 bullies."

(Cheers) "8:27. Oo, let's get started,
Doctor, and get it over!" "Listen, you

girls. Eleanor, Pat, and Ann. The minute
the doctor starts talking, you all skip

to the back of the house and if anything
starts, see what you can do will you?"

"Right, Mrs. Birgardes I certainly will!
"Come on girls let's go, let's go out

there and face them Dr. Wormser,
are you game?" "Oh, they don't

bother me in the least, I'm used to
them. After you Ms. Bogardes."

"At a girl Dr. Wormser, Never say die!"
(Cheering) "Let's start the convention."

"On with the ball and chain!" "Hooray for
the lady Doc!" "Votes for the skirts!"

"Ladies and gentlemen, I'm afraid that in
unavoidable haste of getting out the news

papers our friends and reporters
considerably exaggerated the radicalism of

of the speaker for this evening. I will
let her speak now for herself, I present

Dr. Melvina Wormser!"

"ladies and gentlemen"

"boo, go on back to New York"

"Ladies and gentlemen, and also
anti-suffragist.

Ladies and gentlemen I agree with you.

If I knew myself only through reading
the papers this evening,

I would thoroughly disapprove of myself."

(laughter)

"Yes I would tell Melvina Wormser to get
out of this lovely city

and go back to the sinfulness of New York."

"Go on back then, we don't want you"

and in the mean time in the back of
of the hall, the three girls confer

"What are we going to do? If that one
drunk would keep quiet she could speak."

"He's going to ruin everything"

"lets get one of those policemen to
through him out."

"Good Idea."

"Hey officer, you've gotta throw that man
out, he will start a riot!"

"Oh he ain't doin nothin lady,
He'll shut up"

(drunk singing)

"I'll get him myself then, come on Elanor
there he is."

"you get out of here you drunk!"

"Go fly a kite you. Who do you think your
talking to you floozy?"

"Don't you talk to her like that,
don't you dare!"

"I'll fix you"
(smacking sound)

"She hit him, that brazen hussy hit him."

"That's no way to act, slapping a man
around, you bunch of tough"

"Hes making a disturbance, here officer
take him out."

(man)"He's got a right to talk"

(woman) "You ought to be ashamed of
yourselves, call yourselves ladies"

(man) "let a bunch of hellions like you
have the vote"

"here officer get these rough skirts
away from here."

(officer) "you get back to yourself ladies
your making all the fuss not this guy"

"you baited her I'll run you in, we'll
take care of the rumpus."

(drunk singing)

(man) "come on boys lets spank a whole
bunch of em and then start on the lady doc"

(man) "Just a minute, don't start anything"

"I came to hear a speech and if this
gentleman is going to interfere"

"I suggest he be removed. And if the
officers refuse to do it, who'll help me"

(man) "I will! Hey, which one you want
out, lady?"

(woman) "That one! Kick him out! And that
one! And that one! Oh, thank you Officer

I'm so glad to see you're helping, thank
you! "

(man) "That's alright, lady!" And Dr.
Wormser resumed her address. A fictitious

episode from Sinclair Lewis's novel Ann
Vickers. In 1917, the American Woman's

Suffrage Association won a victory which
made universal suffrage for women almost

inevitable. The state of New York yielded
to 69 years of persistent agitation and

granted the franchise to women. During
the last few years of the campaign,

200,000 women worked tirelessly for their
cause like a well-trained army, organizing

every county, borough, and precinct in
New York on the model of a political

machine, frankly patterned after the
Tammany Organization. In 1910, when the

state legislature refused to act on the
suffrage petition the workers of greater

New York organized a protest parade in
which thousands of woman marched up 5th ave.

A demonstration which they repeated every
year afterward until suffrage was won.

On one occasion in New York, the women
joined in a night torchlight parade

In which a seemingly endless stream of
women each carrying a lighted lantern,

marched up 5th avenue in a procession
which went on for hours.

One parade toward the end of the campaign

Lasted all day long.

