Part 13 (1/2)

He made no mention of his state-by-state conviction, however, as he had in previous interviews, and the Committee of Progressives understood him to have at least tacitly accepted federal action.

The House Judiciary Committee continued to refuse to act and the House Rules Committee steadily refused to create a Suffrage Committee.

Hoping to win back to the fold the wandering Progressives who had thus demonstrated their allegiance to suffrage and seeing an opportunity to embarra.s.s the Administration, the, Republicans began to interest themselves in action on the amendment. In the midst of Democratic delays, Representative James R. Mann, Republican leader of the House, moved to discharge the Judiciary Committee from further consideration of the suffrage amendment.

No matter if the discussion which followed did revolve about the authorization of an expenditure of $10,000 for the erection of a monument to a dead President as a legitimate war measure. It was clear from the partisan att.i.tude of those who took part in the debate that we were advancing to that position where we were as good political material to be contested over by opposing political groups as was a monument to a dead President. And if the Democrats could defend such an issue as a war measure, the Republicans wanted to know why they should ignore suffrage for women as a war measure. And it was encouraging to find ourselves thus

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suddenly and spontaneously sponsored by the Republican leader.

The Administration was aroused. It did not know how far the Republicans were prepared to go in their drive for action, so on the day of this flurry in the House the snail-like Rules Committee suddenly met in answer to the call of its chairman, Mr.

Pou, and by a vote of 6 to 5 decided to report favorably on the resolution providing for a Woman Suffrage Committee in the House ”after all pending war measures have been disposed of.”

Before the meeting, Mr. Pou made a last appeal to the Woman's Party to remove the pickets . . . . ”We can't possibly win as long as pickets guard the White House and Capitol,” Mr. Pou had said. The pickets continued their vigil and the motion carried.

Still uncertain as to the purposes of the Republicans, the Democrats were moved to further action.

The Executive Committee of the Democratic National Committee, meeting in Was.h.i.+ngton a few days later, voted 4 to 9. to ”officially urge upon the President that he call the two Houses of Congress together and recommend the immediate submission of the Susan B. Anthony amendment.” This action which in effect reversed the plank in the Democratic platform evidently aroused protests from powerful quarters. Also the Republicans quickly subsided when they saw the Democrats making an advance. And so the Democratic Executive Committee began to spread abroad the news that its act was not really official, but merely reflected the ”personal conviction” of the members present. It extracted the official flavor, and so of course no action followed in Congress.

And so it went-like a great game of chess. Doubtless the politicians believed they were moved from their own true and n.o.ble motives. The fact was that the pickets had moved the Democrats a step. The Republicans had then attempted to

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take two steps, whereupon the Democrats must continue to move more rapidly than their opponents. Behind this matching of political wits by the two parties stood the faithful pickets compelling them both to act.

Simultaneously with these moves and counter-moves in political circles, the people in all sections of this vast country began to speak their minds. Meetings were springing up everywhere, at which resolutions were pa.s.sed backing up the picket line and urging the President and Congress to act. Even the South, the Administration's stronghold, sent fiery telegrams demanding action. Alabama, South Carolina, Texas, Maryland, Mississippi, as well as the West, Middle West, New England and the East-the stream was endless.

Every time a new piece of legislation was pa.s.sed; the war tax bill, food conservation or what not,-women from unex- pected quarters sent to the Government their protest against the pa.s.sage of measures so vital to women without women's consent, coupled with an appeal for the liberation of women.

Club women, college women, federations of labor; various kinds of organizations sent protests to the Administration leaders. The picket line, approaching its sixth month of duty, had aroused the country to an unprecedented interest in suf- frage; it had rallied widespread public support to the amend- ment as a war measure, and had itself become almost univer- sally accepted if not universally approved. And in the midst of picketing ands in spite of all the prophecies and fears that ”picketing” would ”set back the cause,” within one month, Michigan, Nebraska and Rhode Island granted Presidential suffrage to women.

The leaders were busy marshaling their forces behind the President's war program, which included the controversial Conscription and Espionage Bills, then pending, and did not relish having our question so vivid in the public mind. Even when the rank and file of Congress gave consideration to questions not

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in the war program, they had to face a possible charge of inconsistency, insincerity or bad faith. The freedom of Ireland, for example, was not in the program. And when 132 members of the House cabled Lloyd George that nothing would do more for American enthusiasm in the war than a settlement of the Irish question, we took pains to ascertain the extent of the belief in liberty at home of these easy champions of Irish liberty. When we found that of the 132 men only 5'7 believed in liberty for American women, we were not delicate in pointing out to the remaining ”(5 that their belief in liberty for Ireland would appear more sincere if they believed in a democratic reform such as woman suffrage here.

The manifestations of popular approval of suffrage, the constant stream of protests to the Administration against its delay nationally, and the shame of having women begging at its gates, could result in only one of two things. The Administration had little choice. It must yield to this pressure from the people or it must suppress the agitation which was causing such interest.

It must pa.s.s the amendment or remove the troublesome pickets.

It decided to remove the pickets.

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Chapter 3

The First Arrests

The Administration chose suppression. They resorted to force in an attempt to end picketing. It was a policy doomed to failure as certainly as all resorts to force to kill agitation have failed ultimately. This marked the beginning of the adoption by the Administration of tactics from which they could never extricate themselves with honor. Unfortunately for them they were entering upon this policy toward women which savored of czarist practices, at the very moment they were congratulating the Russians upon their liberation from the oppression of a Czar. This fact supplied us with a fresh angle of attack.