On the opening day of Congress not only were the pickets again on duty at the White House, but another picket line was inaugurated at the Capitol. Returning senators and congressmen were surprised when greeted with great golden banners reading:
RUSSIA AND ENGLAND ARE ENFRANCHISING THEIR WOMEN IN WAR-TIME. HOW LONG MUST AMERICAN WOMEN WAIT FOR THEIR LIBERTY
The last desperate flurries in the pro-war and anti-war camps were focused on the Capitol grounds that day. There swarmed about the grounds and through the buildings pacifists from all over the country wearing white badges, and advocates of war, wearing the national colors. Our sentinels at the Capitol stood strangely silent, and almost aloof, strong in their dedication to democracy, while the peace and war agitation circled about them.
With lightning speed the President declared that a state of war existed. Within a fortnight following, Congress declared war on Germany and President Wilson voiced his memorable, "We shall fight for the things we have always carried nearest our hearts for democracy-for the right of those who submit to authority to have a voice in their own government." Inspir-
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ing words indeed! The war message concluded with still another defense of the fight for political liberty: "To such a task we can dedicate our lives and our fortunes, everything that we are and everything that we have, with the pride of those who know that the day has come when America is privileged to spend her blood and her might for the principles that gave her birth and happiness and the peace which she has treasured. G.o.d helping her, she can do no less."
Now that the United States was actually involved in war, we were face to face with the question, which we had considered at the convention the previous month, when war was rumored, as to what position we, as an organization, should take in this situation.
The atmosphere of that convention had been dramatic in the extreme. Most of the delegates a.s.sembled had been approached either before going to Washington or upon arriving, and urged to use their influence to persuade the organization to abandon its work for the freedom of women and turn its activities into war channels. Although war was then only rumored, the hysterical att.i.tude was already prevalent. Women were asked to furl their banners and give up their half century struggle for democracy, to forget the liberty that was most precious to their hearts.
"The President will turn this Imperialistic war into a crusade for democracy." . . . "Lay aside your own fight and help us crush Germany, and you will find yourselves rewarded with a vote out of the nation"s grat.i.tude," were some of the appeals made to our women by government officials high and low and by the rank and file of men and women. Never in history did a band of women stand together with more sanity and greater solidarity than did these 1000 delegates representing thousands more throughout the States.
As our official organ, The Suffragist, pointed out editorially, in its issue of April 21st, 1917: Our membership was
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made up of women who had banded together to secure political freedom for women. We were united on no other subject. Some would offer pa.s.sive resistance to the war; others would become devoted followers of a vigorous military policy. Between these, every shade of opinion was represented. Each was loyal to the ideas which she held for her country. With the character of these various ideals, the National Woman"s Party, we maintained, had nothing to do. It was concerned only with the effort to obtain for women the opportunity to give effective expression, through political power, to their ideals, whatever they might be.
The thousand delegates present at the convention, though differing widely on the duty of the individual in war, were unanimous in voting that in the event of war, the National Woman"s Party, as an organization, should continue to work for political liberty for women and for that alone, believing as the convention stated in its resolutions, that in so doing the organization "serves the highest interest of the country." They were also unanimous in the opinion that all service which individuals wished to give to war or peace should be given through groups organized for such purposes, and not through the Woman"s Party, a body created, according to its const.i.tution, for one purpose only-"to secure an amendment to the United States Const.i.tution enfranchising women."
We declared officially through our organ that this held "as the policy of the Woman"s Party, whatever turn public events may take."
Very few days after we were put upon a national war basis it became clear that never was there greater need of work for internal freedom in the country. Europe, then approaching her third year of war, was increasing democracy in the midst of the terrible conflict. In America at that very moment women were being told that no attempt at electoral reform had any place in the country"s program "until the war is over." The Demo-
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crats met in caucus and decided that only "war measures" should be included in the legislative program, and announced that no subjects would be considered by them, unless the President urged them as war measures.
Our task was, from that time on, to make national suffrage a war measure.
We at once urged upon the Administration the wisdom of accepting this proposed reform as a war measure, and pointed out the difficulty of waging a war for democracy abroad while democracy was denied at home. But the government was not willing to profit by the experience of its Allies in extending suffrage to women, without first offering a terrible and brutal resistance.
We must confess that the problem of dramatizing our fight for democracy in compet.i.tion with the drama of a world-war, was most perplexing. Here were we, citizens without power and recognition, with the only weapons to which a powerless cla.s.s which does not take up arms can resort. We could not and would not fight with men"s weapons. Compare the methods women adopted to those men use in the pursuit of democracy; bayonets, machine guns, poison gas, deadly grenades, liquid fire, bombs, armored tanks, pistols, barbed wire entanglements, submarines, mines-every known scientific device with which to annihilate the enemy!
What did we do?
We continued to fight with our simple, peaceful, almost quaint device -a banner. A little more fiery, perhaps; pertinent to the latest political controversy, but still only a banner inscribed with militant truth!
