The World Affairs council of dallasfort worth hosted this online event. Hi, everyone. Thank you so much for being with us this afternoon. Joining us this afternoon is dr. Dubois. She is the author of suffrage womens long battle for the vote. Im so pleased the conversation be with a very dear and special friend and supporter of the World Affairs council. Let me remind you you can purchase a copy by going to dallass independent bookstore. Please be sure to type in the off and you will get 10 not just on suffrage but any book in your shopping cart. Thanks to ourcial director for being a sponsor of todays program. And so much thanks the league of women voters being our perversion our promotional partner. Programs, with our please go online, or if you missed program, you can go to our Youtube Channel and one surprise you that the weight to find our channel is typed in d fwworld. Lee is a special friend of the World Affairs council and the host of a program where she interviews local business leaders. You can catch that if you missed one of her programs you can also go to the website to see some of her past programs. Fellow at aenior center here in dallas, a Southern Methodist university and has been a very active member of the board of directors on the council of formulations. So i to sit back and listen to your wonderful conversation. Take it away. Lee it is wonderful to have you here with us today. Allen has written a wonderful book suffrage womens long battle for the vote. Certainly was a long battle paired she has written other books along the subject. She is a specialist in womens history. She wrote feminism and suffrage, the emergence of an independent Womens Movement in america. Edited unequal sisters, which we will talk about later and also coauthored a textbook on womens history. Dont know if you agree with me but my observation has been that there are no more faithful alums. A lot of loyalty. Its wonderful. She got her phd at northwestern and for the past several years has been a ucla. And no import no sooner had she retired that she married, terrific thing to do. To turn right to your book, we all imagined that this womens fallsnt began at seneca but in fact it has been brewing as part of the abolitionist movement. Is that not the case . Professor dubois it was the case. The first generation of suffrage were supporters of the Abolition Movement and actually had learned their skills and their beliefs about human rights relative insignificant of sex or race as opposed to the common humanity. They learned that as they said, in the schools of antislavery. They learned how to do things that women of their generation did not do very much. Speak in public, right. Organize meetings, petition and begin to draw up a whole set of demands for equality to women and they learned this in the abolitionist movement. This is the first generation. This connection between antislavery and black rights on the one hand and women rights on the other petes in the postcivil war years in the early 1870s what you call the reconstruction. Connection with the two of the three reconstruction and the 14th amendment, which gives all persons the United States citizenship and in the 15th , which is not quite right to say gives men the right to vote. It prohibits the state from franchising anyone on the basis was the decision of the Ruling Republican Party not to include prohibitions on sex as well as race. Oft leads to the breakup this historic coalition. Lee lets talk about Elizabeth Stanton. Fallsd to move to seneca that was not a happy thing to do. Professor dubois this is old Elizabeth Cady stanton. Lee she looked very different from that. Women couldnt even appear on the floor. What did she do if with herself what did she do with herself . Professor dubois this one was taken on her honeymoon and she is sitting in the balcony and surrounded by women both british and american. Much more active in the Abolition Movement than she is. Friends with the most experienced and philosophical enemy important abolitionist woman in the entire states, women about 20 years older than her, who is a quaker from philadelphia. Really, they can act on the issue of womens rights. She basicallyon begins to school distilled woman in her late 20s and begins to school her in the history of. Omens right eight years after this crucial said whois knows, its a legend, in london they decide they are going to hold a Public Meeting for womens rights. They end up doing that eight years later in 1848. By this time, stanton is now living in seneca falls, as a sort of bustling Industrial Town between rochester and syracuse. There are plenty of people in that part of new york who were very experienced activists and reformers. That year is a crucial year. Its the year that is usually known for revolutions throughout europe to begin to lay the basis for democracy in places like france and germany. And seneca falls, the United States despite the fact that slave that there were slaves many black people and women were prohibited from the right about. It is still the case that the american electorate is more expensive than any other soctorate in the world and seneca falls, lets call a revolution. The american version of the Political Revolution in europe. The other thing that is happening in these years. The United States has just come out of a war with mexico in which it has taken over the , bringn third of mexico up the lands that include my own state of california and the entry of this a normal swath of territory breaks open a prohibition on the discussion of slavery in the american congress. Slaving that point on, is an increasingly controversial political issue. The fact that the Seneca Falls Convention raises political franchise for women is connected to the fact that american politics is beginning to grapple with this allimportant issue