men whosts and the supported them as part of a series of events related to our current special exhibit, rightfully hers, american women and the vote. partners are here tonight and we thank them for their support. our special exhibit, rightfully hers, tells the story of the woman struggle for voting rights. women activists had to win allies among men in influential positions. it was men who sat in state legislatures that would ratify or reject the 19 amendment, whose centennial we celebrate. opened,htfully hers guests were offered a yellow rose pin when they entered. that was won by members of the men's league for women's suffrage. not to theests, this role that men played came as a surprise. tonight we will take a look at theirffragists and contributions to the voting right struggle. it's my pleasure to welcome nancy tate, she has served as women's votef the centennial initiative and is also on the board of the turning point suffragists memorial. she served as the executive director of the league of women voters, and previously she served as the chief operating officer at the national academy of public administration and with the department of energy, department of education, and office of economic opportunity. please join me in welcoming nancy tate. [applause] nancy: thank you. it's wonderful to be here, especially at the national archives, since they have opened this lovely exhibit on women and the vote. as she has said, it's called rightfully hers, american women in the vote. i have toured the exhibit twice and i encourage everyone to see it. women's cochair of the vote centennial initiative. i'm also the former executive director of the league of women voters. the league is one of the cofounders of the women's vote centennial initiative, and that group was formed as an information sharing collaborative of the ending organization -- the many organizations and scholars working in this area. we want to celebrate the anniversary of the passage of the 19th amendment, which will be next year, 2020. we want to shed light on the powerful but little-known stories behind that long and hard struggle to win the vote. the league itself was founded in of the largestd suffrage organization, the national american women's or -- suffrage organization. the league was formed under her guidance six months before the amendment passed. league is also having its own 100th anniversary next year. there is a league in every state and approximately 700 cities and counties around the country. it has been spending nearly 100 years continuing the fight for full equality for all americans. we do that through education and advocacy. a few more words about the 2020 women's vote centennial initiative. connectto establish and people, networks all around the country, girl scout troops, universities, any organization interested in learning about our suffrage history and how they can be a part of the celebrations, which they may want to create themselves next year. in the d.c. area, these educational programs that we put on with other groups as the main thing we undertake. thisht, as deborah said, particular evening as a part of the series. this is after the fourth we have done at the archives and we hope to do at least one more in 2020. when we pick a topic, each of these focuses on some of the little told stories about what went on to enable women to finally get that vote. and all the panels will look at how some of these lessons show relevance to the issues of today . as many know, the 72 year fight for women's suffrage is a powerful historical story. it can be used to enhance our understanding of our own kinds and how to navigate it. i bycan learn more about wvc visiting our website, instagram, and twitter. i'm pleased to introduce tonight's panel, you have their full biographies in your program. so i will call them up by name. come on up ladies. we have our moderator, betsy fisher martin, the executive director of women in politics institute at american university. [applause] kroger, the offer of the sufferer just -- the suffragists, how women used meant to get the boat. -- the vote. johanna neuman, the author of gilded suffragists. and susan where, the author of why they marched. betsy, i turn it over to you. >> thank you, and welcome. it's nice to be with you today. we have a special treat, three terrific experts. personally, i had a wonderful time leading and learning -- reading and learning so much about this issue in preparation for tonight. i'm excited for you. .rooke, let me start with you brooke your story tells about powerful man in new york who helped women gain the right to vote. what brought these men together for the movement and how did they first come together to form the men's league for women's suffrage? >> it's a good story. starting around that sign -- inund that time, ann came through canada for a lecture around thee lectured country. one of her themes was how pathetic the wealthy women of america were in terms of understanding how to engage in a political process. and further, how the men of england had been supportive of women in their fight for the vote and how nothing of this nature was going on here. and ins in the press people's consciousness, at least people in certain circles, around the same time that and anna howard shaw who wrote to the editor and publisher of the nation magazine in new york evening post. he was also the son of fanny garrison who was an important suffragists, and the grandson of william garrison, the abolitionist and suffragists. she wrote to him, remembering that when he was at harvard in speech made us each -- a at the massachusetts suffrage organization and wanted him to the kata convention -- and wanted him to speak at a convention. he did not think he could commit to anything of that nature, but he thought it was a good idea that a group of men of prominence would come together not to do much more than lend their names and trotted to albany or washington and speak to legislatures and politicians if the need arose. she wrote back and said this was , the suffrage organization was very much in the doldrums and had had the idea before. there was a mensa suffrage league that started in 1874 -- a in 1874.frage league it met about 80 times and then fell out of existence. she said the men who have been willing to engage are so full of isms. and so many women are full of isms, it's the last thing we need. the men we really need, you, oswald, never seem to have the time for cause. he wrote back and i'm paraphrasing he said i think i held find a