Chapter 23

Political Results

Immediately following the release of the prisoners and the magnificent demonstration of public support of them, culminating at the mass meeting recorded in the preceding chapter, political events happened thick and fast. Committees in Congress acted on the amendment. President Wilson surrendered and a date for the vote was set.

The Judiciary Committee of the House voted 18 to 2 to report the amendment to that body. The measure, it will be remembered, was reported to the Senate in the closing days of the previous session, and was therefore already before the Senate awaiting action.[1]

[1] See Chapter 8.

To be sure, the Judiciary Committee voted to report the amendment without recommendation. But soon after, the members of the - Suffrage Committee, provision for which had also been made during the war session, were appointed. All but four members of this committee were in favor of national suffrage, and immediately after its formation it met to organize and decided to take the suffrage measure out of the hands of the Judiciary Committee and to press for a vote.

A test of strength came on December 18th.

On a trivial motion to refer all suffrage bills to the new suffrage committee, the vote stood 204 to 107. This vote, although unimportant in itself, clearly promised victory for the amendment in the House. In a few days, Representative Mondell of Wyoming, Republican, declared that the Republican side of the House would give more than a two-thirds majority of its members to the amendment.

“It is up to our friends on the Democratic side to see that the amendment is not defeated through hostility or indifference on their side,” said Mr. Mondell.

Our daily poll of the House showed constant gains. Pledges from both Democratic and Republican members came thick and fast; cabinet members for the first time publicly declared their belief in the amendment. A final poll, however, showed that we lacked a few votes of the necessary two-thirds majority to pass the measure in the House.

No stone was left unturned in a final effort to get the President to secure additional Democratic votes to insure the passage of the amendment. Finally, on the eve of the vote President Wilson made his first declaration of support of the amendment through a committee of Democratic Congressmen. During the vote the following day Representative Cantrill of Kentucky, Democrat, reported the event to the House. He said in part:

It was my privilege yesterday afternoon to be one of a committee of twelve to ask the President for advice and counsel on this important measure (prolonged laughter and jeers). Mr. Speaker, in answer to the sentiment expressed by part of the House, I desire to say that at no time and upon no occasion am I ever ashamed to confer with Woodrow Wilson upon any important question (laughter, applause, and, jeers) and that part of the House that has jeered that statement before it adjourns to-day will follow absolutely the advice which he gave this committee yesterday afternoon. (Laughter and applause.) After conference with the President yesterday afternoon he wrote with his own hands the words which I now read to you, and each member of the committee was authorized by the President to give full publicity to the following:

“The committee found that the President had not felt at liberty to volunteer his advice to Members of Congress in this important matter, but when we sought his advice (laughter) he very frankly and earnestly advised us to vote for the amendment as an act of right and justice to the women of the country and o f the world.”

. . . To my Democratic brethren who have made these halls ring with their eloquence in their pleas to stand by the President, I will say that now is your chance to stand by the President and vote for this amendment, “as’ an act of right and justice to the women of the country and of the world” . . .

Do you wish to do that which is right and just toward the women of your own country? If so, follow the President’s advice and vote for this amendment. It will not do to follow the President in this great crisis in the world’s history on those matters only which are popular in your own districts. The true test is to stand by him, even though your own vote is unpopular at home. The acid test for a Member of Congress is for him to stand for right and justice even if misunderstood at home at first. In the end, right and justice will prevail everywhere.

. . . No one thing connected with the war is of more importance at this time than meeting the reasonable demand of millions of patriotic and Christian women of the Nation that the amendment for woman suffrage be submitted to the States . . . .

The amendment passed the House January 10, 1918, by a vote of 274 to 136—a two-thirds majority with one vote to spare—exactly forty years to a day from the time the suffrage amendment was first introduced into Congress, and exactly one year to a day from the time the first picket banner appeared at the gates o f the White House.

