“i have no son to give my country to fight for democracy abroad and so i send my daughter to washington to fight for democracy at home.”
mrs. s. h. b. gray of colorado.
it will be remembered that the arrest of lucy burns and katherine morey—the first of a series extending over more than a year—occurred on june 22.
on june 23, mrs. lawrence lewis and gladys greiner were arrested in front of the white house. on the same day, mabel vernon and virginia arnold were arrested at the capitol.
on june 25, twenty women bore suffrage banners to their stations. the slogans on these banners were:
how long must women wait for liberty?
mr. president, you say “liberty is a fundamental
demand of the human spirit.”
we address our demand for the ballot at this time
in no narrow, captious, or selfish spirit, but from
purest patriotism for the highest good of every citizen
for the safety of the republic and as a glorious example
to the nations of the earth.
twelve women were arrested. they were: mabel vernon, lucy burns, gladys greiner, katherine morey, elizabeth stuyvesant, lavinia dock, berta crone, pauline clarke, virginia arnold, maude jamison, annie arniel, and mrs. townsend scott.
on tuesday, june 26, nine women were arrested for carrying the same banners. they included some of the women from the day before, and, in addition, vivian pierce and hazel hunkins.
221a high-handed detail of this arrest was that the women were overpowered by the police before they had proceeded half a block.
most of these women were released after each arrest. the last six to be arrested were asked to return to court for trial.
on june 27, six american women were tried in the police court of the district of columbia.
these women were: virginia arnold, lavinia dock, maud jamison, katherine morey, annie arniel, mabel vernon.
the women defended themselves. mabel vernon, who conducted the case, demanded that the banners they had carried be exhibited in court. it made a comic episode in the midst of the court proceedings when the policeman, who had been sent for them, returned, bristling all over his person with banner sticks, and trailing in every direction the purple, white, and gold. the courtroom crowd burst out laughing when they read the legend:
mr. president, you say “liberty is the fundamental desire of the human spirit.”
there was a technical discussion as to how much sidewalk space the young women occupied, and how near the white house palings they stood. the suffrage group had photographs which showed the deserted pavements at the time of the arrests.
the women cross-examined the police who testified that there was no crowd at that time of the morning and that the women stood with their backs to the white house fence.
the judge said: “if you had kept on moving, you would be all right.”
“i find these defendants guilty as charged,” was his verdict, “of obstructing the highway in violation of the police regulations and the act of congress, and impose a fine of twenty-five dollars in each case, or in default of that, three days’ imprisonment.”
222the six young women refused to pay the fine. they were each sentenced to three days in the district jail.
when the first pickets came out of jail, a hundred women, representing many states, gave them a reception breakfast in the garden of cameron house.
a subsequent chapter will relate the prison experiences of these women and of the long line of their successors.
the next picket line went out on independence day, july 4, 1917. five women marched from headquarters bearing purple, white, and gold banners. they were: helena hill weed, vida milholland, gladys greiner, margaret whittemore, iris calderhead. helena hill weed carried a banner:
governments derive their just power from
the consent of the governed.
following the advice of the judge, they kept moving. across the street, a crowd had gathered in expectation of arrests. standing about were policemen—a newspaper man said twenty-nine. the police walked along parallel with the women, and the crowd followed them. as the banner bearers crossed the street to the white house, the police seized them before they could get onto the sidewalks. an augmenting crowd surged about them. some of the onlookers protested, but most of them took their cue from the police, and tore the flags away from the women. apart from the pickets, kitty marion, who for some weeks had been selling the suffragist on the streets, was attacked by a by-stander who snatched her papers away from her, tearing one of them up. miss marion was arrested. she protested at the behavior of her assailant and he was arrested too. hazel hunkins, who was not a part of the procession, came upon a man who had seized one of the banners carried by the pickets and was bearing it away. miss hunkins attempted to get it from him, and she also was arrested.
the police commandeered automobiles, and commenced bundling the women into them.