group of men -- actually said i think a group of men could be found, as long as there's is someone to do the heavy lifting. , and itss back imperfect style and she says we will do all of the work. he saidnormous credit, that's not a good idea, the more strategic plan would be for us to form this ourselves, provided we can find someone to do the work. that would be the way to make this effective. so he summons rabbi stephen wise and john dewey, the philosopher and columbia professor as his triumvirate. and max eastman was a student at columbia who was starting to have a writing career, obviously short of funds living in the village. he becomes the secretary-treasurer of the organization. his charge was to put together a this very secret, and put together 100 names that , from everye world profession, clergy, professors, names that american new -- knew. and announce this as a group that was organized to mow the suffrage because -- because -- cause. anna eastmanother, from ohio. the letters are going everywhere . there were 15 newspapers in the new york -- in new york at the time and it's unimaginable that someone would not get wind of it and the new york times writes a chiding front page article with the headline that was something like men's voices to join the soprano chorus for women's votes . and it names these people whose names they had gotten wind of, there were only 25 at that point. one with the director of bellevue hospital, who resigned in embarrassment. eastman was mortified. but he had recruited george foster peabody who became the financial mainstay. he said by the time you're really ready to announce everyone will have forgotten this and all will be well. that is what happened. by november he did not have 100 names but 150. they had their first meeting in early november. by january they produce their first booklet with these names and addresses listed. with their charter and constitution. by later in the year they gave their first banquet, 600 p all, to honor ethel snowden, the wife of the british mp. this was very elite in its construction. allr they invited men of sorts, what you needed was men who voted area this was the point. -- men who voted. this was the point. having the support was key. i'm sure someone else could tell the story of the parade, they march as a group of 89 men in .op hats and bowlers they are pilloried and mopped -- and everymocked, insult is hurled. it galvanizes them and they are no longer offering their names, they are ready for work. joanna, why was it so controversial to have men? they were ridiculed in a lot of cases. >> i wanted to pick up on brooks point.- brooke's there were 89 men in the 1911 parade, in 1912 there were 1000 men. that's how much the movement grew in a short period. >> a year later they were in 35 states and in the tens of thousands. >> i was looking for this quote, one of the men who march was rabbi wise, he was a major progressive who often lectured those city on causes, isms you spoke of. it was a time of great ferments, debate among students at and in max eastman's circle in greenwich village. his capitalism the right thing? should we look at socialism? should we explore free love? imagine a time when everything was up for debate. participated in the where many of the men that he knew from elite circles where in their clubs, avenue,down on fifth hurling insults as brooks suggested. rolling their eyes. on the streets they were hurling insults. i jog -- hei dug out his diary and wrote of the mockery he encountered. for a few moments i was very warm and took off my hat, whereupon somebody shouted look at the long-haired susan's. some of the other delights let's play nation that greeted us were who is taking care of the baby? ?ren't they cute .ook at the mollie cottle's another suffrage husband, as they were called, was george, who recalled hecklers buying take that -- crying take that handkerchief out of your cost, you gay deceiver, you forgot to shave this morning. we have some suggestion of why this was so controversial, it disrupted this gender role expectation that men have. and throughout the 1910s, what i that there is a succession of events that help to normalize the idea of women voting. men,he great fear among after all, the only voters and the only people eligible to vote for women's suffrage, either as voters in their state on , or members of legislative committees, or lawmakers in congress. there was this great fear that andtics would harden women emasculate men. and also hurt the family. a lot of things that the suffrage leaders did in those publicas to reassure the that women could be in political life and still maintain their femininity. was probably worth saying somewhere that men have always stood, some men, have always stood with women. there was a famous judge in massachusetts in the american revolution who wrote to john adams and said jested that they consider universal suffrage. so here we have the founding from agitation for women to have the vote. after the civil war, when elizabeth stanton and susan b anthony with the movement apart by vowing that they will not support the 15th amendment, which removed the barriers to black men voting, they will not support it unless women are also included. and this horrifies the other women, who started a rival organization. for 20 years you have these two rival group working at cross .urposes but one black man named robert for elizabethp stanton and susan b anthony in this unexpected decision to fight the 15th amendment. and he said if my daughter cannot have voting rights along with my son, i will not vote for it. because she has a double curse of being a woman, and a black woman. that there are always some men who have stood with women. and i wanted to throw that into the conversation. >> what's distinct in this era is that they organized. celebrity endorsers have always been back to thomas payne and jon stewart. but this was really a unique happening. >> i agree. >> what else is strange is that few people in their memoirs who write about it at all, right about the 1911 parade or 1912, and the response from the crowds. that seems to be affecting his experience -- and affecting -- an affecting experience. nobody mentions the league by names. only an obituary mentions it because his wife wrote it and she was a great suffragist. they never talk about it again. , was ited why chivalrous to not take credit? were they not ally -- were they consummate allies? or was it insignificant in the history of these active lives, and by the time they