Suffragists -- United States; Women -- Suffrage -- United States
As proof of this admiration for what the women had done, the great
audience in a very few moments pledged $86,826 to continue the
campaign. Many pledges were made in honor of Alice Paul, Inez
Milholland, Mrs. Belmont, Dudley Field Malone, and all the prisoners.
Imperative resolutions calling upon President Wilson and his
Administration to act, were unanimously passed amid an uproar.
Chapter 15
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:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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