History of Woman Suffrage/Volume 6/Chapter 48

 

CHAPTER XLVIII.

WISCONSIN.^[1]

Woman suffrage history in Wisconsin from 1900 to 1920 naturally divides itself into three sections, the first including the ten years preceding the submission of the referendum measure by the Legislature in 1911; the second the two years of the referendum campaign and the third the succeeding seven years to 1920.

The work of the State Woman Suffrage Association, which was organized in 1869, continued in the 20th century, as in the 19th, through organization, public meetings, annual conventions, the publication of the Wisconsin Citizen. The conventions of the first decade, which always took place in the autumn, were held as follows: 1901, Brodhead; 1902, Madison; 1903, Platteville; 1904, Janesville; 1905, Milwaukee; 1906, 1907, 1908, 1909, 1910, Madison; 1911, Racine. The Rev. Olympia Brown, who had been elected president in 1883, continued to serve in that capacity with undiminished vigor and ability, having been elected every year, until the end of 1912. Besides her other services she gave hundreds of addresses on woman suffrage, speaking in nearly every city in the State.^[2]

The publication of the Wisconsin Citizen, established in 1887, was continued in spite of limited finances. Its first editor was Martha Parker Dingee from Boston, a niece of Theodore Parker, who gave her services for seven years. After that the editors were Mrs. Helen H. Charlton, Miss Lena V. Newman and Mrs. Youmans. After 1914 it was published at Waukesha, before that at Brodhead, and was discontinued in 1917. Notable speakers from outside the State at conventions of the first decade were Mrs. Catharine Waugh McCulloch, the Rev. Florence Buck, the Rev. Marion Murdock, Mrs. Clara Bewick Colby, Mrs. Belva A. Lockwood, Miss Jane Addams and Dr. Julia Holmes Smith.

The association for some time supported a State organizer, the Rev. Alice Ball Loomis, and later Mrs. Emma Smith DeVoe for two seasons. In 1902 headquarters were established at Madison, the capital, in a little room in the State House, for the distribution of literature, and here was kept a register of men and women who believed in woman suffrage. In 1907 the Rev. Mrs. Brown prepared a bulletin for the legislators, giving the statistics of woman suffrage in the United States and other countries.

In 1908 Mrs. Maud Wood Park came to Wisconsin and spoke to women students of five colleges, arrangements having been previously made by Mrs. Brown, who took part in some of the meetings, and College Women's Suffrage Leagues were organized. Mrs. Brown prepared a pamphlet, Why the Church Should Demand the Ballot for Women, which was widely distributed. Near the end of 1909 the State association was asked to circulate the national petition to Congress for the Federal Suffrage Amendment. Blanks were sent all over the State to schools, libraries and other public institutions and to individuals. The members took up the matter with enthusiasm and worked faithfully. The association did all that could be done in the six weeks allowed and about 18,000 names were signed, 5,000 of them in Racine. Mrs. Wentworth, over eighty years of age, canvassed portions of the city and obtained 1,000 names.

During this whole decade resolutions and petitions were sent to Congress and at every session of the Legislature suffrage measures were introduced. Mrs. Jessie M. Luther was chairman of the Legislative Committee during this period, an unrecognized and unpaid lobbyist, but by her skilful work, in which at times she was assisted by Mrs. Nellie Donaldson and others, she kept the Legislature in advance of the people of the State.

In 1911 the Legislature submitted to the voters a statutory law giving full suffrage to women, as it had authority to do. Influences from outside the State led to the organization of the Political Equality League, of which Miss Ada L. James was president and Mrs. Crystal Eastman Benedict from New York was made campaign manager. The campaign of 1911-1912, therefore, was carried on by two organizations, the State association and this league, working separately, although effort was made to correlate their activities by forming a cooperative committee representing both societies, of which Miss Gwendolen Brown Willis was chairman. The National American Woman Suffrage Association, through its president, Dr. Anna Howard Shaw, contributed $100 per month salary for an organizer and speaker, Miss Harriet Grim, and gave further assistance to both organizations.^[3]

Both associations employed field organizers, arranged meetings, provided speakers, distributed literature and made active effort to interest as far as possible organizations and individuals in the cause. The State association had headquarters in the Majestic Building and later in the Goldsmith Building in Milwaukee. The League had offices first in the Wells Building and later in the Colby-Abbott Building in that city. A bulletin of suffrage news was sent each week to the 600 newspapers in the State by Mrs. Youmans, who was press manager.