Just as our political strategy had been to oppose, at elections, the party in power which had failed to use its power to free women, so now our military strategy was based on the military doctrine of concentrating all one"s forces on the enemy"s weakest point. To women the weakest point in the
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Administration"s political lines during the war was the inconsistency between a crusade for world democracy and the denial of democracy at home. This was the untenable position of President Wilson and the Democratic Administration, from which we must force them to retreat. We could force ,such a retreat when we had exposed to the world this weakest point.
Just as the bluff of a democratic crusade must be called, so must the knight-leader of the crusade be exposed to the critical eyes of the world. Here was the President, suddenly elevated to the position of a world leader with the almost pathetic trust of the peoples of the world. Here was the champion of their democratic aspirations. Here was a kind of universal Moses, expected to lead all peoples out of bondage no matter what the bondage, no matter of how long standing.
The President"s elevation to this unique pinnacle of power was at once an advantage and a disadvantage to us. It was an advantage to us in that it made our attack more dramatic. One supposed to be impeccable was more vulnerable. It was a disadvantage to have to overcome this universal trust and world-wide popularity. But this conflict of wits and brains against power only enhanced our ingenuity.
On the day the English mission headed by Mr. Balfour, and the French mission headed by M. Viviani, visited the White House, we took these inscriptions to the picket line:
WE SHALL FIGHT FOR THE THINGS WE HAVE ALWAYS CARRIED NEAREST OUR HEARTS
DEMOCRACY SHOULD BEGIN AT HOME
WE DEMAND JUSTICE AND SELF-GOVERNMENT IN OUR OWN LAND
Embarra.s.sing to say these things before foreign visitors? We hoped it would be. In our capacity to embarra.s.s Mr. Wilson in his Administration, lay our only hope of success. We had to keep before the country the flagrant inconsistency of
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the President"s position. We intended to know why, if democracy were so precious as to demand the nation"s blood and treasure for its achievement abroad, its execution at home was so undesirable.
Meanwhile:
"I tell you solemnly, ladies and gentlemen, we cannot any longer postpone justice in these United States"-President Wilson.
"I don"t wish to sit down and let any man take care of me without my at least having a voice in it, and if he doesn"t listen to my advice, I am going to make it as unpleasant as I can President Wilson,-and other challenges were carried on banners to the picket line.
Some rumblings of political action began to be heard. The Democratic majority had appointed a Senate Committee on Woman Suffrage whose members were overwhelmingly for federal action.
The chairman, Senator Andreas Jones of New Mexico, promised an early report to the Senate. There were scores of gains in Congress. Representatives and Senators were tumbling over each other to introduce similar suffrage resolutions. We actually had difficulty in choosing the man whose name should stamp our measure.
A minority party also was moved to act. Members of the Progressive Party met in convention in St. Louis on April 12, 13 and 14 and adopted a suffrage plank which demanded "the nation- wide enfranchis.e.m.e.nt of women . . . ."
In addition to this plank they adopted a resolution calling for the establishment of democracy at home "at a time when the United States is entering into an international war for democracy" and instructing the chairman of the convention "to request a committee consisting of representatives of all liberal groups to go to Washington to present to the President and the Congress of the United States a demand for immediate sub-
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mission of an amendment to the United States const.i.tution enfranchising women."
They appointed a committee from the convention to carry these resolutions to the President. The committee included Mr. J. A. H.
Hopkins of the Progressive Party, as chairman; Dr. E. A. Rumley of the Progressive-Republican Party and Vice President of the New York Evening Mail; Mr. John Spargo of the Socialist Party; Mr.
Virgil Hinshaw, chairman of the Executive Committee of the Prohibition Party; and Miss Mabel Vernon, Secretary of the National Woman"s Party. It was the first suffrage conference with the President after the declaration of war, and was the last deputation on suffrage by minority party leaders. The conference was one of the utmost informality and friendliness.
The President was deeply moved, indeed, almost to the point of tears, when Miss Mabel Vernon said, "Mr. President, the feelings of many women in this country are best expressed by your own words in your war message to Congress . . . . To every woman who reads that message must come at once this question: If the right of those who submit to authority to have a voice in their own government is so sacred a cause to foreign people as to const.i.tute the reason for our entering the international war in its defense, will you not, Mr. President, give immediate aid to the measure before Congress demanding self-government for the women of this country?"
The President admitted that suffrage was constantly pressing upon his mind for reconsideration. He added, however, that the program for the session was practically complete and intimated that it did not include the enfranchis.e.m.e.nt of women.
He informed the Committee that he had written a letter to Mr.
Pou, Chairman of the Rules Committee of the House, expressing himself as favoring the creation of a Woman Suffrage Committee in that body. While we had no objection to
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having the House create a Suffrage Committee, we were not primarily interested in the amplification of Congressional machinery, unless this amplification was to be followed by the pa.s.sage of the amendment. The President could as easily have written the Senate Committee on Suffrage or the Judiciary Committee of the House, advising an immediate report on the suffrage resolution, as have asked for the creation of another committee to report on the subject.