223immediately another group of women came marching up pennsylvania avenue on the opposite side of the street. this second group contained mrs. frances green, mrs. lawrence lewis, lucile shields, joy young, elizabeth stuyvesant, lucy burns. joy young, who is a little creature, led this group. they reached the west gate of the white house, and there the police arrested them. a washington paper described with great glee how, like a tigress, little joy young fought to retain her banner, and how finally three policemen managed to overpower her. the women were booked for “unlawful assembly” all except kitty marion, who was charged with “disorderly conduct.”
helena hill weed and lucy burns cross-examined the witnesses on behalf of the women. mrs. weed insisted that the torn, yellow banner should be brought into court. throughout the trial, it hung suspended from the judge’s bench—governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed. lucy burns, examining the police officers, asked why citizens carrying banners on june 21 were protected by the police, and on july 4 arrested for doing the same thing. the officer replied that they were protected on june 21 because he had no orders for that day. the orders which came later were, he said, not to allow picketing, though he admitted there were no directions about seizing banners. the women brought out by skillful cross-questioning that it was the action of the police which had collected a disorderly crowd, and not the marching of the two groups of women; that at the former trial of a group of suffrage pickets, the judge himself had declared that marching pickets did not violate the law.
lucy burns summed up the case for the suffragists as follows:
i wish to state first—she said—as the others have stated, that we proceeded quietly down the street opposite the white house with our banners; that we intended to keep marching; that our progress was halted by the police, not the crowd. there was no interference on the part of the crowd until after the police had 224arrested us and turned their backs on the crowd. our contention is as others have stated that the presence of the crowd there was caused by the action of the police and the previous announcement of the police that they would arrest the pickets, and not by our action which was entirely legal.
in the second place i wish to call your attention to the fact that there is no law whatever against our carrying banners through the streets of washington, or in front of the white house. it has been stated that we were directed by the police not to carry banners before the white house, not to picket at the white house. that is absolutely untrue. we have received only one instruction from the chief of police and that was delivered by major pullman in person. he said that we must not carry banners outside of headquarters. we have had no other communication on this subject since that time.
we, of course, realized that that was an extraordinary direction, because i don’t think it was ever told an organization that it could not propagate its views, and we proceeded naturally to assume that major pullman would not carry out that order in action because he would not be able to sustain it in any just court.
we have only been able since to judge instructions by the action of the police, and the actions of the police have varied from day to day, so that as a point of fact, we don’t know what the police have been ordered to do—what is going to be done. on one occasion we stepped out of headquarters with a banner—the so-called russian banner—and it was torn to fragments before we had reached the gate of our premises, although major pullman had given no notice to us at that time. another time we proceeded down madison place with banners, walking in front of the belasco theatre, and were arrested. another time we were allowed to proceed down madison place and the north side of the avenue and were not molested.
now the district attorney has stated that on account of the action of this court a few days ago, we knew and deliberately did wrong. but we were advised then by the judge—and he was familiar with the first offense—that we would have been all right if we had kept on walking. on july 4 we kept on walking and this is the result of that action.
i myself was informed on june 22 by various police, that if i would keep on walking, my action would be entirely legal. we were innocent of any desire to do anything wrong when we left our premises.
it is evident that the proceedings in this court are had for the 225purpose of suppressing our appeal to the president of the united states, and not for the purpose of accusing us of violating the police regulations regarding traffic in the district of columbia.
the eleven women were found “guilty,” and sentenced to pay a fine of twenty-five dollars or to serve three days in the district jail. they refused to pay the fine, and were sent to jail. the case against hazel hunkins was dismissed. kitty marion was found “not guilty,” of disorderly conduct.
in the meantime, alice paul had been seized with what looked like a severe illness. a physician finally warned her that she might not live two weeks. it was decided, on july 14, to send her to a hospital in philadelphia for treatment. the day before she left, a meeting of the executive board was held at her bedside in the washington hospital. although later diagnosis proved more favorable, and miss paul was to be away from washington only a month, many of the women present at that meeting believed that they would never see her again. that was a poignant moment, for the devotion of her adherents to their leader can neither be described nor measured. but they felt that there was only one way to serve her if she left them forever and that was to carry out her plans.... the next day they went out on the picket line.
that next day was the french national holiday—july 14. the woman’s party had, as was usual with them when they planned a demonstration, announced this through the press.
on the anniversary of the fall of the bastille, therefore, three groups of women carrying banners, one inscribed with the french national motto: liberty, equality, fraternity, and the woman’s party colors, marched one after another from headquarters.
in the first group were mrs. j. a. h. hopkins, mrs. paul reyneau, mrs. b. r. kincaid, julia hurburt, minnie d. abbot, anne martin.
in the second group were, amelia himes walker, florence bayard hilles, mrs. gilson gardner, janet fotheringham.