The campaign opened with a big rally in Racine June 1, 1912. The Rev. Olympia Brown, State president, continued her speaking tours without cessation and was assisted by prominent outside speakers, including Mrs. May Wright Sewall, Mrs. Colby, Dr. and Mrs. William Funck of Baltimore, Mrs. Rachel Foster Avery and Mrs. Clara V. Laddey, who addressed the Germans. Miss Willis arranged a course of lectures in Milwaukee for Miss Jane Addams, Louis F. Post, Dr. Sophonisba Breckinridge of Chicago University, and Mrs. Catherine Waugh McCulloch.^[4]

The Political Equality League believed enthusiastically in street meetings and arranged many of them in Milwaukee and other cities. Under the same auspices several automobile tours swept the State, one of them having an itinerary through the southwestern counties, Miss James, Mrs. B. C. Gudden, Miss Grim and Miss Mabel Judd the speakers. The noted air pilot, Beachy, scattered suffrage fliers from the airship which he took up into the clouds at the State Fair in Milwaukee. The State association had a large tent on the grounds, in front of which there were a platform for speakers, where addresses were made every day, and a counter covered with literature and books. The two societies conducted Votes for Women tours up the Wolf and Fox Rivers, which were important features of the campaign. They traveled in a little steamer, stopping at landings and speaking and giving out literature. The association also held outdoor meetings at lunchtime before the factories and wherever it seemed best. The league formed two allied societies, the Men's League for Woman Suffrage, of which the late H. A. J. Upham was president, and a league for colored people, Miss Carrie Horton, president.

An extended series of mass meetings was held in many cities addressed by prominent speakers, who came from outside the State to assist, among whom were Mrs. Elizabeth Lowe Watson, Miss Addams, Mrs. Beatrice Forbes Robertson, Mrs. Emily Montague Bishop, Professor Charles Zueblin, Max Eastman, Mrs. Rachel Foster Avery; the Countess of Warwick and Miss Sylvia Pankhurst of England; Miss Inez Milholland, Mrs. Maud C. Nathan, Mrs. Glendower Evans, Baroness von Suttnet (Austria), Mrs. Alice Duer Miller, Mrs. Florence Kelley, Rabb: Emil Hirschberg, Mrs. Grace Wilbur Trout, Mrs. Henrietta C. Lyman, Mrs. Ella S. Stewart, Dr. Anna E. Blount, the Rev. Anna Garlin Spencer, Mrs. Clara Neymann, who addressed the Germans, and Dr. Shaw.

There is no adequate record of that campaign in existence. Mrs. Luther was State historian and in the habit of keeping carefully all programs, calls for meetings, reports and other material necessary for history, which were preserved at the Capitol and were destroyed when it was burned. The Political Equality League raised and expended $10,000 and the State association $5,000, as reported to the Secretary of State. Nearly as much more was expended by individual members and by other organizations. Dr. Shaw and Mrs. Benedict arranged a mass meeting in New York which netted $2,700.

The determined hostility of the liquor interests to woman suffrage was unmistakably shown during the campaign by the official organ of the State Retail Liquor Dealers' Protective Association, called "Progress." For months preceding the election it was filled with objections, innuendo and abuse in prose, verse and pictures, all designed to impress the reader with the absurdity and danger of giving the vote to women. It appealed to the farmers and to every class of people connected in any way with the manufacture and sale of beer, saying in headlines: "Give the Ballot to Woman and Industry goes to Smash." "It means the Loss of Vast Sums to Manufacturer, Dealer and Workingmen," and this was kept up to the end.