died six decades later, it was an important aspect to they were. it's fascinating. george creel, as soon as he becomes the head of the committee of public information, he is not talking about it at all. it's interesting. the want to get back to home wife, if you will, a woman goes off and joined the suffrage movement, what does that mean for the home life and husband at that time? >> it really changes all aspects of it, especially for a woman signs onto the suffrage movement . it's like having a religious conversion. if she is all in, it's like having a full-time job, unpaid about full-time. this is likely something she has not done before. you can see that there would be a ripple effect that the kind of wifely or daughter early duty she had done before, like being there when the kids come home or to entertain at dinner, those things are not going to happen anymore. i think what we need to remember is that it's not just as a woman says i will support suffrage, it affects all kinds of other things in her life. she isily of origin, who partnered with, her colleagues, where she lives or travels, how she dresses. it's a big commitment. one of the places where you see it hitting home, literally, is in marriages. >> you right in your book about a married couple -- write in your book about a married couple, the browns. >> ray and gertrude foster were suffrage couple. she was the head of new york state's women's suffrage organization. he was a journalist. he wrote a pamphlet, published anonymously, he did not put his name on it, called how it feels to be the husband of a suffragette. in the pamphlet you can tell that he is a true feminist and he supports women's economic independence and how having a wife who does things beyond the domestic sphere is more interesting to have around. andays all the right things he puts on this wonderful cheerful face publicly of its great, this is what it's like being married to a suffragette. in private, things are more complicated. she is off traveling, she goes to conventions, giving speeches, out every night. her. at home, missing there is a difference between endorsement,public and sometimes on the homefront it's a little harder to make it work and he is the one feeling left behind. this had happened before in their marriage, she was a talented musician and she had gone off on the road and had a successful career, and he felt he was left behind. both times they managed to work their way through and stay in 1944.ntil his death it's a good reminder that we always need to think about the personal as well as the political when we tell the story. >> i want to ask you about the press, and how the men were depicted in the press at the time. >> as a curiosity, first of all. it made interesting news. and the men initially involved made news because they always made news. these were people who wrote social problems and were followed for their business dealings and everything. suffragefollowed for drew attention. another thing to because ms. and cognizant of is that a huge proportion of the men engaged were editors, publishers, writers, poets, dramatists. they were people with media access. they were also able to guide coverage. we were talking about catherine dewar mackey a few minutes ago. one of the publishers was the publishers of harper's. so there is a four piece puff page -- four page puff pieces spread about her when she starts her society which is a parallel organization to the men's league which was attracted at directing elite women. and that kind of access to print , to having things published that were positive for the movement that for 70 years had been seen as downey -- doughty it dolph, it was -- dull, was not a group that was attractive in a celebrity way. there was a wonderful cartoon where it shows two suffered women, one who looks like ace gold and one who is very shapely -- looks like a scold, and one who is very shapely, and the caption was the tide has changed. you could hear flattering descriptions of and a sharp -- anna sharp's clothes. things had changed. attraction brought something that was needed. brooke is looking at me because my focus about the new york socialites who fought for the vote. and my conclusion on studying the was that they were the oprah winfrey of their day. cause,ey embraced this it gave a burst of energy to the concept. it popularized the movement. many more recruits came in after they joined. there was an excitement in the wind. i wanted to add, on the question of press, that most of the coverage was not favorable. and especially we mentioned earlier, the new york times. it was a hostile news timeszation, and the greeted the men with virulentized editorials against what they suggestive that they did not know their own way, that they were a little misguided, perhaps they had been. one editorial in the times suggested that some of the men might have been trying to curry seamstressesmale to make their suits. unbelievable stuff. >> there was a great deal of hostility. there were other papers that were very pro. previously they were all like that. that was the big change, that you had this wave of positive response that started to create that turn. >> there is something else that is a general context for what your books are about, which is your organization starts in 1909, 1908. the phrase i use is a kind of quickening of suffrage activism right around that time, 1908 to 1910, where things really burst into public in a way that for the first 70 years of the movement, it really was taking place in church parlors and lecture halls. it was not engaging the public. of reasons, things really began to pop. there is a sort of self-fulfilling. then you have this escalation for the next 10 years. >> i think the reason for that is that, as you said, until this suffrageasically people were talking to each other. it was preaching to the converted. i think there was a dawning realization that you have to reach the public. start to use they all the new science of public spectacle,weapons of the public parade, all kinds of things. they had suffered days at the polo grounds. they had women pilots dropping flyers from airplanes. they had marchers. >> calling people at the baseball field. that wouldhave bands save be a suffrage band. they tried all kinds of things. >> they just got savvy about public relations. >> where does the term suffragette come from? >> from england, it was one of the pejoratives. it was not official. diminutive'slot of . >> suffragette is also a from word in the u.s. context. that is one of