226in the third group were mrs. john winters brannan, mrs. john rogers, jr., louise p. mayo, doris stevens, mary h. ingham, eleanor calnan.
a big crowd, attracted by the expectation of excitement, had collected outside headquarters. the police made no effort to disperse them. when the first group appeared, there was some applause and cheering. they crossed the street, and took up their station at the upper gate of the white house. as nothing happened to the first group, the second group, led by amelia himes walker, emerged from headquarters and took up a position at the lower gate of the white house. however, the instant the two groups had established themselves, the policemen, who had been making a pretense of clearing the sidewalks, immediately arrested them.
the third group of pickets, however, came forward undismayed, their flags high. the crowd applauded them; then fell back and permitted the pickets to take their places. the police in this third case waited for four minutes, watches in hand. then they arrested the women on the charge of “violating an ordinance.”
at the station the sixteen women were booked for “unlawful assembly.” on july 17, judge mullowny, sentenced the sixteen women to sixty days in occoquan workhouse on the charge of “obstructing traffic.”
a detailed consideration of the treatment of the pickets in occoquan and the jail is reserved for a later chapter. it will, therefore, be stated briefly here that these sixteen women were pardoned by the president after three days in occoquan. however, they were submitted to indignities there such as white prisoners were nowhere else compelled to endure. when j. a. h. hopkins and gilson gardner were permitted to visit their wives, they did not at first recognize them in the haggard, exhausted-looking group of creatures in prison garb, sitting in the reception room. one of the women, however, seeing her husband, half rose from her chair.
227“you sit down!” superintendent whittaker yelled, pointing his finger at her.
j. a. h. hopkins, who had been a member of the democratic national campaign committee of 1916, went immediately to the president and told him the conditions under which these women were being held. gilson gardner, a well-known newspaper man who had supported wilson throughout the previous election campaign, wrote a long communication to the president on the same subject. dudley field malone, collector of the port of new york and one of the president’s closest friends and warmest advisors, who was later in so gallant a way to show his disapproval of the suffrage situation, saw the president also. president wilson professed himself as being “shocked” at his revelations. he said he did not know what was going on at occoquan.
“after this, mr. president,” mr. malone replied, “you do know.”
after her release, mrs. j. a. h. hopkins wanted to find out whether this pardon also meant that the president supported their amendment. she therefore wrote him the following letter:
my dear mr. president:
the pardon issued to me by you is accompanied by no explanation. it can have but one of two meanings—either you have satisfied yourself, as you personally stated to mr. hopkins, that i violated no law of the country, and no ordinance of this city, in exercising my right of peaceful petition, and therefore you, as an act of justice, extended to me your pardon, or you pardoned me to save yourself the embarrassment of an acute and distressing political situation.
in this case, in thus saving yourself, you have deprived me of the right through appeal to prove by legal processes that the police powers of washington despotically and falsely convicted me on a false charge, in order to save you personal or political embarrassment.
228as you have not seen fit to tell the public the true reason, i am compelled to resume my peaceful petition for political liberty. if the police arrest me, i shall carry the case to the supreme court if necessary. if the police do not arrest me, i shall believe that you do not believe me guilty. this is the only method by which i can release myself from the intolerable and false position in which your unexplained pardon has placed me.
mr. hopkins and i repudiate absolutely the current report that i would accept a pardon which was the act of your good nature.
in this case, which involves my fundamental constitutional rights, mr. hopkins and myself do not desire your presidential benevolence, but american justice.
furthermore, we do not believe that you would insult us by extending to us your good-nature under these circumstances.
this pardon without any explanation of your reasons for its issuance, in no way mitigates the injustice inflicted upon me by the violation of my constitutional civil right.
respectfully yours,
alison turnbull hopkins.
after having written this letter, quite alone and at the crowded hour of five o’clock in the afternoon, mrs. hopkins carried a banner to the white house gates, and stood there for ten minutes. the banner said: we ask not pardon for ourselves but justice for all american women. a large and curious crowd gathered, but nobody bothered her. while she stood there, the president passed through the gates and saluted.
