The Story of the Woman's PartyGillmore, Inez Haynes
History
The Story of the Woman's Party
Gillmore, Inez Haynes
National Woman's Party; Paul, Alice, 1885-1977; Women -- Suffrage -- United States
A prominent Democratic candidate for the Arizona Legislature
testified to the fear which the Union campaign had aroused among the
Democratic element in that State by an appeal to Dr. Cora Smith
King, a member of the Advisory Council of the Congressional Union,
urgently imploring her to use her influence with the Union to
terminate its election activities in Arizona. Dr. King replied: “The
more the local Democrats complain, the more they advertise the
slogan of the Congressional Union, that the Democrats put Suffrage
second to Party. Do, for Heaven’s sake, raise the Democratic roof in
Washington for involving you in this dilemma.”
Among the concrete results showing the effectiveness of the
Congressional Union election activities was the inclusion of a
Federal Suffrage Amendment plank in the platforms of each of the
State parties in Colorado, the first time that this occurred in that
State, and the inclusion of a similar plank in the Arizona
Democratic platform.
Another result was the conversion of Senator Smith of Arizona to a
belief in the Federal Amendment. On September 28, Senator Smith and
Representative Hayden, the two Democratic candidates who were
running for Congress from Arizona, sent the following telegram to
Mrs. Frances Munds, candidate for State Senatorship on the
Democratic ticket: “Our record in Congress shows that we are for
National Woman Suffrage. If you think best, offer as plank in State
platform the following: ‘We pledge our candidates for United States
Senator and Representative in Congress to vote at all times for
National Women Suffrage.’”
The Democratic Committee adopted and strengthened this platform.
All candidates, indeed, seemed to develop a marked increase in the
fervor of their allegiance to the Suffrage Amendment. Senator
Chamberlain of Oregon, in his last edition of street-car cards
before election day, headed his poster with a declaration of his
support of National Woman Suffrage as the leading argument for his
re-election.
Not only the Congressional candidates, but minor Democratic workers,
suddenly developed unsuspected interest in the cause of Woman
Suffrage. Said the _Examiner_ of Yuma, Arizona (October 24, 1914),
in commenting on the situation: “We view with amazement the efforts
of the Democratic bosses to be in favor of Equal Suffrage.”
And so in each of the States.
No more conclusive proof of the support given by the women voters to
the Union’s campaign could be afforded than the readiness with which
they became members and active workers.
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Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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