the things i noticed when ray brown uses it in the title of his pamphlet. i think he was maybe making a subtle jab at his wife, i don't know. triedmerican suffragists to distance themselves from the term because it was associated with the british movement, which was more willing to embrace violence against property, which is something the u.s. movement never did and a much wanted to draw those lines. i cannot really think of hardly any instance where women in this country would call themselves suffragettes. you find that the term is very often used to describe them, and it has a somewhat pejorative cast to it. today finding that again as we are looking forward to the centennial, the term suffragettes is coming back. i find myself often waging battles and saying no, that is not the right term. clinton used it in her book. i wrote her a letter and explained it to her, a wellesley grads, why she should not use it. she never responded. >> i think people just don't know the difference. [laughter] >> i want to ask you about the financial support that was significant in terms of funding the suffrage fight. in some cases from the grave, some of these men, titans of industry were funding the suffrage movement. theiss wesley one back money that her husband lost. and when shemoney, died gave $2 million to the movement. she was not a big activist, but was very supportive. >> that made a huge difference, that money. >> huge. all the headquarters were built by those funds. andles like delayed laws other wealthy new york couples who are engaged with the movement were financially supportive. they would do a challenge grant during a convention. most of these men served on the finance committee. york,the 1915 feet in new a huge gearing up for the 1917 battle, which actually succeeded and was extremely important because when the suffrage amendment passed in new york in 1917, that brought 44 congressmen who were pro-suffrage, which gave wilson a way to counter the opposition from the south. all of these things fed into creating that burst of activity through the decades. >> what role did african-american men play? >> we can all talk about that. it is important as we think back about the history to pay attention to the large roles that african-american men and women played on this movement. there is some falls, frederick douglass, with katie stanton supporting the women's right to vote. , but he never her loses his faith in the womenance for votes for and universal suffrage. if you think about someone like du bois, when you read the national association of colored people that was founded in 1908 or 1909, it practically reads like a suffrage magazine. there are so many editorials he is writing. there are reasons for that. it is because african-american in the fought so hard civil war only to have it taken away in the south by jim crow restrictions, they knew how important the vote was. du bois makes another point, which is kind of obvious, which if women get the vote, black women get the vote too. i think it is important as we think about a movement that has a reputation for being predominantly white and middle-class, we cannot let the racism of that movement keep us and makingledging front and center the contributions of both african-american women, which are so important, but here is a perfect case where putting the men in the story adds so much. i am glad for that question. >> joanna, i read in one of your papers a quote from frederick douglass. he said when i ran away from slavery, it was for myself. when i have indicated, it was for my people. for the rights of women, iself was out of the question. i found nobility in that act. quote, so thank you for digging it up. for frederick douglass and for many other people early in the was a certaine ability in their acts. when we get to the modern see a couple of groups of people. the first are the bohemian sexual radical. that women should have the vote because it will make them better lovers. be an equalizing of gender roles, and women will stop being silly, and men can stop being profligate. the women's movement, the feminist cause would liberate men because they would not have to work, that there would not be an obligation on their shoulders to support women and children. they are quite enthusiastic. weman called suffrage the great fight for liberation in my lifetime. they soon lose -- i don't want to say they lose interest, but they lose belief. they start to lose belief by about 1912. max says that he prefers the cause where you can suffer a little for the good. by 1912, it is getting very mainstream. they sort of peel away. most of the members of the league are now good government reformers. these are people who join any movement to reform the public space. they join all kinds of causes. readjoin the causes to city hall of corruption, to improve sanitation for immigrants, to improve working workers,s for factory to end racial lynching in the south. but iave myriad causes, think they welcome women because it doubles their numbers. progressivism even stronger if women get the vote and can help. are -- people come to the cause for different i think one of the great lessons of the suffrage movement is that what finally succeeds is a huge, broad umbrella that takes in everyone from working-class to celebrity socialites, librarians, actresses, professionals, men, it is just -- it conveys in its breadth public acceptance. if i can just take one more minute, i think one of the least studied aspects of the women's suffrage movement is the role of the states. lesson that social change begins at the grassroots level. the states start rolling from .he west wyoming is the first state in 1890. you have colorado in 1893. by 1911, california becomes the fifth state. it is an extremely close election in california. the suffrage initiative passes by one vote per precinct. in impact is huge because the 1912 election, there are 1.2 million women eligible to vote for president. later, analysts say woodrow wilson would not have been reelected but for the votes of people in the women's suffrage states. there is this groundswell. what happens when we get to the 19th amendment is that women are no longer petitioning congress, please, can we have the vote? they are coming as constituents. they are saying we have the power to vote you out of office. >> if you are having a cocktail conversation about the 19th amendment and someone says women were granted the vote, i always hate that, but you can say, actually quite a few women were voted, and it really