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31 - Woman Suffrage and Politics by Carrie Chapman Catt, Nettie Rogers Shuler · Woman Suffrage and Politics

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  Speaker 1: Chapter twenty six of Woman's Suffrage and Politics. This is
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  Speaker 1: a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain.
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  Speaker 1: For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org.
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  Speaker 1: Recording by Betty B. Woman Suffrage and Politics, The Inner
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  Speaker 1: Story of the Suffrage Movement by Carrie Chapman Kat and
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  Speaker 1: Nettie Rogers Schuller. Last of all suffrage conventions. With February
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  Speaker 1: of nineteen twenty, the suffrage program reached its inter organizational climax,
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  Speaker 1: the Annual Suffrage Convention scheduled for Chicago February twelfth through
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  Speaker 1: the eighteenth. Not only was this to be the last
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  Speaker 1: of all suffrage conventions far and wide, it had been
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  Speaker 1: heralded as the victory convention. Although the end of the
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  Speaker 1: suffrage struggle had not yet come, everybody felt sure it
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  Speaker 1: would come in nineteen twenty, and the National American Woman
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  Speaker 1: Suffer Ridge Association was forehanded enough to go part way
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  Speaker 1: to meet the final victory. Far from sidetracking the ratification
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  Speaker 1: campaign to make way for convention activities, those activities were
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  Speaker 1: but used to point and push the campaign. Suffragists. Here
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  Speaker 1: this last call to a suffrage convention so read the
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  Speaker 1: call that was to assemble the suffrage hosts of all
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  Speaker 1: the conventions held within the past fifty one years, this
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  Speaker 1: will prove the most momentous. Few people live to see
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  Speaker 1: the actual and final realization of hopes to which they
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  Speaker 1: have devoted their lives. That privilege is ours. Let us
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  Speaker 1: tell the world of the ever buoyant hope, born of
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  Speaker 1: the assurance of justice and the inevitability of our cause,
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  Speaker 1: which is given our army of workers, unswerving courage and determination,
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  Speaker 1: which has at last overcome every obstacle and attained its aim.
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  Speaker 1: From Maine and from Florida, from California, and from Texas,
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  Speaker 1: and from all the states between, the women streamed into
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  Speaker 1: Chicago in the wintry February weather. The city, the whole
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  Speaker 1: country was ice locked and snow banked, but spring was
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  Speaker 1: in the hearts of the suffragists. Never where women had
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  Speaker 1: come together, had there been a gathering so gay, and
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  Speaker 1: never one so feelingly motivated by the sense of solidarity
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  Speaker 1: that holds organizations together. Hand clasps seemed to mean more
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  Speaker 1: that February than they had ever meant before. Women looked
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  Speaker 1: into each other's eyes and saw old, endearing memories of
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  Speaker 1: long hard work together leap to life. They were facing
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  Speaker 1: new things, new affiliations, separate ways. But the recognition of
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  Speaker 1: what the old things, the old supreme affiliation, the old
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  Speaker 1: way together had done for them singly and collectively, rested
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  Speaker 1: on them with a poignant inner compulsion. They could not
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  Speaker 1: shake it off. It dominated their merrymaking. It made them
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  Speaker 1: stop one another in corridors and in corners, to whisper,
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  Speaker 1: to think that we shall not meet again like this,
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  Speaker 1: not next year, not ever. Ours has been a movement
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  Speaker 1: with the soul, said the president of the Suffrage Association
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  Speaker 1: to the assembled delegates, A dauntless, unconquerable soul, ever leading on.
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  Speaker 1: Women came, served and passed on, but others came to
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  Speaker 1: take their places, while the same great soul was ever
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  Speaker 1: marching on through one hundred, nay a thousand years, a
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  Speaker 1: soul immortal directing leading the woman's crusade for the liberation
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  Speaker 1: of the mothers of the race. That soul is here today,
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  Speaker 1: and who shall say that all the hosts of the
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  Speaker 1: millions of women who have toiled and hoped and met
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  Speaker 1: delay are not here today enjoining in the rejoicing that
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  Speaker 1: their cause has at last won its triumph. Oh, how
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  Speaker 1: do I pity the women who have had no share
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  Speaker 1: in the exuled timeation and the discipline of our army
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  Speaker 1: of workers? How do I pity those who have felt
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  Speaker 1: none of the grip of the oneness of women's struggling, serving, suffering,
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  Speaker 1: sacrificing for the righteousness of woman's emancipation. Be glad today,
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  Speaker 1: Let your voices ring out the gladness in your hearts.
