The Story of the Womans Party by Inez Haynes Irwin

267 Pages·2021·2.05 MB·English

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Title: The Story of The Woman's Party

Author: Inez Haynes Irwin

Release Date: March 7, 2018 [EBook #56701]

Language: English

Character set encoding: UTF-8

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE STORY OF THE WOMAN'S PARTY ***

Produced by David Edwards, Barry Abrahamsen, and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
file was produced from images generously made available
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on

Alice Paul.

Taken the Day Before She Went to Prison.

Photo Copr. Edmonston Studio, Washington, D. C.

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ii

THE STORY OF

THE WOMAN’S PARTY

BY

INEZ HAYNES IRWIN

ILLUSTRATED FROM PHOTOGRAPHS

NEW YORK

HARCOURT, BRACE AND COMPANY

1921

COPYRIGHT, 1921, BY

HARCOURT, BRACE AND COMPANY, INC.

THE QUINN & BODEN COMPANY

RAHWAY. N. J.

iii

“But with such women consecrating their lives failure is impossible.”

Last words spoken in public by Susan B. Anthony—

her birthday, 1906.

“Most of those who worked with me in the early years have gone. I am here for a little time only and my place will

be filled as theirs was filled. The fight must not cease; you must see that it does not stop.”

Susan B. Anthony.

iv

TO THE INSPIRED, DEVOTED, UNTIRING, AND SELF-
SACRIFICING MEMBERS OF THE WOMAN’S PARTY,
AND IN ESPECIAL TO THOSE WHOSE WORK CANNOT
FOR LACK OF SPACE BE MENTIONED HERE OR
WHOSE EFFORTS MAY NEVER EVEN IN THE FUTURE
BE PROPERLY APPRECIATED, THIS BOOK
IS ADMIRINGLY AND REVERENTLY DEDICATED.

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CONTENTS

PART ONE
1913-1914

I.
Introduction
3

II.
Alice Paul
6

III.
Alice Paul and Lucy Burns
14

IV.
F Street and the Early Days
18

V.
Making the Federal Amendment an Issue
31

VI.
Pressure on Congress
49

VII.
Pressure on the President
57

VIII.
The Struggle With the Rules Committee
66

IX.
The First Appeal to the Women Voters
73

X.
Congress Takes up the Suffrage Amendment
87

PART TWO
1915-1916

I.
The Woman Voters Appeal to the President and to Congress
99

II.
The New Headquarters and the Middle Years
123

III.
The Conflict with the Judiciary Committee
130

IV.
More Pressure on the President
144

V.
Forming the Woman’s Party
149

VI.
Still More Pressure on the President
164

VII.
The Second Appeal to the Women Voters
172

VIII.
Hail and Farewell
183

PART THREE

1917

I.
The Perpetual Delegation
193

1. The Peaceful Picketing
193

2. The Peaceful Reception
212

3. The War on Pickets
220

4. The Court and the Pickets
259

5. The Strange Ladies
261

II.
Telling the Country
292

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III.
More Pressure on Congress
299

PART FOUR
VICTORY

I.
The New Headquarters and the Later Years
311

II.
Lobbying
317

III.
Organizing
327

IV.
The President Capitulates and the House Surrenders
336

V.
Fighting for Votes in the Senate
340

VI.
Burning the President’s Words
355

VII.
The President Appeals to the Senate to Pass the Suffrage Amendment
366

VIII.
Picketing the Senate
372

IX.
The Third Appeal to the Women Voters
380

X.
The President Includes Suffrage in His Campaign for Congress
384

XI.
Burning the President’s Words Again
386

XII.
The Watch Fires of Freedom
391

XIII.
The Appeal to the President on His Return
408

XIV.
The Appeal to the President on His Departure
412

XV.
The President Obtains the Last Vote and Congress Surrenders
415

XVI.
Ratification
418

XVII.
The Last Days
464

Index
477

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

Alice Paul
Frontispiece

Lucy Burns at the Head of the “Prison Specialists”
16

Why is the Girl from the West Getting all the Attention? Cartoon by Nina Allender
76

The Suffragist’s Dream. Cartoon by Nina Allender
146

Inez Milholland in the Washington Parade, March 3, 1913
184

Joy Young at the Inez Milholland Memorial Service
188

Wage Earners Picketing the White House, February, 1917
200

The Thousand Pickets try vainly to Deliver Their Resolutions to the President, March 4,