does start in the west and moved east. it is the role of the state. of that is very few african-american women were enfranchised by the 19th amendment. that was because most of them still lived in the american south, where they were restricted from voting by the same tools that kept black men from voting, literacy test and poll taxes and things like that. we always need to keep both of these perspectives in mind when people say women got the vote. it is a little more complicated than that. >> you spend a lot of your book talking about new york and the significance of that. was that 1917? why is that significant? >> it was the first really big delegation coming to congress and creating change. it was the first state east of the mississippi. we are not job first. -- geographers. it was understood that if it had failed in new york, that would have been the end. it gave wilson cover in a sense to start changing his mind. he always used the state's argument. this is a state issue. >> we still hear that. >> it avoided the question of the south for him. this gave him away to come forward and actually help change some minds and make this happen. fast forwarding to ratification and the state of , who wantsharry burn to tell us that story? it is a great story. legislators a young in the tennessee senate. the setup for this, of course, is that to get an amendment, a constitutional amendment through of twos took the votes thirds of the house and two thirds of the senate. >> to ratify it. >> know, to get it through congress. that was the congress role. that happened in 1919. to get it ratified by the states suffragee fourths, so leaders spent about a year and a half going from legislature to legislature trying to get ratification. at first it was going along swimmingly. frommroll of approval three states that rushed to be the first to ratify. they now stand in history together because nobody made it in ahead of others. >> the same thing with the e.r.a. by then there is a groundswell of what we call the forces that also see this as the big battle of their lifetime. , and noneal for it the liquorul than locker that -- lobby that fears the temperance movement that was fueled by women, that women have other things up their sleeves, and they are going to come with all the social legislation that is going to be costly to their business and other businesses. everyone is to sending on the state capitals. they get to 35. they need 36. everyone understands that tennessee is going to be the last state. they either make it in tennessee, or they don't. everyone goes there. many of the key players take rooms at the hermit tosh -- herm itage hotel in nashville. the liquor lobby takes the eighth floor. they call it the jack daniels suite where they are offering if not bribes at least a lot of liquor. the vote is extremely close. those who isof ti.n as an an this is signified by wearing colored roses, and i think the pros wore yellow. all of a sudden on a procedural vote, the changes his mind and votes yes and tips the thing. he pulls out a letter from his pocket that basically says my mother asked me to vote. [laughter] he said he was sympathetic to the cause, but he was going to vote no because that is how his constituents had made very clear to him that they wanted him to vote, but he got this letter from his mother, and it touched his heart, and he voted the way he did. he was then hounded. he was accused of taking bribes. were very powerful in tennessee. they filed a lawsuit. this is a little-known story. i hope somebody is looking at it more closely. they actually filed a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the 19th amendment, and that was finally ran through the courts and rejected. >> 1922. but harry said it tickles to history andte make his party looks good. >> we all have the right to vote because the young man listened to his mom. it's a great story. do either of you have another man the highlight who you thought was one of the most important people that maybe we don't know about? >> i do. i think laidlaw, the national president of the men's league. he could trace his lineage back through colonial days. he was on the board of what became standard and poors. he was a real player. his wife was involved in new york suffrage. if i can read the mission statement of the league, and if i can see it, which would be a trick. i can add that laidlaw, when at the 1912 parade, he was asked why they were marching, and he said we are here to give moral support to the women and courage to the men. i always thought that was quite poignant. mene says there are many who inwardly feel the justice of equal suffrage but who are not ready to acknowledge it publicly unless they are backed by numbers. there are other men who are not even ready to give the subject consideration until they see that a large number of men are willing to be counted in favor of it. the man who is so prejudiced that he will not consider it at all will pass away with this generation if not sooner. the usefulness of the men's womens politically to constitutes one of the unanswerable arguments for women's suffrage, legislators are mainly responsible to voters and voters only. in the majority of states in this country, ernest, determined women are besieging the toislatures, endeavoring bring about the submission of a women's suffrage amendment to the people. how long and how burdensome is this effort on the part of but ifrs everyone knows, a well organized minority of men suffragemand equal legislation from the legislators, they will get it. after that, it is only a question of propaganda, and the men's leagues come in again on the issue of moral support. that's pretty great. >> does anyone come to mind for you? >> i would give a shout out to a man named fred nathan. i think it is partly because he is married to one of the maudecters in my book, nathan, who is a prominent suffragists. she is in my book because i have used her relationship with her mayer, whoie nathan is an anti-suffragist and the founder of bernard college. it is this interesting sibling rivalry and reminds us that not all women wanted to support women get the vote. maude and frederick had another one of those suffrage marriages and did things like a cross-country automobile trips in 1912 when there were no cross country roads. he turns out that one of the ues, theional men's leag international dimension of the suffrage movement is very important. when we finally get to this critical turning point that we have all talked about of the 1917 referendum