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  Speaker 1: There will never come another day like this. Let your
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  Speaker 1: joy be unconfined, and let it speak so clearly that
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  Speaker 1: its echo will be heard around the world and find
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  Speaker 1: its way into the soul of every woman of any
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  Speaker 1: and every race and nationality, who was yearning for opportunity
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  Speaker 1: and liberty still denied her sex. She closed with a
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  Speaker 1: parody on Kipling's poem If, which read, we kept our
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  Speaker 1: heads when all about us were losing theirs and blaming
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  Speaker 1: it on us. We made allowance for the doubts of
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  Speaker 1: men and kept our faith though they were scornful. Then
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  Speaker 1: we were lied about, yet did not deal in lies.
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  Speaker 1: We were hated, yet did not give way to hating.
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  Speaker 1: We did not look too good, nor talk too wise.
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  Speaker 1: We waited and were not tired by waiting, we heard
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  Speaker 1: the truths that we had spoken, twisted by knaves to
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  Speaker 1: make a trap for fools, and watch the cause we'd
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  Speaker 1: given our life to broken, yet bravely built again with poor,
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  Speaker 1: cheap tools. We held on when there was nothing in
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  Speaker 1: us except the will which says hold on. Thus for
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  Speaker 1: sixty years marched on the suffrage soul, and felt no
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  Speaker 1: doubt to reach the final goal. Thus filled, we up
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  Speaker 1: each fleeting minute with sixty seconds worth of distance run.
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  Speaker 1: And now ours is the earth and everything that's in it. Rejoice, applod,
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  Speaker 1: be glad you've won. A ribbon attached to the clapper
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  Speaker 1: of a bell hung in the middle of the convention hall,
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  Speaker 1: was pulled by a woman holding the other end of
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  Speaker 1: the ribbon. Other women with other ribbon ends pulled the
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  Speaker 1: bell peeled forth. The woman's hour was striking at the sound.
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  Speaker 1: Old staid traditions were flung to the winds, cheering and singing.
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  Speaker 1: Delegation after delegation got to its feet and began marching,
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  Speaker 1: women were sowing their political wild oats. They seemed suddenly
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  Speaker 1: to discover what men long since discovered, that the true
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  Speaker 1: purpose of a political convention is to make a noise.
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  Speaker 1: The High Hall rang with their racket for a long time.
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  Speaker 1: It was a question whether they would ever be quiet again.
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  Speaker 1: While convention celebrations and festivities were mounting to high tide,
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  Speaker 1: there came, one by one the announcement of ratifications in
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  Speaker 1: New Jersey, Idaho, Arizona, and New Mexico, bringing the total
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  Speaker 1: number to thirty two. The Washington League of Women Voters
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  Speaker 1: wired the women of Washington send greetings to the Victory Convention.
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  Speaker 1: We were a pioneer state, the fifth to be enfranchised. Therefore,
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  Speaker 1: we resent the disgraceful humiliation put upon us by the
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  Speaker 1: stubborn refusal of our governor to listen to our united
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  Speaker 1: demand for a special session to ratify the Suffrage Amendment. Immediately.
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  Speaker 1: A telegram was sent by the Convention to Lewis A. Hart,
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  Speaker 1: Governor of the state, which read, Washington is now the
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  Speaker 1: only enfranchised state which has taken no action toward ratification
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  Speaker 1: of the Federal Suffrage Amendment. Thirty five ratifications are assured
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  Speaker 1: in the immediate future. The nation has been informed for
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  Speaker 1: many years that Washington approves woman's suffrage. It therefore looks
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  Speaker 1: to you to call an immediate session of your Legislature
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  Speaker 1: and once more announce Washington's endorsement of woman's suffrage by
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  Speaker 1: ratification of the Federal Amendment. Through the Associated Press, the
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  Speaker 1: telegram went to the newspapers of Washington. The governors of Connecticut, Vermont, Delaware,
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  Speaker 1: and West Virginia were also urged by wire to call sessions,
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  Speaker 1: and there was a lively exchange of telegrams with the
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  Speaker 1: ratification committees in these states. The Convention ordered telegrams of
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  Speaker 1: thanks sent to the governors who had called special sessions
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  Speaker 1: and to the chairman of the national committees of the
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  Speaker 1: two dominant parties, will H. Hayes Republican and Homer Cummings Democrat,
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  Speaker 1: who had rendered continuous and able support to the campaign.