An unprecedented vote was cast on the woman suffrage proposition at the election November 4, 1912: for, 135,736; against, 227,054; lost by 91,318. Each of the three constitutional amendments voted on at the time received barely a fifth of the vote cast on this measure. Of the 71 counties but 14 were carried for suffrage, Douglas county in the extreme northwest on Lake Superior had the best record, a majority of 1,000. Milwaukee county, including the city, gave 20,445 votes for and 40,029 votes against. The referendum was placed on a pink ballot, used only for this purpose, which unquestionably increased the majority against it, as even the most illiterate could stamp it with a "no." The defeat was conceded to have been due to an insufficiency of general education on woman suffrage and of organization, the large foreign population and the widespread belief that it would help largely to bring prohibition.

Three days after the election officers of the Political Equality League sent to officers of the State association a letter proposing a union of the two under a new name and on condition that the president of neither should be made president of the new one. The latter was in favor of the union but insisted that the old historic name, Wisconsin Suffrage Association, should be retained, which was done. Miss Lutie E. Stearns was chosen its president at its annual convention to serve until the union was effected. There were ultimatums and counter-ultimatums and finally a call for a joint convention to be held in Madison Feb. 4, 5, 1913, was issued by Miss Zona Gale, vice-president of the association, and Miss James, president of the League. Here the union was duly effected; the Rev. Olympia Brown was elected honorary president, Mrs. Henry M. Youmans president and the other officers were divided between the two societies.

The suffrage work henceforth was conducted under the same president and the same policy. The first year of the new régime, the organization had no headquarters and paid no salaries, the officers doing their correspondence with their own hands, The next year an office was opened in Madison and Miss Alice Curtis was installed as executive secretary. It was difficult to do effective work so far away from the president and the office was removed to Waukesha, her residence, with Miss Curtis and later Mrs. Helen Haight in charge. In October, 1916, it was removed to Milwaukee, and, with the county association, headquarters were opened at 428 Jefferson Street, where they remained, with Mrs. Ruth Hamilton as office secretary.^[5]

The great increase of sentiment favorable to woman suffrage throughout the country was plainly seen in Wisconsin and it was evident that a wide campaign of education must be undertaken. A “suffrage school” held in Madison in June, 1914, was very successful. Sixty-six women enrolled for the full course and hundreds of men and women attended the special lectures. The “faculty” of the school included the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, members of the faculty of the State University and other well known men and women. Social Forces, a topical outline with bibliography, published this year by the Education Committee, Mrs. A. S. Quackenbush, chairman, was especially designed for the instruction of women, first, in existing conditions, and second, in the various movements made to improve them. Copies were purchased by universities, organizations and individuals all over the United States. Wisconsin Legislators and the Home was a valuable pamphlet compiled by Miss James following the legislative session of 1913, giving the records of all members on the bills of especial interest to women which came up that year. Wisconsin Legislation, Topics for Discussion, was prepared in 1915 by Mrs. J. W. McMullein Turner for the use of the legislative and educational committees.

Miss James served as legislative chairman in 1913; Mrs. Ben Hooper in 1915; Mrs. Joseph Jastrow in 1917; Mrs. Hooper again in 1919. She was also for several years congressional chairman. Regular press service was continued during the last decade, a weekly letter being sent to 100 newspapers. Mrs. Youmans had charge of all publicity during her presidency. Mrs. Gudden supplied suffrage letters regularly to several German papers and due to her ability they were always published.

In March, 1916, a Congressional Conference was held in Milwaukee with Mrs. Catt, the national president, as the chief speaker. In June at the time of the Republican National Convention in Chicago the association sent to the great suffrage parade an impressive contingent, accompanied by a G. A. R. drum corps. This year it gave $500 to the Iowa campaign and among its members who assisted there and in campaigns in other States were Mrs. Hooper, Mrs. Haight, Miss Curtis, Mrs. Maud McCreery, Miss Edna Wright and Mrs. Youmans.

On Oct. 14, 1917, a branch of the National Woman’s Party was formed in the home of Mrs. Victor Berger and became active. There were two anti-suffrage societies of women, one in Milwaukee and one in Madison, and together they formed a so-called State association, of which Mrs. C. E. Estabrook was president and Mrs. Francis Day an active member. They provided speakers for legislative hearings and signed their names to newspaper articles sent them from the East but were of slight importance. The State petition work was stopped by the epidemic of influenza in the autumn of 1918 and after the first of the next year the apparent favorable attitude of the Legislature made it unnecessary, but already in forty counties the names of 5,800 men and 20,000 women had been obtained. Self-denial Day was originated by Miss Harriet Bain of Wisconsin and adopted by the National Association. The fund in this State was over $400.