Eighty-three per cent of the Republicans voting on the measure, voted in favor of it, while only fifty per cent of the Democrats voting, voted for it. Even after the Republicans had pledged their utmost strength, more than two-thirds of their membership, votes were still lacking to make up the Democratic deficiency, and the President’s declaration that the measure ought to pass the House, produced them from his own party. Those who contend that picketing had “set back the clock,”—that it did “no good,”—that President Wilson would “not be moved by it”—have, we believe, the burden of proof on their side of the argument. It is our firm belief that the solid year of picketing, with all its political ramifications, did compel the President to abandon his opposition and declare himself for the measure. I do not mean to say that many things do not cooperate in a movement toward a great event. I do mean to say that picketing was the most vital force amongst the elements which moved President Wilson. That picketing had compelled Congress to see the question in terms of political capital is also true. From the first word uttered in the House debate, until the final roll-call, political expediency was the chief motif.

Mr. Lenroot of Wisconsin, Republican, rose to say:

“May I suggest that there is a distinction between the Democratic members of the Committee on Rules and the Republican members, in this, that all of the Republican members are for this proposition?” This was met with instant applause from the Republican side.

Representative Cantrill prefaced his speech embodying the President’s statement, which caused roars and jeers from the opposition, with the announcement that he was not willing to risk another election, with the voting women of the West, and the amendment still unpassed.

Mr. Lenroot further pointed out that: “From a Republican standpoint—from a partisan standpoint, it would be an advantage to Republicans to go before the people in the next election and say that this resolution was defeated by southern Democrats.”

An anti-suffragist tried above the din and noise to remind Mr. Lenroot that three years before Mr. Lenroot had voted “No,” but a Republican colleague came suddenly to the rescue with “What about Mr. Wilson?” which was followed by, “He kept us out of war,” and the jeers on the Republican side became more pronounced.

This interesting political tilt took place when Representatives Dennison and Williams of Illinois, and Representative Kearns of Ohio, Republicans, fenced with Representative Raker of California, Democrat, as he attempted, with an evident note of self-consciousness, to make the President’s reversal seem less sudden.

MR. DENNISON : It was known by the committee that went to see the President that the Republicans were going to take this matter up and pass it in caucus, was it not?’

MR. RAKER: I want to say to my Republican friends upon this question that I have been in conference with the President for over three years upon this question . . . .

MR. KEARNS: How did the women of California find out and learn where the President stood on this thing just before election last fall? Nobody else seemed to know it.

MR. RAKER: They knew it.

MR. KEARNS: How did they find it out?

MR. RAKER: I will take a minute or two—

MR. KEARNS: I wish the gentleman would.

MR. RAKER: The President went home and registered. The President went home and voted for woman suffrage.

MR. KEARNS: He said he believed in it for the several states . . . .

MR. RAKER: One moment——

MR. KEARNS : That is the only information they had upon the subject, is it?

MR. WILLIAMS: . . . Will the gentleman yield?

MR. RAKER: I cannot yield.

MR. WILLIAMS: Just for a question.

MR. RAKER: I cannot yield . . . .

That the President’s political speed left some overcome was clear from a remark of Mr. Clark of Florida when he said:

“I was amused at my friend from Oklahoma, Mr. Ferris, who wants us to stand with the President. God knows I want to stand with him. I am a Democrat, and I want to follow the leader of my party, and I am a pretty good lightning change artist myself sometimes (laughter); but God knows I cannot keep up with his performance. (Laughter.) Why, the President wrote a book away back yonder” . . . and he quoted generously from President Wilson’s many statements in defense of state rights as recorded in his early writings.

Mr. Hersey of Maine, Republican, drew applause when he made a retort to the Democratic slogan, “Stand by the President.” He said:

“Mr. Speaker, I am still ‘standing with the President,’ or, in other words, the President this morning is standing with me.”

The resentment at having been forced by the pickets to the point of passing the amendment was in evidence throughout the debate.