on monday, july 23, exactly a month from the time that the police had first interfered with the picketing and the suffragists, the daily suffrage picket was resumed. the crowds streaming home in the afternoon from the offices, laughed when they saw the banners at the white house gates again. some stopped to congratulate the women.
time went on and still the president did nothing about putting the amendment through. as always when it was not strikingly brought to his attention, suffrage seemed to pass from his mind. it became again necessary to call his 229attention to the amendment. often it seemed as though the president’s attention could be gained only by calling the country’s attention to his inaction.
within a week appeared a new banner. elihu root, the special envoy of the united states to russia, had just come home from a country which had enfranchised its women. with the other members of the american mission to russia, he called at the white house, and at the gates he was confronted by these words:
to envoy root:
you say that america must throw its manhood in the
support of liberty.
whose liberty?
this nation is not free. 20,000,000 women are denied
by the president of the united states the right to
representation in their own government.
tell the president that he cannot fight against
liberty at home while he tells us to fight for liberty
abroad.
tell him to make america free for democracy before
he asks the mothers of america to throw their sons to
the support of democracy in europe.
ask him how he could refuse liberty to american
citizens when he has forced millions of american boys
out of their country to die for liberty.
for two hours, lucy ewing and mary winsor stood holding this banner. it attracted the largest crowd that the pickets had as yet experienced. but the police managed them perfectly—although in the courts there had been plenty of testimony that they could not manage similar crowds—and without a word of protest—although half a block was completely obstructed for two hours.
230the following day saw scenes the most violent in the history of the pickets. this was august 14. catherine flanagan’s story of this period of terror is one of the most thrilling in the annals of the party:
that day a new banner was carried for the first time by elizabeth stuyvesant—the “kaiser” banner. the banner read:
kaiser wilson, have you forgotten your sympathy with
the poor germans because they were not self-governing?
twenty million american women are not self-governing.
take the beam out of your own eye.
i do not remember when elizabeth took this banner out, but i think she was on the four o’clock shift. for a half an hour people gathered about the banner. the crowd grew and grew. you felt there was something brewing in them, but what, you could not guess. suddenly it came—a man dashed from the crowd and tore the banner down. immediately, one after another, the other banners were torn down. as fast as this happened, the banner bearers went back to headquarters; returned with tri-colors and reinforcements; took up their stations again. finally the whole line of pickets, bannerless by this time, marched back to headquarters. the crowd, which was fast changing into a mob, followed us into madison place. as the pickets emerged again, the mob jumped them at the very doors of cameron house, tore their banners away from them and destroyed them. by this time the mob, which had become a solid mass of people, choking the street and filling the park, had evolved a leader, a yeoman in uniform, who incited everybody about him to further work of destruction. suddenly, as if by magic, a ladder appeared in their midst. a yeoman placed it against cameron house, and accompanied by a little boy, he started up. he pulled down the tri-color of the woman’s party which hung over the door. in the meantime, it was impossible for us to take any banners out. we locked the door, but two strange women, unknown to the woman’s party, came in. they opened a window on the second floor and were about to push the ladder, on which the sailor and the little boy still stood, back into the street when ella morton dean drew them away.
at the other side of the house and at the same moment, another member of the crowd climbed up the balcony and pulled down the american flag which hung beside the tri-color. immediately virginia arnold and lucy burns appeared on the balcony carrying, 231the one the kaiser banner and the other the tri-color. the crowd began to throw eggs, tomatoes, and apples at them, but the two girls stood, virginia arnold white, lucy burns flushed, but—everybody who saw them comments on this—with a look of steady consecration, absolutely motionless, holding the tri-color which had never before been taken from its place over the door at headquarters.
suddenly a shot rang out from the crowd. a bullet went through a window of the second story, directly over the heads of two women who stood there—ella morton dean and georgiana sturgess—and imbedded itself in the ceiling of the hall. the only man seen to have a revolver was a yeoman in uniform, who immediately ran up the street. by this time elizabeth stuyvesant had joined lucy burns and virginia arnold on the balcony; others also came. three yeomen climbed up onto the balcony and wrested the tri-color banners from the girls. as one of these men climbed over the railing, he struck georgiana sturgess. “why did you do that?” she demanded, dumbfounded. the man paused a moment, apparently as amazed as she. “i don’t know,” he answered; then he tore the banner out of her hands and descended the ladder. lucy burns, whose courage is physical as well as spiritual, held her banner until the last moment. it seemed as though she were going to be dragged over the railing of the balcony, but two of the yeomen managed to tear it from her hands before this occurred. new banners were brought to replace those that had disappeared.