The State association was prompt to organize for war work and formed all the committees recommended by the National American Suffrage Association. Many suffrage leaders served as leaders of the war work in their communities. The president was on the Woman's Committee of the State Council of Defense and State chairman for Americanization. The association sent $1,590 for the Oversea Hospitals financed by the National Association.

The relations of the State with the National Association have been very cordial. It has sent a large delegation to each of the— national conventions and paid its quota for the support of national work, about $1,500 in 1919.

In February, 1919, the Legislature gave Presidential suffrage to women and the submission of the Federal Amendment was near at hand. The last meeting of the State association, a Good Citizenship convention, was held in Milwaukee Oct. 29-Nov.'1. The program was devoted to the intelligent and patriotic use of the ballot. Mrs. Nancy M. Schoonmaker came from Connecticut to give six lectures on Citizenship for Women. A plan was adopted for publishing a Citizenship Manual and engaging a traveling representative to teach good citizenship to groups of women thoughout the State. The convention provided that the association should automatically cease to exist as soon as the Federal Amendment was ratified, in any case not later than March 1, 1920, and should be replaced by a State League of Women Voters. This took place on February 20 and Mrs. Ben Hooper was elected chairman.^[6]

Legislative Action. 1901. Provision was made for separate ballot boxes for women, making fully operative the School Suffrage Law of 1885.

1903. A Municipal suffrage bill received a small vote. A full suffrage measure introduced in the Assembly by David Evans was lost by only one and had a large vote in the Senate.

1905. A Municipal suffrage bill was passed by the Assembly; not acted upon by the Senate.

1909. A bill for a referendum to the voters passed in the Senate; defeated in the Assembly by a vote of 53 to 34.

1911. The session opened promisingly. David G. James introduced in the Senate and J. H. Kamper in the Assembly a measure providing full suffrage for Wisconsin women contingent upon the approval of a majority of the voters at the general election in November, 1912. Miss Mary Swain Wagner was the only registered lobbyist but other suffragists, notably Miss James, Mrs. George W. Peckham, Mrs. Nellie Donaldson and Mrs. Luther, worked for the measure. At a joint hearing thirteen speakers, including several from outside the State, spoke in favor of the bill and one lone Assemblyman, Carl Dorner, spoke in opposition. It passed the Senate March 31 by a vote of 16 to 4, and the Assembly April 26 by a vote of 69 to 29, and was signed by Governor Francis E. McGovern on the ground that it was a problem which should be solved by the voters. This measure was not, as generally assumed, an amendment to the constitution but was a law, the constitution providing that suffrage might be extended by statute but this must be ratified by a majority of the voters at a general election. It was defeated in 1912.

1913. Paradoxical as it may seem, legislators now became more friendly. The Legislature of 1913 passed by a large majority in both Houses another referendum bill introduced by Senator Robert Glenn but it was vetoed by Governor McGovern on the ground that the voters should not be asked so soon to pass upon a measure which they had just defeated.

1915. Three measures were introduced in 1915, one by Senator Glenn and Assemblyman W. C. Bradley, providing for full suffrage by State-wide referendum; one by Senator George E. Scott and Assemblyman H. M. Laursen, providing for Presidential suffrage by action of the Legislature, and one by Senator A. Pearce Tompkins and Assemblyman Axel Johnson to permit to counties local option in the matter of enfranchising their women. Only the first was seriously considered and this was defeated in the Assembly by a vote of 49 to 41. A representative of the German-American Alliance appeared against it at the hearing and at several later sessions.

1917. A referendum measure was introduced by Senator George B. Skogmo and Assemblyman James Hanson and was killed in the Assembly by a vote of 47 to 40.

1918. Meanwhile the tide was perceptibly turning and at the State political conventions held in September, 1918, all parties adopted planks favoring the enfranchisement of women. What was known as "the woman suffrage session" followed.

