Volume VI Part 49 (1/2)
Since 1910 Mrs. Woodworth had kept the question of woman suffrage continually before the State Federation of Women's Clubs and in all organizations of women there was an increasing interest in legislation, especially for the benefit of women and children, and they were seeing the necessity of the ballot as a means of attaining it. Meanwhile most of the States west of the Mississippi River had enfranchised their women and for months before the Legislature convened in 1917 letters and telegrams came in announcing that former foes had become friends, many of them offering to help the cause.
Woman suffrage was the first subject discussed when the Legislature convened. The resolution to submit an amendment was championed in the Senate by Senators Fred Tucker of Ardmore, John Golobie of Guthrie, Walter Ferguson of Cherokee and many others. In the House among the most earnest supporters were Paul Nesbitt of McAlester and Bert C.
Hodges of Okmulgee. The vote in the Senate February 2 was unanimous and in the House March 17 was 75 ayes, 12 noes.
Women over the State watched anxiously the action of the Legislature and many were in attendance. Mrs. Stephens, Mrs. Frank Mulkey of Oklahoma City and Mrs. Robert Ray of Lawton were especially active but the chief credit belongs to Mrs. Frank B. Lucas, legislative representative of the Federation of Women's Clubs, with wide experience in legislative procedure. Mrs. Woodworth and Mrs. Lucas had acted as committee for the State suffrage a.s.sociation, which now merged with the campaign committee.
The campaign was made particularly difficult by the fact that Governor Robert L. Williams, Attorney General S. P. Freeling and the chairman of the State Election Board, W. C. McAlester, all Democrats, were avowed and active anti-suffragists, notwithstanding the party had declared in State convention in favor of the amendment. Encouraged by eastern women an Anti-Suffrage Committee was formed with Mrs. T. H.
Sturgeon chairman and Miss Maybelle Stuard press chairman and speaker, both of Oklahoma City. Other women prominent in the movement were Miss Edith Johnson, of the _Daily Oklahoman_ and Miss Alice Robertson of Muskogee, who were very active in the distribution of the usual ”anti” literature, attempting to link the suffragists with Germans and with the negro vote. Miss Charlotte Rowe of Yonkers, N. Y., representing the National Anti-Suffrage a.s.sociation, remained in Oklahoma during most of the campaign but their work was scattered and ineffectual.
The election took place Nov. 8, 1918, and the amendment received a majority of 25,428 of the votes cast on it. It had a majority of 9,791 of the highest number of votes cast at the election, a record that never had been equalled in any State. After the National League of Women Voters was organized at the convention of the National American Suffrage a.s.sociation in March, 1919, a State League was formed in Oklahoma with Mrs. Phil Brown of Muskogee chairman.
Report of Mrs. Shuler to the Board of the National American Woman Suffrage a.s.sociation on the Oklahoma Campaign.
Against the advice of the National Board with conditions adverse as they were in Oklahoma the legislative committee of the State Federation of Women's Clubs and some members of the State suffrage board secured the submission of an amendment to the voters in 1917 and appealed for help to the National a.s.sociation.
It found that the Oklahoma a.s.sociation was not organized as in other States with the club as the unit but was composed of individual members.h.i.+ps and was not an auxiliary of the National a.s.sociation, not having paid dues for several years. After obtaining the submission there seemed to be a desire on the part of the women to waive all responsibility for the campaign, but they said that if the National a.s.sociation considered the winning of it a necessity to its program, it should a.s.sume the entire financial responsibility.
On Jan. 19, 1918, Mrs. Nettie Rogers Shuler, corresponding secretary and chairman of campaigns and surveys; Mrs. T. T.
Cotnam of Arkansas and Mrs. Charles H. Brooks of Kansas, directors of the National American a.s.sociation, reached Oklahoma City. Several conferences were held with the State board none of whose members could give all their time to the campaign, although two would work for salary and expenses. It was evident that a Campaign Committee must be formed and new groups interested, to which the board agreed. Forty-five women met at the Lee Huckins Hotel on January 21, adopted a plan for work and agreed to raise a budget of $25,000, Mrs. Shuler stating that no financial a.s.sistance from the National a.s.sociation could be given until the Board had taken action on her ”survey” of conditions. Mrs. John Threadgill was elected chairman of the campaign committee with a salary of $100 a month and Mrs. Julia Woodworth, the former State secretary, was made executive secretary at a salary of $15 a week. Mrs. Frank B. Lucas, chairman of finance, agreed to raise the $25,000 necessary for the campaign with the understanding that she was to have personally 10 per cent. of the money raised.
She raised a little over $2,000 and resigned April 1.
An organization of young women was formed in Oklahoma City and State and city headquarters were opened in the Terminal Arcade.
Two organizers, Miss Josephine Miller who remained one week and Miss Gertrude Watkins who remained three weeks, were sent by the National a.s.sociation. Miss Lola Walker came January 30, Miss Margaret Thompson, a volunteer, and Miss Edna Annette Beveridge in February, all remaining through the campaign.
Mrs. Shuler left April 6 for South Dakota and Michigan, both in amendment campaigns. While in Oklahoma she had visited twenty-seven counties out of the seventy-seven and organization had been effected in thirty-two county seats; also the pa.s.sage obtained of a resolution by the Democratic and Republican State Committees not only endorsing but promising to work for the amendment. A Campaign Committee had been formed with representatives from seventeen organizations of men and women representing different groups with widely diversified interests.