Two factors states Inez Haynes Irwin in
Angels and Amazons,

besides the unceasing efforts of the
organization workers contributed to the

final victory.

One was that the organized liquor
industries were by this time,

occupied in fighting the prohibition
amendment and could give only

secondary attention to the campaign
against women suffrage.

And the second factor was that so many

New York women had become enthusiastic

supporters of the suffrage movement.

But Tammany hall refused to make a stand
against it.

In 1917 the New York victory was won.

And the largest state in the union had
granted women full suffrage.

Even before this notable triumph however,

much headway had been made towards
obtaining suffrage for women on a national scale

In 1913 a new element had
entered the struggle.

A group young militant intellectuals

led by Ellis Paul, from Swarthmore in
Pennsylvania from which he held a PHD

And lucy Burns from Vassare, Berlin and
Bonn had organized a national womens party

and was striking boldly for a womens

suffrage amendment to the United States
Constitution.

The day before Woodrow Wilsons
innaguration as president,

These women, with the approval Jane adams
of the national association

Had organized a demonstration of
8000 women in Washington D.C.

As the procession moved down Pennsylvania
avenue towards the White House,

It ran into unexpected difficulties.

Washington was crowded with people who had
come from all over the country

to witness the inauguration and violence
broke out.

Women were spat upon, tripped, slapped
in the face,

pelted with burning cigar stubs, and
insulted by jeers and obscene language.

The secretary of war finally called in

troops from Fort Meyer
to settle the rioting.

But afterwards the suffragist forced a

congressional inquiry on the neglect of
the police

which resulted in the chief of
police losing his job.

The suffrage cause received unprecedented
publicity

The radical faction
continued the campaign

with tactics which grew
more and more militant.

They held meeting and demonstrations

they exerted pressure on the president
and on congress,

They sent delegations, caused thousands

of letters and telegrams
to flood the capital.

They worked on political leaders.

In 1914 they initiated their policy

in holding the political party in power

responsible for the fact that womens
suffrage was not yet the law of the land.

And they campaigned actively against the
democratic candidates

in the 9 states in which
women could already vote.

According to Ellis Pauls testimony they
campaigned that year against 43 men

who running for congress on the
democratic ticket.

Only 19 of those campaigned against were
returned by their states to Washington.

The Democratic party was forced to
acknowledge the power of the women.

In 1916 president Wilson recognized the
principle of women's suffrage

In his parties platform.

But he did not yet commit himself to
the national amendment.

Later that year he addressed the

convention of the national association
advising patience.

Knowing that the president could compel
passing of the amendment if he would.

Alice Paul concentrated on winning Wilsons
support.

To keep the matter constantly in his mind,

she set the famous suffrage pickets
before the White house.

Which for a year and a half made front
page news in America.

"Mister president, what will you do for
womans suffrage?

How long must women wait for liberty"
their banners read.

On inauguration day of that year

A thousand pickets surrounded the
white house four times.

Even after the declaration of war with
Germany the picketing continued.

The women knew from their experience

of the civil war that they cannot afford
to stop now with their final goal in sight

But suddenly in June 1918, on who's order
know one knows.

The police began to arrest the pickets.

Scores of women were arrested,

including both Lucy Burns and Alice Paul.

They were subjected to all
manner of atrocities and persecutions

which culminated in the following episode

which the national womans party refers to
as the night of terror.

The party historian tells the story thus:

On November 14, 1917, a group of pickets was

arrested and taken to the Occoquan Workhouse in Virginia

they protested against being sent there and refused to register

demanding that they be considered political prisoners.

The officers tried to force them to register.

"Why'd you hit me, you?" "Come on girls, over here! Be nice, now! Over here at the desk!"

"We demand to see Superintendent Whittaker!"

"Superintendent Whittaker is away! You'd better all line up and get registered!"

"But, I'm sure there's some mistake about our being sent here! We're political prisoners, not common criminals! We'll wait and talk to Mr. Whittaker!"

