History Lesson/Lecture!

Do you recognize this woman???

Her name was Alice Paul and without her I would not have been able to vote yesterday.

Alice Paul was the leader of the National Women's Party in 1917. For years, she had lobbied Congress for Women's Suffrage. In 1917 she organized the "Silent Sentinels" that stood outside the White House holding banners inscribed with phrases directed toward President Wilson.

The president initially treated the picketers with bemused condescension, tipping his hat to them as he passed by; however, his attitude changed when the United States entered World War I in 1917. Many saw the suffragists' wartime protests as unpatriotic, and the sentinels, including Alice Paul, were attacked by angry mobs. The picketers began to be arrested on the trumped up charge of "obstructing traffic," and were jailed when they refused to pay the imposed fine. To pay the fine would be admitting guilt and they had done nothing wrong.

Despite the danger of bodily harm and imprisonment, the suffragists continued their demonstrations for freedom unabated.

The arrested suffragists were sent to Occoquan Workhouse, a prison in Virginia. Paul and her compatriots demanded to be treated as political prisoners and staged hunger strikes. Their demands were met with brutality as suffragists, including frail, older women, were beaten, pushed and thrown into cold, unsanitary, and rat-infested cells. Arrests continued and conditions at the prison deteriorated. For staging hunger strikes, Paul and several other suffragists were forcibly fed in a tortuous method. Prison officials removed Paul to a sanitarium in hopes of getting her declared insane. When news of the prison conditions and hunger strikes became known, the press, some politicians, and the public began demanding the women’s release; sympathy for the prisoners brought many to support the cause of women's suffrage.

The following is a clip from the movie Iron Jawed Angels. Hillary Swank played Alice Paul. It's a long clip 8 or so minutes, but it's worth the time. It's a short amount of time to learn a little something about what these women went through so that we are no longer deprived of liberty. Caution: It definitely explains the "suffer" in suffrage.

I promise you that scene above, will ensure that I never again blow off my right to vote because it's raining, I've got to work, the line is too long......



Go vote ladies. Teach your daughters to vote.



By the way...because I don't like to leave any history lesson unfinished....



In 1917, in response to public outcry about the prison abuse of suffragists, President Wilson reversed his position and announced his support for a suffrage amendment, calling it a "war measure." In 1919, both the House and Senate passed the 19th Amendment and the battle for state ratification commenced. Three-fourths of the states were needed to ratify the amendment. The battle for ratification came down to the state of Tennessee in the summer of 1920; if a majority of the state legislature voted for the amendment, it would become law. The deciding vote was cast by twenty-four year-old Harry Burn, the youngest member of the Tennessee assembly. Originally intending to vote “no,” Burn changed his vote after receiving a telegram from his mother asking him to support women’s suffrage. On August 18, 1920, Tennessee ratified the 19th Amendment. Six days later, Secretary of State Colby certified the ratification, and, with the stroke of his pen, American women gained the right to vote after a seventy-two year battle. August 26th is now celebrated as Women's Equality Day in the United States.

Alice Paul unfurling the ratification banner over the railing of the National Woman's Party headquarters on August 26, 1920 -- the day the 19th Amendment was ratified. The banner was one of the most important to the NWP. For every state that ratified suffrage, the members sewed on a star. When Tennessee ratified the amendment, the final star was sewn on.

VOTE!!!

Patriotic Blessings,

Leslie