while this was going on, katherine morey and i went out the back way of headquarters, made our way to the white house gates, unfurled a kaiser banner, and stood there for seventeen minutes unnoticed. there was a policeman standing beside each of us, but when the yeoman who had led the mob and who was apparently about to report for duty, tore at the banner, they did not interfere. we were dragged along the pavements, but the banner was finally destroyed.
by this time the crowd had thinned a little in front of headquarters. the front door had been unlocked when we went back. five different times, however, we and others, led always by lucy burns, made an effort to bear our banners to the white house gates again. always, a little distance from headquarters, we were beset by the mob and our banners destroyed.
about five o’clock, the police reserves appeared and cleared the street. thereupon, every woman who had been on picket duty that day, bearing aloft the beautiful tri-color, went over to the white house gates, marched up and down the pavements three 232times. the police protected us until we started home. when, however, our little procession crossed the street to the park, the crowd leaped upon us again, and again destroyed our banners. madeline watson was knocked down and kicked. two men carried her into headquarters.
while the crowd was milling its thickest before headquarters, somebody said to a policeman standing there, “why don’t you arrest those men?” “those are not our orders,” the policeman replied.
twenty-two lettered banners and fourteen tri-color flags were destroyed that day.
during all the early evening, men were trying to climb over the back fence of the garden to get into cameron house. none of us went to bed that night. we were afraid that something—we knew not what—might happen.
the next day, august 15, was only a degree less violent. the suffrage pickets went on duty as usual at twelve o’clock, and picketed all that afternoon.
all the afternoon yeomen, small boys, and hoodlums attacked the women without hindrance. elizabeth stuyvesant was struck by a soldier who destroyed her flag. beulah amidon was thrown down by a sailor, who stole her flag. alice paul was knocked down three times. one sailor dragged her thirty feet along the white house sidewalk in his attempts to tear off her suffrage sash, gashing her neck brutally. they were without protection until five o’clock.
during this time they lost fifty tri-color banners and one kaiser banner.
the pickets were, of course, constantly going back to headquarters for new banners, and constantly returning with them.
at five o’clock, in anticipation of the president’s appearance, and while still the turmoil was going on, five police officers quickly and efficiently cleared a wide aisle in front of each gate, and as quickly and as efficiently drove the mob across the street. the president, however, left by a rear gate.
on the next day, august 16, the policy toward the pickets changed again. fifty policemen appeared on the scene, and 233instead of permitting suffragists to be attacked by others, they attacked them themselves. virginia arnold was set upon by three police officers. before she could relinquish her banner to them, her arms were twisted and her hands bruised. elizabeth stuyvesant, natalie gray, and lucy burns were all severely handled by the police. elizabeth smith and ruth crocker, who were carrying furled flags, were knocked down. when men, more chivalrous-minded than the crowd, came to their rescue, they were arrested.
in the late afternoon, the crowd grew denser. the police, therefore, ceased their efforts, and waited while the crowd attacked the women and destroyed their banners an officer threatened to arrest one young woman who defended her banner against an assailant.
“here, give that up!” called the second officer to a girl who was struggling with a man for the possession of her flag.
during these days of mob attacks, the pickets had been put to it to get outside headquarters to some coign of vantage where they could stand for a few seconds before the inevitable rush. for the first time in the history of their picketing the girls could not carry their banners on poles. either the mobs seized them or the policemen who lined the sidewalks outside headquarters. the pickets carried them inside their sweaters and hats, in sewing bags, or pinned them, folded in newspapers or magazines, under their skirts. one picket was followed by crowds who caught a gleam of yellow at the hem of her gown. when they got to the white house, the pickets held the banners in their hands. lucy burns kept sending out relays with new banners to take the place of those which were torn.