Ten State vice-chairmen had been selected from different sections and eleven chairmen of active committees. Headquarters had been opened in Tulsa and Muskogee and others promised in the larger cities. A canva.s.s had been made of forty-six newspapers showing only five to be absolutely opposed. The State had been divided into ten districts and it was hoped that each might have the services later of an experienced national worker.
On April 17, 18, a meeting of the Executive Council of the National a.s.sociation was held in Indianapolis. The Board took action on Oklahoma, agreeing to give organizers, press work and literature to the amount of $13,650, provided the State would put two more trained organizers in the field immediately and raise the rest of the ”budget,” about $11,000. Mrs. Threadgill attending this meeting and agreed to the plan.
On May 1 Miss Marjorie Shuler was sent by the National a.s.sociation to take entire charge of press and political work, and, to quote from Miss Katherine Pierce's report, ”to her effective work with the newspapers of the State was due in a great measure the success of the campaign.” Three hundred were supplied with weekly bulletins and two-and-a-half pages of plate, and the last week 126,000 copies of a suffrage supplement sent from national headquarters in New York were circulated through the newspapers. As a unit the suffrage organization was used for the 3rd and 4th Liberty Loans, and a statewide Unconditional Surrender Club, in which nearly 100,000 members were enrolled, was organized by Miss Shuler. In the face of these activities the men paid little heed to the charges of pacifism and lack of patriotism made against the suffragists by paid ”anti” speakers sent in from outside the State.
May 1 found the Campaign Committee without funds and a meeting held in Oklahoma City early in the month pa.s.sed the following resolution: ”On account of the unusual conditions prevailing at this time which have caused the Oklahoma State Campaign Committee to find itself unable to meet the expenses of the campaign, said committee does hereby dissolve and stands ready to cooperate in any way possible in any plans that may be evolved by the National Board, hoping for its continued aid and support and expressing warmest thanks and most earnest appreciation of the generous aid and a.s.sistance already given.” This resolution was unanimously carried, the committee dissolved and Mrs. Clarence Henley was made chairman, Mrs. Frank Haskell, vice chairman, Mrs. A..
Crockett, secretary, Mrs. Blanche Hawley, treasurer, and Mrs. C.
B. Ames, chairman of finance of a new one. As the State had not put in the two trained organizers, the National Board sent Mrs.
Mary K. Maule in April and Misses Alice Curtis and Doris Long in June.
One of the requirements by the National a.s.sociation if financial a.s.sistance were given was that States in campaign should secure signatures of women on pet.i.tions. At the meeting in January officers of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union agreed to take entire charge of this work but later decided that it might injure the chances for national prohibition. Its president, however, Mrs. Abbie Hillerman of Sapulpa, served as an advisory member of the Campaign Committee and with other members rendered valuable a.s.sistance. Under the direction of Miss Curtis 58,687 signatures were obtained.
In the meantime the Oklahoma City organization, which had for officers a group of young women, was dissolved and their headquarters given up. Money was needed to maintain State headquarters, which were an absolute necessity. In June Mrs.
Henley, the chairman, sent a financial plan to all county chairmen, asking for a certain sum from each county based on population, wealth, etc. Some county chairmen resigned, which was a discouragement to Mrs. Henley and to the national workers.
Early in July Mrs. Henley telegraphed her resignation to the National Board, stating that the campaign must go by default unless it would a.s.sume all financial obligation. Mrs. Catt, the national president, wrote urging her not to resign and stating that the National a.s.sociation would pay salary and expenses of all national organizers then in the field and would send other workers as needed, providing Oklahoma would finance its State headquarters and speakers' bureau and meet the pledge made in April to pay salary and expenses of two workers. Mrs. Henley remained chairman; Mary Parke London and Sally f.a.n.n.y Gleaton were sent by the board in July; Alma Sa.s.se in August and Isabella Sanders as headquarters secretary on September 1. Mrs. Shuler returned from New York and took over the campaign for the final two months, with headquarters in Oklahoma City.
All of the prominent suffragists in the State were doing war work.... There was a depleted treasury. The Campaign Committee was not able to pay for any workers in the field. Money was needed for rent, postage, telegrams, stenographers' salaries, etc. It became necessary for Mrs. Shuler and the organizers, in addition to the detailed work of the campaign, to a.s.sume the financial burden as well. Mrs. Shuler gave her personal check for rent for August, September and October and with the national a.s.sistants in the field and by personal appeals raised $2,433.
From January 21 to November 5, 1918, there came into the State Campaign Committee's treasury $4,993 and of this amount $2,559 were spent from January to June for salaries of Mrs. Threadgill, the chairman; Mrs. Woodworth, the secretary, and headquarters expenses. These funds were checked out on warrants signed by them and the checks signed by Mrs. Hawley, treasurer. From June to November $2,433 were raised and checked out on warrants signed by Mrs. Henley and checks signed by Mrs. Hawley for headquarters expenses--not a penny going for salary or expenses of any national worker. The sum of $79.92 remaining in the treasury at the end was turned over to the Ratification Committee.
The Tulsa suffragists opened headquarters, engaged an executive secretary and financed their own campaign. They also very generously paid nearly $500 for the suffrage supplement distributed through the State. There were other counties no doubt where money was spent locally, but no record was sent to headquarters. The National a.s.sociation expended nearly $20,000 in Oklahoma, the largest sum it had ever put into a State Campaign.
By September 1 it was paying salaries and expenses of eleven national workers.[149]