1917

204a

A Thousand Pickets Marching Around the White House, March 4, 1917
204b

Obeying Orders, Washington Police Arresting White House Pickets Before the Treasury

Building

256a

The Patrol Wagon Waiting the Arrival of the Suffrage Pickets
256b

Burning the President’s Words at the Lafayette Monument, Washington
356a

A Summer Picket Line
356b

Lucy Branham Burning the President’s Words at the Lafayette Monument
364b

The Russian Envoy Banner, August, 1917
364b

One of the Watchfires of Freedom
396a

A Policeman Scatters the Watchfire
396b

Suffragist Rebuilding the Fire Scattered by the Police
398a

The Last Suffragist Arrested. The Fire Burns On
398b

The Oldest and the Youngest Pickets
448

The Flag Complete
462

Every Good Suffragist the Morning after Ratification. Cartoon by Nina Allender
470

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PART ONE
1913 and 1914

I

INTRODUCTION

In 1912 the situation in the United States in regard to the enfranchisement of women was as follows:

Agitation for an amendment to the National Constitution had virtually ceased. Before the death of Susan B. Anthony

in 1906, Suffragists had turned their attention to the States. Suffrage agitation there was persistent, vigorous, and
untiring; in Washington, it was merely perfunctory. The National American Woman Suffrage Association maintained a
Congressional Committee in Washington, but no Headquarters. This Committee arranged for one formal hearing before
the Senate and the House Committee of each Congress. The speeches were used as propaganda mailed on a
Congressman’s frank. The Suffrage Amendment had never in the history of the country been brought to a vote in the
National House of Representatives, and had only once, in 1887, been voted upon in the Senate. It had not received a
favorable report from the Committee in either House since 1892 and had not received a report of any kind since 1896.
Suffrage had not been debated on the floor of either House since 1887. In addition, the incoming President, Woodrow
Wilson, if not actually opposed to the enfranchisement of women, gave no appearance of favoring it; the great political
Parties were against it. Political leaders generally were unwilling to be connected with it. Congress lacked—it is
scarcely exaggeration to say—several hundreds of the votes necessary to pass the Amendment. Last of all the majority
of Suffragists did not think the Federal Amendment a practical possibility. They were entirely engrossed in State
campaigns.

On the other hand, the Suffrage movement, itself, was virile and vital. The fourth generation of women to espouse

this cause were throwing themselves into the work with all the power and force of their able, aroused, and emancipate
generation. The franchise had been granted in six States: Wyoming, Colorado, Utah, Idaho, Washington, California.
With the winning of Oregon, Kansas, and Arizona in 1912, the movement assumed a new importance in the national
field. These victories meant that there were approximately two million women voters in the United States, that one-fifth
of the Senate, one-seventh of the House and one-sixth of the electoral vote came from Suffrage States.

It was in December, 1912, as Chairman of the Congressional Committee of the National American Woman Suffrage

Association, that Alice Paul came to Washington.

In the next eight years, this young woman was to bring into existence a new political Party of fifty thousand members.

She was to raise over three-quarters of a million dollars. She was to establish a Headquarters in Washington that
became the focus of the liberal forces of the country. She was to gather into her organization hundreds of devoted
workers; some without pay and others with less pay than they could command at other work or with other
organizations. She was to introduce into Suffrage agitation in the United States a policy which, though not new in the
political arena, was new to Suffrage—the policy of holding the Party in power responsible. She was to institute a
Suffrage campaign so swift, so intensive, so compelling—and at the same time so varied, interesting, and picturesque—
that again and again it pushed the war news out of the preferred position on the front pages of the newspapers of the
United States. She was to see her Party blaze a purple, white, and gold trail from the east to the west of the United
States; and from the north to the south. She was to see the Susan B. Anthony Amendment pass first the House and
then the Senate. She was to see thirty-seven States ratify the Amendment in less than a year and a half thereafter. She
was to see the President of the United States move from a position of what seemed definite opposition to the Suffrage
cause to an open espousal of it; move slowly at first but with a progress which gradually accelerated until he, himself,
obtained the last Senatorial vote necessary to pass the Amendment.

What was the training which had developed in Alice Paul this power and what were the qualities back of that

training, which made it possible for her to invent so masterly a plan, to pursue it so resistlessly?

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