catherine flanagan says that on august 16 when the four o’clock shift of the picket line started out, lucy burns pointed to rolls of banners done up in various receptacles and said, “take out as many of these as you can carry and keep them concealed until it is necessary to use them.” the eight pickets distributed the banners in different parts of their clothes, and approaching the white house by various 234routes, suddenly lined themselves against the white house fence, each unfurling a kaiser banner at the word of command. they were faced by forty policemen, policewomen, and secret service men. instantly the police were on them. the pickets held the banners as long as it was physically possible—it took three policemen to remove each banner. the policemen heaved sighs of relief, as though their work for the day was done, turned, and moved to the edge of the pavement. instantly, eight more banners appeared and as instantly they fell on the pickets again. this happened seven times. as often as the police turned with captured banners in their hands, reinforcing pickets in the crowd handed fresh banners to the pickets at the gates. fifty-six kaiser banners were captured this day. when the kaiser banners were exhausted, the eight pickets returned to headquarters and soon emerged bearing the tri-color. the tactics of the police changed then. they did not, themselves, attack the pickets, but they permitted the crowds to do so. in all, one hundred and forty-eight flags were destroyed.
on august 17, major pullman, police head of washington, called upon alice paul, and warned her that young women carrying banners would be arrested.
alice paul replied, “the picketing will go on as usual.”
in a letter to his friend, major pullman, quoted in the suffragist of august 25, gilson gardner put the case concisely and decisively....
you must see, pullman, that you cannot be right in what you have done in this matter. you have given the pickets adequate protection; you have arrested them and had them sent to jail and the workhouse, you have permitted the crowds to mob them, and then you have had your officers do much the same thing by forcibly taking their banners from them. in some of these actions, you must have been wrong. if it was right to give them protection and let them stand at the white house for five months, both before and after the war, it was not right to do what you did later.
you say it was not right and that you were “lenient,” when 235you gave them protection. you cannot mean that. the rightness or wrongness must be a matter of law, not of personal discretion, and for you to attempt to substitute your discretion is to set up a little autocracy in place of the settled laws of the land. that would justify a charge of “kaiserism” right here in our capitol city.
the truth is, pullman, you were right when you gave these women protection. that is what the police are for. when there are riots they are supposed to quell them, not by quelling the “proximate cause,” but by quelling the rioters.
i know your police officers now quite well and i find that they are most happy when they are permitted to do their duty. they did not like that dirty business of permitting a lot of sailors and street riffraff to rough the girls....
it is not my opinion alone when i say that the women were entitled to police protection, not arrest. president wilson has stated repeatedly that these women were entirely within their legal and constitutional rights, and that they should not have been molested. three reputable men, two of them holding office in this administration, have told me what the president said, and i have no reason to doubt their word. if the president has changed his mind he has not changed the law or the constitution, and what he said three weeks ago is just as true today.
in excusing what you have done, you say that the women have carried banners with “offensive” inscriptions on them. you refer to the fact that they have addressed the president as “kaiser wilson.” as a matter of fact, not an arrest you have made—and the arrests now number more than sixty—has been for carrying one of those “offensive” banners. the women were carrying merely the suffrage colors or quotations from president wilson’s writings.
but suppose the banners were offensive? who made you censor of banners? the law gives you no such power. even when you go through the farce of a police court trial, the charge is “obstructing traffic,” which shows conclusively that you are not willing to go into court on the real issue.
no. as chief of police you have no more right to complain of the sentiments on a banner than you have of the sentiments in an editorial in the washington post, and you have no more right to arrest the banner bearers than you have to arrest the owner of the washington post. so long as the law against obscenity and profanity is observed, you have no business with the words on the banners. congress refused to pass a press censorship law. there are certain lingering traditions to the effect that a people’s 236liberties are closely bound up with the right to talk things out and those who are enlightened know that the only proper answer to words is words.
during the entire afternoon of that day—august 17—the day that major pullman called on alice paul—the sentinels stood at their posts. one of the banners read:
england and russia are enfranchising women in war time;
another:
the government orders our banners destroyed because they tell the truth.