in new york ill, ande is quite he is pushed in a wheelchair so he can cast his vote for the suffrage amendment. theefinitely, he was one of original figures, also important. there is not a lot known about some of these folks. ,s you were writing your book how did you go about finding a lot of the information and stories you have about the men? they did not boast about it. it was not in their obits. >> interesting that historians have not picked up about this. when i started, there was a page, a paragraph, not even academic papers that did much more than mention it in passing. fulltonhistory.com, this incredible resource of small-town newspapers. i almost did it for chronology of the 10 years to figure out that it was really a movement and there was more to it than celebrity endorsement, which is what they set out to do, but clearly became deeply engaged but quietly. quietly. i think we also have to say that as i got the idea to write this and put out a proposal, most of the response was who cares what the men did? that was a very typical response. >> what was your response to that? >> what was there to say? >> it took a while. >> it took a while. when you were talking about the men who should be included in this conversation, my mind went to teddy roosevelt. >> why? he was the disciple of manliness, vigor. some would argue that we went to war in 1898 because he thought it was going to help the vigor of the male population amid a period of feminization of politics. at the beginning he is not very when he is asked about it. at the turn-of-the-century, he says women will get the vote when they ask for it, and until then, the whole thing bores me. let's move on to something interesting. only in 1912, when he is running to recapture the presidency and needs the votes of women does he embraced the cause. cause.ace the what i love about him, after women get the vote in new york in 1917, in 1918, theodore roosevelt is setting off for the and he gets in the car, and he finds his wife is already there. he says in that wonderful teddy roosevelt accent, what are you doing here? she said, i'm going to vote. -- it was one thing for this man to embrace suffrage endorsement, but for him to understand the enormity of the social change that he had reluctantly and , to me it wasrsed like witnessing the human toll of social change. was a generation of men who decide -- and i don't ever the suffragents were in majority, but they were activists. >> they also understood as laidlaw once said that they could make easier, happier work things that were difficult for women to accomplish that they could just do. take for example a meeting at the lotus club in new york where women reporters were coming to report and could not get in the door. laidlaw could immediately open his offices and his cafeteria so the meetings could be held. this was just an ease of being able to fix things. >> i think their role at the end was to normalize the a natural partt of everyday life. >> to make what, voting? >> yes, women voting. >> i think what has always endeared me to those men's leagues, and this comes out of my training as a historian, you see all the organizations out of the 1920's were men's organizations and then there were women's auxiliaries that often do all the work and raise all the money, but they don't get the credit. what has always tickled me about leagues is that they really were the auxiliaries. of role reversal. >> they actually used the term when they get thanked after the victory, laidlaw says we have learned to become auxiliaries. >> it does not happen all that often. let's give them credit. >> the governor of new york at the time was asked after the women'se, who won suffrage? he said, i thought that the men of new york had a lot to do with that. there were all these newspaper and magazine articles at the time saying that this faction or that faction of women had actually won the thing, and whitman is reminding us that the voters were men. >> we have some time for questions. we have microphones on either side. if anyone has a question, please make your way to the microphones. i see a gentleman here with a question, happens to be my husband. [laughter] auxiliary. >> thank you for taking the questions and for the great presentation. the question i have, and the moderator was not bad either, by the way. the question i have, you touched on this at the outset, but why the west? why is it that this first came out of wyoming and then california and colorado? spirit, theioneer fact that the genders were more equal in the west whereas more stratified in the traditional east? what was it that took prairie fire on west? >> i think in a lot of cases, rather than generalizing about the west, we need to look at specific states. there often are stories within those states that have to do with political alignments and whether they are third-party and whether someone believes that giving women the right to vote is going to help them. having said that, one of the things that is the most instructive if you are trying to get a handle on suffrage history is to look at a map of the u.s. and see that the west, where you have these victories, and then there is this blackhole of the south, where there are no victories, and the industrial northeast, where there are very few until new york, so the geography is really important. , i find that i am a little uncomfortable using phrases like pioneering spirit, but thank goodness for that because once you have all these women voting in the west, number one, the world has not come to an end. that is important to show people. it gets people used to the idea of women voting. you also have increasing numbers of women who actually vote, and then they can be a political force in their own state and in this national movement. women -- e west, >> i just want to add that there were -- i think there were some sawtical motives by men who adding women to the roles in the west as an the opportunity to double their influence in congress, but i also think they needed women to populate very sparsely populated states. >> that makes sense. >> the strategies in the west were stronger. they were very good at giving arguments that appealed to the converted and could still appeal to those that have not made the change. there are several papers that have to deal with why that is possible. not so much. took a while. it is a western state that elects the first woman to congress. that is not a fluke. talking, youere are talking a lot about wealthy men in new york, things happened out