"Sit there all night, then!"

"Well, they're not going to sit here all night! You get right over there and register, you! Go on, now!"

"Leave me alone!" "You stop pushing me!"

"Come now, ladies. You can't wait here all night. You, there, come over here and register. I want to ask you a few questions."

"Get going, now! Get a move on!"

"We won't answer any questions until we've seen Mr. Whittaker!"

"You'd better answer or it'll be the worse for you!" "I'll handle you so you'll be sorry you made me!"

"Get a move on!"

"Wait boys, here's Superintendent Whittaker now!"

"Alright, what's all this? What's going on here? What's all the trouble about?"

"We demand to be treated as political prisoners!"

"Political prisoners! Oh, ugh, you shut up! I have men here who will political prisoners you!"

"Here, grab that woman! You take that one! Here, each of you take one!"

"Come on boys, come on now! Now you'll see how you'll be treated as political prisoners!"

"In there, lady, get going! Get in there through that door! Don't you claw me, you cat!"

"Let go of her! That woman's over seventy years old!"

"I'll come with you. Don't drag me! I have a lame foot. Oh, oh, help me! Help me!"

"That damn suffrager! My mother ain't no suffrager! I'll put you through hell!" [scream]

"Oh, please don't! Please!" "Now, damn you, old lady, you get in there through that door!"

"My foot! I told you I'd go with you! Please don't drag me!"

"Oh, be careful of your foot, Mrs. Nolan!"

Mrs. J.W. Brannan, who was one of those arrested, says of the attack

"Its perfectly unexpected ferocity stunned us. I saw two men seize Mrs. Lawrence Lewis, lift her from her feet, and catapult her through the doorway."

"I saw three men take Lucy Burns, twisting her arms behind her and then two other men grasp her shoulders."

"There were six to ten guards in the room and many others collected on the porch - forty to fifty in all."

"These all rushed in with Whittaker when he first entered. The guards brought from the male prison fell upon us."

"Miss Lincoln, a slight young girl, was thrown to the floor."

"Mrs. Nolan a delicate old lady of seventy-three was mastered by two men."

"The furniture was overturned and the room was a scene of havoc. Whittaker, in the center of the room, directed the whole attack, inciting the guards to every brutality."

"The women were dragged out of the office, down the steps and across the road and field to the administation building. They were thrown into the cells with such violence that several of them were seriously injured."

"And Mrs. Lewis, whose head struck an iron bedstead, was unconscious for some time."

"As always when arrested, Lucy Burns took charge of the situation. Now, from her cell, she began calling the roll."

"Paula Jacoby?" "Here." "Julia Emory?" "Here." "Mrs. Brannan?" "Here."

"Shut up!"

"Mrs. Lewis?" "They've thrown her in here. She's in here, Lucy." "Thank you, Mrs. Nolan."

"Mrs. [inaudible]?" "She's in here, too. They've both..."

"You, old lady in there, if you open your mouth again, I'll put you in a straitjacket!"

"Mrs. Butterworth?"

"Listen, are you gonna stop that?"

"Not until I find out if we are all here and all still alive."

"Well, I guess we know how to fix you! You, guard there! Bring me those handcuffs!"

"Uh, here they are!"

"Don't you put those on me!"

"Quick! Hold her hands! No use fighting, lady."

"Oh! Let go of me! Ohhhh!"

"I've got her! Now, then, we'll fasten them to the top of the door and her with 'em. How do you like that, my fine lady?"

"That's a good place for you!"

"I guess that'll keep her out of mischief for a while!"

"And if I hear anymore noise out of you, I'll bring the buckle gag!"

The country resented the persecution of the pickets and a month later, they were all suddenly released.

In another month, President Wilson declared himself in favor of the federal amendment, and two days later it was passed by the House.

By June of 1919, the 19th Amendment had passed both houses of the 65th Congress and was ready for ratification by the states.

The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.

The American women voted in the presidential election of 1920.