at intervals of fifteen minutes—for two hours—the pickets were told by a captain of police that they would be arrested if they did not move. but they held their station. at half-past four, the hour at which the thousand of government clerks invade the streets, there was enough of a crowd to give the appearance that the pickets were “blocking traffic.” lavinia dock; edna dixon; natalie gray; madeline watson; catherine flanagan; lucy ewing, were arrested soon after four o’clock. their trial lasted just forty minutes. one police officer testified that they were obstructing traffic. they all refused to pay the ten-dollar fine, which, though it would have released them, would also have been an admission of guilt, and police magistrate pugh sentenced them to serve thirty days in the government workhouse.
on august 23, six women appeared at the white house, bearing banners. they were, pauline adams; gertrude hunter; clara fuller; kate boeckh; margaret fotheringham; mrs. henry l. lockwood. all of their banners quoted words from the president’s works:
i tell you solemnly, ladies and gentlemen, we cannot
postpone justice any longer in these united
237states, and i don’t wish to sit down and let any man
take care of me without my having at least a voice in
it; and if he doesn’t listen to my advice i am going to
make it as unpleasant for him as i can.
in ten minutes they were all arrested. when they appeared before police magistrate pugh, clara kinsley fuller said in part:
i am the editor, owner, and publisher of a daily and weekly newspaper in minnesota. i pay taxes to this government, yet i have nothing to say in the making of those laws which control me, either as an individual or as a business woman. taxation without representation is undemocratic. for that reason, i came to washington to help the federal amendment fight. when i learned that president wilson said that picketing was perfectly legal, i went on the picket line and did my bit towards making democracy safe at home, while our men are abroad making democracy safe for the world.
margaret fotheringham, a school-teacher, said:
i have fifteen british cousins who are in the fighting line abroad. some are back very badly wounded, and others are still in france. i have two brothers who are to be in our fighting line. they were not drafted; they enlisted. i am made of the same stuff that those boys are made of; and, whether it is abroad or at home, we are fighting for the same thing. we are fighting for the thing we hold nearest our hearts—for democracy.
to these pleas, judge pugh answered that the president was “not the one to petition for justice”; that the people of the district virtuously refrained from picketing the white house for the vote for themselves “for fear the military would take possession of the streets.”
i quote the suffragist of september 2.
here is a sample of judge pugh’s logic:
“these ladies have been told repeatedly that this law was ample to prevent picketing in front of the white house, or anywhere else on the sidewalks of the district of columbia; that it was not the fashion to petition congress in that way, to stand in front 238of the white house, the president’s mansion, to petition somebody else, a mile and a half away. the president does not have to be petitioned.... you ladies observe all the laws that give you benefits, property rights that legislatures composed of men have passed ... and those that are aimed at preserving the peace and good order of the community you do not propose to observe.”
and much more to the same effect, which proved that judge pugh knew nothing of the long vigil of the pickets at the doors of congress, and apparently nothing of the president’s actual dictatorship.
finally he admitted that he did not care to send “ladies of standing” to jail, and would refrain if they promised to stop picketing, although they were not charged with picketing. in the face of the dead silence that followed, he pronounced sentence: a fine of twenty-five dollars or thirty days at occoquan workhouse. every woman refused to pay the fine.
attorney matthew o’brien represented the women in the district court, appealing finally from the judgment of the court.
on august 28, the same women, with cornelia beach, vivian pierce, maud jamison, and lucy burns, were again arrested, and given the same sentence. an appeal was granted them again, the judge announcing that this was the last appeal he would give in the picketing cases until a decision had been given by the court of appeals.
on september 4, the day of the parade of the drafted men, thirteen women were arrested. they were: abby scott baker, dorothy bartlett, annie arniel, pauline adams, mrs. w. w. chisholm, lucy burns, margaret fotheringham, lucy branham, julia emory, eleanor calnan, edith ainge, maude malone, mary winsor.
the banner these women bore was inscribed:
mr. president, how long must women be denied a voice
in the government that is conscripting their sons?
they were sent to occoquan for sixty days.
at this vivid interval in the history of the woman’s party occurred a notable incident.