Representative Gordon of Ohio, Democrat, said with bitter ness : “We are threatened by these militant suffragettes with a direct and lawless invasion by the Congress of the United States of the rights of those States which have refused to confer upon their women the privilege of voting. This attitude on the part of some of the suffrage Members of this House is on an exact equality with the acts of these women militants who have spent the last summer and fall, while they were not in the district jail or workhouse, in coaxing, teasing, and nagging the Presi dent of the United States for the purpose of inducing him, by coercion, to club Congress into adopting this joint resolution.”

Shouts of “Well, they got him!” and “They got it!” from all sides, followed by prolonged laughter and jeers, interrupted the flow of his oratory.

Mr. Ferris of Oklahoma, Democrat, hoped to minimize the effectiveness of the picket.

“Mr. Speaker,” he said, “I do not approve or believe in picketing the White House, the National Capitol, or any other station to bring about votes for women. I do not approve of wild militancy, hunger strikes, and efforts of that sort. I do not approve of the course of those women that . . ., become agitators, lay off their womanly qualities in their efforts to secure votes. I do not approve of anything unwomanly anywhere, any time, and my course to-day in supporting this suffrage amendment is not guided by such conduct on the part of a very few women here or elsewhere.” (Applause.)

Representative Langley of Kentucky, Republican, was able to see picketing in a fairer light:

“Much has been said pro and con about ‘picketing’,-that rather dramatic chapter in the history of this great movement. It is not my purpose to speak either in criticism or condemnation of that; but if it be true—I do not say that it is, because I do not know—but if it be true, as has been alleged, that certain promises were made, as a result of which a great campaign was won, and those promises were not kept, I wonder whether in that silent, peaceful protest that was against this broken faith, there can be found sufficient warrant for the indignities which the so-called ‘pickets’ suffered; and when in passing up and down the Avenue I frequently witnessed cultured, intellectual women arrested and dragged off to prison because of their method, of giving publicity to what they believed to be the truth, I will confess that the question sometimes arose in my mind whether when the impartial history of this great struggle has been written their names may not be placed upon the roll of martyrs to the cause to which they were consecrating their lives in the manner that they deemed most effective.”

Mr. Mays of Utah was one Democrat who placed the responsibility for militancy where it rightly belonged when he said:

“Some say to-day that they are ashamed of the action of the militants in picketing the Capitol: . . . But we should be more ashamed of the unreasonable stubbornness on the part of the men who refused them the justice they have so long and patiently asked.”

And so the debate ran on. Occasionally one caught a glimmer of real comprehension, amongst these men about to vote upon our political liberty; but more often the discussion stayed on a very inferior level.

And there were gems imperishable!

Even friends of the measure had difficulty not to romanticize about “Woman—God’s noblest creature” . . . “man’s better counterpart” . . . “humanity’s perennial hope” . . . “the world’s object most to be admired and loved” . . . and so forth.

Representative Elliott of Indiana, Republican, favored the resolution because—“A little more than four hundred years ago Columbus discovered America. Before that page of American history was written he was compelled to seek the advice and assistance of a woman. From that day until the present day the noble women of America have done their part in times of peace and of war . . .”

If Queen Isabella was an argument in favor for Mr. Elliott of Indiana, Lady Macbeth played the opposite part for Mr. Parker of New Jersey, Republican . . . . “I will not debate the question as to whether in a time of war women are the best judges of policy. That great student of human nature, William Shakespeare, in the play of Macbeth, makes Lady Macbeth eager for deeds of blood until they are committed and war is begun and then just as eager that it may be stopped.” . . .

Said Mr. Gray of New Jersey, Republican: “A nation will endure just so long as its men are virile. History, physiology, and psychology all show that giving woman equal political rights with man makes ultimately for the deterioration of manhood. It is, therefore, not only because I want our country to win this war but because I want our nation to possess the male virility necessary to guarantee its future existence that I am opposed to the pending amendment.”

The hope was expressed that President Wilson’s conversion would be like that of St. Paul, “and that he will become a master- worker in the vineyards of the Lord for this proposition.” (Applause.)

Mr. Gallivan, Democrat, although a representative of Massachusetts, “the cradle of American liberty,” called upon a great Persian philosopher to sustain him in his support. “ ‘Dogs bark, but the caravan moves on.’ . . . Democracy cannot live half free and half female.”