west. comparablee anything in places like san francisco? the other thing i wanted to ask you is, you were talking about the fact that these men did things behind the scenes, and you also said that this became more popular because you had these celebrities and people of influence endorsing it, and that helped. it seems kind of contradictory. >> they were people that were in the news already. that became a vehicle for more attention to the suffrage movement in a way that was palatable. that was the point. california had an important league. it was coeducational, but he felt it was the most important work of his life. massachusetts had an important week. league.had an important 35 states had men's leagues. through the women's journals, this was promoted that women were encouraged to ask the men of their lives to become part of this. i was going to ask how do you think the man in an average american household would have reacted to the idea of women voting? >> not well. what do you think? >> i'm not really sure. i would have hoped it would not have been that is a terrible idea, but i also don't think everybody would have been like, let's do that right now. takethink if you wanted to a broader look at the question of why this bias exists, in my new book, i go back to the american revolution. i don't think suffrage begins in 1848 at seneca falls. i think it begins in that revolutionary moment when some women are agitating for the vote, when new jersey gives women and free blacks the vote if they have the same amount of .roperty that men voters have called ahistorian has revolutionary backlash where all tablet gets taken off the . new generation of patriots about this new republic . many of them use it as a wedge they get a better education. they stick their tell back into politics slowly. are instrumental in the jackson oppose andrew indian removal act policy. there are instrumental in the abolition cause. by the time you get to this 1910s, there is this gender construction, paradigm of gender roles where women are to be a moral ones, and men are the ones that are supposed to get down the dirty, wherefilled rooms politics takes ways. as i mentioned earlier, there is this fear of what will happen women go into that room. i think it just takes a public reassurance that we have been talking about to convince the public. if you look at movements for social change in our lifetimes, maritalook at how gay equality happened, it starts at the grassroots. starts at the states. the public has to be convinced. there are campaigns. there are losing campaign after losing campaign softens public opposition. that is what i think happened here with the men. >> i think we need to remember vote doesthough the not seem like that scary a thi ng. you only go to the polls once a year. it was often seen as an opening wedge. if that is going to change, all kinds of other things about women's roles could change. for many people that can be seen as a positive thing, but for many others, that would be seen as not positive. we see that playing out through the rest of the 20th century. we see similar ideas on both sides to the equal rights battle. i think we need to always remember that something that teams like a fairly minor reform, like giving women the vote, which we know is not minor, please go vote in 2020. it stands for something bigger. it is really women's equality in the modern world. mentioned there was a constitutional challenge to the amendment. in general i thought once an amendment is approved, it is basically instant. what surprised me as i was googling harry during your talk, he barely survived his reelection campaign. i would have thought he would have been a shoo-in with 50% of the voters in tennessee. why did he barely pass? >> it's tennessee. you need to look at the political situation to see how it would have been hard for him. in terms of the constitutional challenges, it is possible to challenge. there were two that were filed very weakly beside the one that was in tennessee. within two years, the supreme court ruled that the 19th amendment was valid, and there could not be any challenges to it because that would have been a very poor start to women's political emancipation and the quality if it happened -- the happenedif it under the shadow of the supreme court knocking it down. i have read both of those were cases. they will be in the library anthology next summer that i edited. i cannot for the life of me remember the details of those cases. >> thank you for having read them. i have not done that. .t is a sad note this is partly why harry burn had trouble subsequently, but the 1920 election is the first one where women, black and white in the north, nationally are eligible to vote. the showing is not good. them come to the polls. there are a lot of reasons for that. the magazines of the day, there are all sorts of headlines about apathy and the apathy of women. it is possible that played a role in tennessee. >> unfortunately, there is a perception that women got the vote, it really did not matter. there are articles with names like women's suffrage is a failure. one that i found most interesting from 1924 from a prominent anti-suffragist. the ladies home journal center out around the country to see what women were doing with the vote. she came back quite impressed by what women were doing with the vote. they were not voting at the same levels as men. this is something most women have not done. it takes a while to learn how to be a voter. i think one of the things i hope that the centennial celebration can help us see is this continuum of women's political activism that starts well before the passage of the 19th amendment and does not end in 1920. you see it continuing through groups like the league of women voters. you see it in the new deal with eleanor roosevelt and in the 1950's with the civil rights movement. i tried to think, that they have done that without the vote? trying to imagine the 20th century without the vote, it has been less than 100 years that women have had it. i tried to take the long view. think of it as the long 19th 1920ment stretching beyond and stretching before 1848. >> nobody should feel bad about passed.a. having not because it has only just begun. >> we could take a poll. [laughter] >> i did not really here. -- hear. >> learning what they did, i don't know. the audience would be like this, a good selection of men who have been interested. i have had one or two hostile comments. bringing up any credit to the men, people sometimes find that