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  Speaker 1: Telegrams were also sent to governors who had not called
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  Speaker 1: special sessions urging the call. A ratification banquet on Saint
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  Speaker 1: Valentine's evening filled to overflowing the largest banquet hall in Chicago.
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  Speaker 1: Banquets had long been a feature of suffrage campaigning, but
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  Speaker 1: never had there been one to tell a story like this.
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  Speaker 1: High upon a balcony was a huge old fashioned Valentine
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  Speaker 1: with lacy frills and a big red heart in the middle.
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  Speaker 1: Two little maids upon signal, pulled back the red silk curtains,
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  Speaker 1: leaving a space large enough for a person to stand
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  Speaker 1: in and make a half length portrait with the heart
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  Speaker 1: for a frame. Then in verse, the states which had
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  Speaker 1: ratified were introduced one by one, and a prominent state
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  Speaker 1: suffrage leader appeared in the frame and in humorous verse
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  Speaker 1: told the story of the victory. There were salvos of
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  Speaker 1: applause and sudden bursts of state songs as Illinois's gaily
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  Speaker 1: attired state delegation sprang upon chairs. After the state's story
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  Speaker 1: had been told by its living Valentine. Tears of joyous
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  Speaker 1: happiness glistened in many an eye, as incidents in the
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  Speaker 1: long struggle were brought to mind or half forgotten memories awakened.
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  Speaker 1: Eloquent speeches, thrilled flags, waved cheers, and unexpected bursts of
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  Speaker 1: song reverberated through the vast hall. Outstanding among the convention's
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  Speaker 1: features was a beautiful and solemn service in memory of
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  Speaker 1: doctor Anna Howard Shaw, whose magic voice now still forever,
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  Speaker 1: had been the uncer inspiration of every previous convention for
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  Speaker 1: thirty years. The one hundredth anniversary of the birthday of
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  Speaker 1: Susan B. Anthony, greatest of all suffrage leaders, was especially
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  Speaker 1: commemorated by a program of brief speeches which collectively told
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  Speaker 1: the whole wonderful story of the emancipation of women from
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  Speaker 1: eighteen forty the age of mobs and eggs to nineteen
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  Speaker 1: twenty a Portent of victory. Another program told the suffrage
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  Speaker 1: story in pictures, another in a living Procession of Victories,
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  Speaker 1: a simple, beautiful and effective pageant at a pioneer's luncheon,
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  Speaker 1: the reminiscences of the workers of early days were told,
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  Speaker 1: and many a woman whose name was familiar to all
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  Speaker 1: suffragists but whose face was unknown to later workers, was
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  Speaker 1: there to share in that last organized tribute. But in
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  Speaker 1: spite of such programs, the Convention did not expend all
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  Speaker 1: its energies on looking backward, nor its time in enjoying
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  Speaker 1: the triumph of the moment. It carefully planned for every
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  Speaker 1: emergency in the uncompleted ratification campaign, and it affected the
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  Speaker 1: organization of the League of Women Voters, with the new
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  Speaker 1: national board distinct from that of the Suffrage Association. To
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  Speaker 1: this new body, the National American Woman Suffrage Associations auxiliaries.
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  Speaker 1: In all the ratified states were transferred by their representatives,
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  Speaker 1: and a program of education and citizenship for new voters,
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  Speaker 1: and legislation for the protection of women, children, and the
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  Speaker 1: home was adopted. Before the convention ended. The phoenix of
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  Speaker 1: a new organization with fresh ideals, aims, and program had
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  Speaker 1: arisen from the old. Pronounced the most wonderful of all
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  Speaker 1: suffrage conventions during the seventy two years of the struggle.
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  Speaker 1: The convention came to an end, The women who had
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  Speaker 1: worked side by side for a generation separated and went
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  Speaker 1: to their homes in the forty eight states, some to
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  Speaker 1: throw themselves with ardor into political party organization work, some
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  Speaker 1: into the legislative program, some into citizenship education. But the
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  Speaker 1: National Suffrage Association's officers and the members of the Association's
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  Speaker 1: auxiliaries in those states whose legislatures had not yet ratified
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  Speaker 1: the Federal Suffrage Amendment bent anew to the suffrage task
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  Speaker 1: end of Chapter twenty six