1919. Resolution urging the U. S. Senate to submit a Federal Suffrage Amendment: Assembly 75 for, 14 against; Senate 23 for, 4 against. Presidential suffrage bill granting to women the right to vote for presidential electors: Assembly 80 for, 8 against; Senate 25 for, one against. Law extending the right of suffrage to women subject to a referendum, passed without an aye and no vote in both Houses. It was repealed after ratification of the Federal Amendment made it unnecessary.

Ratification. The Federal Suffrage Amendment was submitted by Congress on June 4, 1919. The Wisconsin Legislature ratified it about 11 o'clock in the morning on June 10, with one negative vote in the Senate, two in the House. A special messenger, former Senator David G. James (the father of Ada L. James), started for Washington on the first train carrying the certificate from the Governor and he brought back a statement from J. A. Tonner, Chief of the Bureau of Rolls and Library, Department of State, that "the certified copy of the ratification resolution by the Legislature of Wisconsin is the first which has been received." The Illinois Legislature ratified an hour earlier but owing to a technical error it had to ratify a second time. The two U. S. Senators LaFollette and Lenroot and eight of the eleven Representatives from Wisconsin voted for the Federal Amendment on its final passage through Congress.

 

1. The History is indebted for this chapter to Mrs. Theodora W. Youmans, president of the State Woman Suffrage Association from 1913 until its work was finished in 1920.
2. The following were the officers for the first twelve years: Vice-presidents: Mr. Jessie M. Luther, Mrs. Madge Waters, Mrs. Laura James, Vida James, Mrs. E. C. Priddle, Miss Linda Rhodes; corresponding secretaries: Miss Lucinda Lake, Mrs. Margaret Geddes, Mrs. Emma Geddes, Miss Lena Newman, Mrs. B. Ostrander, Mrs. Nellie K. Donaldson; recording secretaries: Miss Marion W. Hamilton, Miss Emma Graham, Mrs. Ethe Irish, Miss W. von Bruenchenhein; treasurer: Mrs. Dora Putnam, Mrs. Lydia Woodward, Mrs. F. H. Derrick, Mrs. A. B. Sprague, Mrs. B. Ostrander, Gwendolen Brown Willis; chairmen Executive Committee: Ellen A. Rome, Mrs. Etta Gardner, Mr. Kate Rindlaub.
3. Near the end of the campaign Miss Mary Swain Wagner from New York organized the American Suffragettes, a short-lived society, with Mises Martha Heide as president, and it arranged a masse meeting in Milwaukee with Mrs. Emmeline Pankhurst of England as the principal speaker.
4. A unique automobile tour was made by Mrs. McCulloch and her husband, Frank McCulloch, both prominent lawyers in Chicago, and their four children, who devoted their annual vacation in the summer of 1912 to a tour through Wisconsin, the eldest son driving a big car, Mr. and Mrs. McCulloch making suffrage speeches at designated points and the three younger children enjoying the outing.
5. After 1913 annual conventions were held as follows: 1914, Milwaukee, speakers at evening meeting, Mrs, Pethick Lawrence of England and Rosika Schwimmer of Hungary; 1915, Milwaukee; 1916 (postponed to January, 1917, at the time of the legislative session), Madison; 1917, Milwaukee, Mrs. Nellie McClung of Canada speaker; 1918, no convention because of the war.
6. The officials from 1913, not already mentioned, were as follows: Vice-presidents: Miss Zona Gale, Dr. Jean M. Cooke, Mrs. Wm. Preston Leek, Mrs. Victor Berger, Mrs, Isaac Witter, Mrs. Frank Thanhouser, Miss Harriet F. Bain; corresponding secretaries: Mrs. W. M. Waters, Mrs. Joseph Jastrow, Mrs. James L. Foley, Mrs. Glen Turner, Mrs. Charles H. Mott, Mrs. H. F. Shadbolt; recording secretaries: Mrs. H. M. Holton, Mrs. A. J. Rogers; treasurers, Miss E. E. Robinson, Mrs. Harvey J. Frame; auditors: Miss Gwendolyn B. Willis, Miss M. V. Brown, Mrs. Louis Fuller Hobbins, Miss Amy Comstock, Mrs. A. W. Schorger, Mrs. H. A. J. Upham, Mrs. Sarah H. Van Dusen, Mrs. A. J. Birkhauser.