which women are determined to be part of. Lee as time went on these women were very interested in their own right but it was Elizabeth Stanton who understood they had to have the right to vote or they wouldnt get anything else. Nobody else agreed except for frederick douglass. How did he get involved with this group of women . Frederickdubois auglass had new stanton as young mother and he was getting to work with the boston abolitionist. They werent were immediately drawn to each other despite the tremendous differences thered they were both deep deep believers in american liberalism say philosophy and shall we , i have thought a lot about their relationship. Im going to write a biography of her after this is all over. Terriblyboth suffered from the contempt that was visited on them by people who they believed rightly were much their inferiors. , this is a little older. He is a fellow with white hair and in his early 70s. He had just moved the year before stanton moved to seneca falls. He moved 50 miles west to rochester and was there starting a newspaper, his lifes desire. And the person funding a newspaper was her cousin. Andhey had many, many links their friendship lasted a halfcentury. Lee it would be a wonderful book. And then there is this wonderful woman on the cover of the new yorker. She got involved. And with a name like Sojourner Truth, who wouldnt want to vote for her . Professor dubois her name was actually isabella. She was born a slave in the hudson ritz hudson river valley. There were slaves in new york. The dutch part of the neat of new york was actually the area where stanton grew up. With otherally freed adult slaves in the 1820s in new york and she went to new york became bornagain. Name and became an itinerant preacher. In her preaching, she began to preach both about antislavery and also to talk about womens rights. She is very interesting because there are a significant number of black women who appear on women rights platforms these early decades. But Sojourner Truth is the one who most consistently supports the equality of men and women. Even though of course she remains a complete devontae for the abolition of slavery and the quality of races. But as she says, when things get going, lets keep the pot stirring. She understood what Elizabeth Stanton understood, which is was this time of abolition an opportunity that would not come again for a while. Back to boston for a moment. There was a moment known as margaret. She was the intellectual american at the time and part of emersons circle. She became the First American war correspondent in europe. She was quite a character. Im not sure if she was a suffragist. We cannot tell. First of all, not until after the civil war is the demand for the right to vote coming part of the womens rights platform. Until then, there are other demands. The quality of education is very important for the ability of women to have professional standing. Economic equality was also very her. There is some circumstantial evidence that she might have been part of a salon she ran for women but we dont have any concrete evidence. There is also pictorial woodhall. She makes margaret seem positively mainstream. She was definitely a suffragist. She was. Now we are jumping ahead to woodhall0 and victoria , its amazing there hasnt been a movie about her. I remember one that was allegedly purchased by nicole kidman. But somehow, these never got made. Of its daughter not even fair to say workingclass. Were carnies. She was taught how to trick and she seems to have had , hardpressed to say this now, she had psychic abilities she and her sister rose in the civil war years through the patronage of some powerful men. It was cornelius vanderbilt, was did was and it . It . Asnt professor dubois one of them was. She had powerful supporters and had her own newspaper. She had the ear of important politicians and and eight sick in 1869, she is able to, and a Congressional Committee and make the argument that suffragists have beginning to make for a while. Very important argument. The argument was that the 14th made all Americans National citizens and made all americans eat right and who could but disagree that the right to vote was a right of citizenship. She made that argument in front of a Congressional Committee. It was the basis of that argument and that contention that susan b. Anthony goes to her polling place in 1872 and is able to convince the polling officers to let her vote for president. She is then a few days later statute under a federal , making it a crime to vote illegal vote. Criminal voting. It was an order that president has unknowingly pardoned susan b. Anthony. I dont the dont think he understood that she was found guilty of voting but voting on the grounds at all american citizens had the right to vote. Anyhow, both susan b. Anthony and victoria woodhall were both arrested within weeks of each other. Woodhall was thrown in jail in new york city. Anthony would have liked to have been thrown in jail. She wished very much to be a martyr to the cause. But the man running the trial was actually a supreme justice herhe was not going to give the benefit of throwing her in jail and refused to allow her to do that. Lee lots of marriages, lots of lovers aired the could commune with the dead and made lots of money on wall street she was something else. But this amendment was very interesting. There was a case in illinois. Was there a woman named bradwell . Professor dubois there are a few cases that come before the supreme in the 1870s. They both are 14 amendment cases. Bradwell was a lawyer in chicago and she was being kept from a membership in the illinois bar. She argued that the 14th amendment properly understood equalted her right professional rights. That her rights to practice her profession should be practiced equally as men. The