Mr. Dill of Washington, Democrat, colored his support with the following tribute: “ . . . It was woman who first learned to prepare skins of animals for protection from the elements, and tamed and domesticated the dog and horse and cow. She was a servant and a slave . . . . To-day she is the peer of man.”

Mr. Little of Kansas, Republican, tried to bring his colleagues back to a moderate course by interpolating:

“It seems to me, gentlemen, that it is time for us to learn that woman is neither a slave nor an angel, but a human being, entitled to be treated with ordinary common sense in the adjustment of human affairs . . . .”

But this calm statement could not allay the terror of Representative Clark of Florida, Democrat, who cried: “In the hearings before the committee it will be found that one of the leaders among the suffragettes declared that they wanted the ballot for ‘protection’, and when asked against whom she desired ‘protection’ she promptly and frankly replied, ‘men.’ My God, has it come to pass in America that the women of the land need to be protected from the men?” The galleries quietly nodded their heads, and Mr. Clark continued to predict either the complete breakdown of family life . . . . or “they [man and wife] must think alike, act alike, have the same ideals of life, and look forward with like vision to the happy consummation ‘beyond the vale.’ . . .

“God knows that . . . when you get factional politics limited to husband and wife, oh, what a spectacle will be presented, my countrymen . . . . Love will vanish, while hate ascends the throne . . . .

“To-day woman stands the uncrowned queen in the hearts of all right-thinking American men; to her as rightful sovereign we render the homage of protection, respect, love, and may the guiding hand of an all-wise Providence stretch forth in this hour of peril to save her from a change of relation which must bring in its train, discontent, sorrow, and pain,” he concluded desperately, with the trend obviously toward “crowning” the queens.

There was the disturbing consideration that women know too much to be trusted. “I happen to have a mother,” said Mr. Gray of New Jersey, Republican, “as most of us have, and incidentally I think we all have fathers, although a father does not count for much any more. My mother has forgotten more political history than he ever knew, and she knows more about the American government and American political economy than he has ever shown symptoms of knowing, and for the good of mankind as well as the country she is opposed to women getting into politics.”

The perennial lament for the passing of the good old days was raised by Representative Welty of Ohio, Democrat, who said:

“The old ship of state has left her moorings and seems to be sailing on an unknown and uncharted sea. The government founded in the blood of our fathers is fading away. Last fall, a year ago, both parties recognized those principles in their platforms, and each candidate solemnly declared that he would abide by them if elected. But lo, all old things are passing away, and the lady from Montana has filed a bill asking that separate citizenship be granted to American women marrying foreigners.”

Representative Greene of Massachusetts, Republican, all but shed tears over the inevitable amending of the Constitution:

“I have read it [the Constitution] many times, and there have been just 17 amendments adopted since the original Constitution was framed by the master minds whom God had inspired in the cabin of the Mayflower to formulate the Constitution of the Plymouth Colony which was made the basis of the Constitution of Massachusetts and subsequently resulted in the establishment of the Constitution of the United States under which we now live . . . .”

Fancy his shock at finding the pickets triumphant.

“Since the second session of the Sixty-fifth Congress opened,” he said, “I have met several women suffragists from the State of Massachusetts. I have immediately propounded to them this one question: ‘Do you approve or disapprove of the suffrage banners in front of the White House . . . ?’ The answer in nearly every case to my question was: ‘I glory in that demonstration’ . . . the response to my question was very offensive, and I immediately ordered these suffrage advocates from my office.”

And again the pickets featured in the final remarks of Mr. Small of North Carolina, Democrat, who deplored the fact that advocates of the amendment had made it an issue inducing party rivalry. “This is no party question, and such efforts will be futile. It almost equals in intelligence the scheme of that delectable and inane group of women who picketed the White House on the theory that the President could grant them the right to vote.”

Amid such gems of intellectual delight the House of the great American Congress passed the national suffrage amendment.

We turned our entire attention then to the Senate.