offensive. the suggestion is never to say that this is a men's victory, just to recognize that social change requires everyone. i think what is interesting about this movement as opposed to some other movements for social change is that it is a one issue thing. it is not a complicated question. it is not like bringing up abortion or fourth control -- birth control, issues that become complicated on numerous grounds. this is simple and straightforward and a moral wrong. how can a citizen who has to pay taxes, has to abide by contracts, has to every other thing a citizen does can have no say? it is just a moral wrong. that is easy to get on board. but then it took so long. >> it was really susan b anthony -- elizabeth katie stanton wanted a broader standard. she wanted church reform. agenda, property rights, educational opportunity. ,t was susan b anthony who said no, we are just going to focus on the vote. this sort of validates her. >> you notice because there are so many horrific things going on, women's issues always tend to get subordinated, even by women. this is horrible, that this is not as horrible as fill in the blank. that seems to happen over and over again. one of the things i have i think maybe 10 years ago if we were doing this you would think about voting for the women getting the vote as unimportant or not a big deal, but i think recent events have opened all of our eyes to the importance of voting and voting rights and voting suppression in a way that makes what could have been a quaint centennial celebration much more relevant and timely. >> hear hear. >> i think we have time for one more rested. >> i was wondering if you know when did women get the right to keep their salaries if they were working? was that part of the movement? righte point, we got the to own property and to keep your salary if you worked. one was that? -- when was that? was a very important state in a lot of these legal reforms in 1848, they passed a married women property act, which meant married women could hold property. law -- theyast a passed a law that said women could control their own earnings. >> this is new york. is there ever a federal law that said women have the right without their husband's permission to earn money and keep their own money? me, and incredibly important thing, and i cannot believe it got subordinated to being able to vote. it goes with it or before it, to not have the right to keep your own money. 1920,hink most states by women would have been able to control their own earnings. >> but you don't know. >> in new york, if you worked, your husband got everything. >> one more quick question. have sre so fortunate to ix exhibits about women's suffrage and accomplishments. is that happening in other places around the country? >> oh god, yes. >> absolutely. >> do you have a favorite exhibit that you have seen? >> to meet the most exciting thing is that they are happening in all of the states. i just have to give a shout out to the league of women voters, who are playing such a central role. many of the states have set up commissions. this is a wonderful networking opportunity for people to find each other and also doing what we all try to do as historians, which is to take an inspiring but complicated historical story to a broader public that doesn't know much about suffrage history. i think it is a story that needs to be more widely known. i think a lot of the state efforts that are going on are going to get the word out there. i hope that it will encourage all kinds of interest in learning more about it, and they can start by reading all of our .ooks eri >> the one i heard about that charmed me the most was on new year's day at the rose parade, there will be a float about women's suffrage. they have invited people to dress as suffragists and walked re-create floats and the moment we have been talking about tonight i think it is a wonderful coming together of our icon ofwith a cultural our president. website called suffrage in the media where anything that has a media aspect , that which is everything really rises to the surface, we put up. we change it almost weekly, so there is always new material. it has one of the best search elements. search by suffrage era, academic and movies and things like that. it is all free. >> please join me in thanking our panel. [applause] thank you all for coming. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2019] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] ♪ >> located in the southern part of the state, we are the capital city. like a spotlight to get more people to visit this wild and wonderful state. >> west virginians are stereotyped as being unsophisticated, but world quality cartoonists come from west virginia. tour is onan cities the road, exploring the american story. this weekend, we take you to charleston, west virginia. >> whether it be the timbering way back when that built most of the east coast and the coal mining that made the steel that built the guns and the ships and the factories that built this great economy. >> join us sunday at 2:00 p.m. on american history tv as our c-span cities tour looks at the history and literary life of charleston, west virginia. but tv has lived weekend coverage of the miami book fair starting saturday, november 23, and sunday november 24. saturday, at 11:00 a.m. eastern, republican senator tom cotton talks about arlington national cemetery. former obama national security adviser susan rice discusses her life and career. dineen, chair of constitutional studies at the university of notre dame on liberalism, and andy greenberg discusses russian hackers. on sunday, our live coverage continues with former undersecretary of state in the obama installation richard single on the proliferation of disinformation in international politics. david marinus on the 1950's red scare. eleanor randolph discusses michael bloomberg. former deputy director of the cia philip mudd talks about the state of cia detention centers. former professional football player don mcpherson on toxic masculinity. c-span2 book tv. presidency, former white house chief of staff johnson and new and andrew card -- such as the collapse of the soviet union and 9/11. mr. sununu served under george h.w. bush and under george w. bush. they compared the styles of father and son. the dublin area republican committee posted this event. to knowt to welcome you what farms. i am happy to have andy card and governor sununu in this room. this stage has wel

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