court, in a summary judgment, road rules against her about 1872. Case, and anythe of you who went to law school and were lucky enough to have any training in womens rights will know about these two cases. The other case comes before the court in 1874 and the woman who brings that case before the court is a st. Louis woman named virginia minor. Voteanthony, she tried to in 1872. Unlike anthony, she was not allowed to cast her vote. Unlike anthony, she was able to take her case to the Supreme Court. She made exactly the same argued that anthony had. I am a person and therefore citizen. Therefore equal rights and privileges protected by the federal government with all other citizens. The right to vote is one of those rights and privileges the Supreme Court said yes, you are person, a citizen yes you have equal rights but the right to vote is not a right of national citizenship. Court ruling that had gone differently and been followed, the world we live in be very, very different. Is still the case that there are not federal protections for the right to code to vote. It is under the control of the state. The federal government has almost no ability, should there be a federal government interested in protecting Voting Rights, has no ability to overrule states and insist upon equal rights. The vote still remains as it was decided in that case. Righta privilege, not a controlled by these. Lee suffragists became discouraged, understandably. Alreadytern states had granted women the right to vote, including wyoming. It happened much earlier and they had very practical reasons. Professor dubois the other side of this insistence was that the separatists suffragists seemed they would be unable to get the constitutional amendment passed. Sandy constitutional door had been slammed shut. They turned to the states and they started to go to those states which they thought were most likely to enfranchise women and these were western states. I think it is a more practical reason. Know what, i have to get a kleenex. Not because im doing anything with any illegal substances but im sneezing if you could wait one moment. I have allergies myself. But what she is about to say and im sure she will elaborate is that wyoming needed women. Anda preponderance of men felt they could trust women to come and live in wyoming if they gave them that they could get they and they felt could trust women to come and live in wyoming if they gave them the right to vote. I said that wyoming wanted to attract women. Because they had lots of men and no women. Professor dubois they had no white man they had lots of white men and no white women is accused native american women were not encouraging any enfranchisement i may have said this in the book. In these western states, the democrats and republicans were not as established. 1890s when each state began to enfranchise women there was an insurgent political. Omen condition movement that wanted toy bring new voters into the electorate heard and it is they who for the brief periods of time in which they have some power in their state, they sponsor womens suffrage. The 90s. Within another 20 years, the Second Third Party is called the Progressive Party and the same is true of them. And want to bring women they are interested in issues they believe women support and it is those states, washington and california which then enfranchise women. Very veryand this is crucial. You might think that because women have the right about and ,hey gained it in their state they had full Voting Rights women of california voted for president and Congress People starting in 1912. These women had full national Voting Rights and by the middle of the 19 teens, there were perhaps 4 million such women who are active voters in the western states. To put pressure and leverage on the existing parties and were a crucial factor in the ultimate passage of the 19th amendment, which was important because there were a lot of states that would never enfranchise. There was a column in the New York Times recently that the liquor lobby really opposed womens voting in the states. They would turn the Temperance Movement is that . He case you dont think much of that . Professor dubois it was at a very good article, i dont think. You have to remember that the 18th amendment was ratified much more recently. By the time suffrage came before congress, it was done. And it is certainly the case that in the late 19th century through an Organization Called the womens christian suffrage your someay be of your great grandmothers belong to. Way that common women, not radicals but conventional women become attracted to suffrage. Becauseome attracted they think of suffrage not as a matter of justice but because they have goals they want to achieve in the goals they want to achieve is to control liquor. Premise thatn the it is men who abuse liquor, and when they do so, they drink up their families wages and they are violent and their families so the christian temporal influential in bringing lots of smalltown relatively convention conventional women into the movement. The other problem is, it is not that attractive to men who dont want to think of womens votes as keeping them from going into the bar and throwing down a couple before they go home. So in that 20th century, there is that sort of link between suffrage and temperance. California, there is a suffragist whose name was younger they had tremendous impact on the movement. She was part of the waitresses union. And these were women who worked in bars and restaurants serve liquor. When they went before their union and argued for the right to vote, the Brewers Union as it was called gave up its opposition. Then the movement got underway and the action move back to washington. Tell us about ellis paul. She let a big demonstration in front of the white house the day before Woodro