Women -- Suffrage -- History; Women -- Suffrage -- United States -- History; Women's rights -- History; Women's rights -- United States -- History
By 1918 a number of counties had been organized and the State
convention, encouraged by the granting of Primary suffrage to women in
Arkansas and Texas, decided to make this its legislative work for
1919, and plans were made to raise $5,000 through local conferences. A
State organizer was put into the field and the National Association
sent its recording secretary, Mrs. Halsey W. Wilson, a trained worker,
to assist the State organization. In January, 1919, Dr. Shaw attended
a conference at Orlando and $1,000 were raised; later at a conference
in Tampa, $198 and at one in Miami and West Palm Beach $260. Miss
Elizabeth Skinner was appointed State organizer and the National
Association sent one of its most capable organizers, Mrs. Maria
McMahon. The 38 county chairmen had obtained nearly 2,500 signatures
to petitions to the Legislature and an active campaign was undertaken
for Primary suffrage.
In January, 1919, the National Association's Congressional Committee
sent its secretary, Mrs. Minnie Fisher Cunningham of Arkansas, and its
press secretary, Miss Marjorie Shuler of New York, to spend several
weeks in a quiet campaign to influence U. S. Senator Park Trammell to
cast his vote for the Federal Suffrage Amendment, this being
considered useless in the case of Senator Duncan U. Fletcher. They
secured newspaper comment in favor, interviews with prominent people
and resolutions from conventions, but these had no effect. At the
annual convention in October the following officers were elected:
President, Mrs. John T. Fuller, Orlando; first vice-president, Mrs.
Edgar A. Lewis, Fort Pierce; second, Miss Elizabeth Skinner, Dunedin;
third, Dr. Minerva B. Cushman, St. Petersburg; corresponding
secretary, Mrs. W. R. O'Neal, Orlando; recording secretary, Mrs. C. E.
Hawkins, Brooksville; treasurer, Mrs. Clara B. Worthington, Tampa;
auditors, Mrs. J. W. McCollum, Mrs. J. D. Stringfellow, Gainesville;
Legislative Committee, Mrs. Amos Norris, chairman, Tampa. A memorial
meeting was held for Dr. Shaw, who had died July 2.
The annual meeting in 1920 took place in Orlando. Mrs. Fuller was
re-elected and plans for extensive work were made but the association
was not quite ready to merge into a League of Women Voters. This was
done April 1, 1921, and Mrs. J. B. O'Hara was elected chairman.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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