239dudley field malone, who had long been a staunch friend of the woman’s party—and one of the few men who had been willing to make a sacrifice for suffrage—resigned his position as collector of the port of new york as a protest against the intolerable suffrage situation. this was a beau geste on the part of mr. malone. there are those who believe that that gallant deed will go rolling down the centuries gathering luster as it rolls. it had an inevitable effect, not only on the members of the woman’s party, but on the members of other suffrage organizations as well, and it produced a profound impression on the country at large.
his letter of resignation reads as follows:
new york, n. y., sept. 7, 1917.
the president,
the white house,
washington, d. c.
dear mr. president:
last autumn, as the representative of your administration, i went into the woman suffrage states to urge your re-election. the most difficult argument to meet among the seven million voters was the failure of the democratic party, throughout four years of power, to pass the federal suffrage amendment, looking towards the enfranchisement of all the women in the country. throughout those states, and particularly in california, which ultimately decided the election by the votes of women, the women voters were urged to support you, even though judge hughes had already declared for the federal suffrage amendment, because you and your party, through liberal leadership, were more likely nationally to enfranchise the rest of the women of the country than were your opponents.
and if the women of the west voted to re-elect you, i promised them i would spend all my energy, at any sacrifice to myself, to get the present democratic administration to pass the federal suffrage amendment.
but the present policy of the administration, in permitting splendid american women to be sent to jail in washington, not for carrying offensive banners, nor for picketing, but on the technical charge of obstructing traffic, is a denial even of their constitutional right to petition for, and demand the passage of, the federal suffrage amendment. it, therefore, now becomes my profound obligation actively to keep my promise to the women of the west.
240in more than twenty states it is a practical impossibility to amend the state constitutions; so the women of those states can only be enfranchised by the passage of the federal suffrage amendment. since england and russia, in the midst of the great war, have assured the national enfranchisement of their women, should we not be jealous to maintain our democratic leadership in the world by the speedy national enfranchisement of american women?
to me, mr. president, as i urged upon you in washington two months ago, this is not only a measure of justice and democracy, it is also an urgent war measure. the women of the nation are, and always will be, loyal to the country, and the passage of the suffrage amendment is only the first step toward their national emancipation. but unless the government takes at least this first step toward their enfranchisement, how can the government ask millions of american women, educated in our schools and colleges, and millions of american women in our homes, or toiling for economic independence in every line of industry, to give up by conscription their men and happiness to a war for democracy in europe while these women citizens are denied the right to vote on the policies of the government which demands of them such sacrifice?
for this reason many of your most ardent friends and supporters feel that the passage of the federal suffrage amendment is a war measure which could appropriately be urged by you at this session of congress. it is true that this amendment would have to come from congress, but the present congress shows no earnest desire to enact this legislation for the simple reason that you, as the leader of the party in power, have not yet suggested it.
for the whole country gladly acknowledges, mr. president, that no vital piece of legislation has come through congress these five years except by your extraordinary and brilliant leadership. and millions of men and women today hope that you will give the federal suffrage amendment to the women of the country by the valor of your leadership now. it will hearten the mothers of the nation, eliminate a just grievance, and turn the devoted energies of brilliant women to a more hearty support of the government in this crisis.
as you well know, in dozens of speeches in many states i have advocated your policies and the war. i was the first man of your administration, nearly five years ago, publicly to advocate preparedness, and helped to found the first plattsburg training camp. and if, with our troops mobilizing in france, you will 241give american women this measure for their political freedom, they will support with greater enthusiasm your hope and the hope of america for world freedom.
i have not approved all the methods recently adopted by women in the pursuit of their political liberty; yet, mr. president, the committee on suffrage of the united states senate was formed in 1883, when i was one year old; this same federal suffrage amendment was first introduced in congress in 1878; brave women like susan b. anthony were petitioning congress for the suffrage before the civil war, and at the time of the civil war men like william lloyd garrison, horace greeley, and wendell phillips assured the suffrage leaders that if they abandoned their fight for suffrage, when the war was ended the men of the nation, “out of gratitude,” would enfranchise the women of the country!
and if the men of this country had been peacefully demanding for over half a century the political right or privilege to vote, and had been continuously ignored or met with evasion by successive congresses, as have the women, you, mr. president, as a lover of liberty, would be the first to comprehend and forgive their inevitable impatience and righteous indignation. will not this administration, re-elected to power by the hope and faith of the women of the west, handsomely reward that faith by taking action now for the passage of the federal suffrage amendment?
in the port of new york, during the last four years, billions of dollars in the export and import trade of the country have been handled by the men of the customs service; their treatment of the traveling public has radically changed, their vigilance supplied the evidence for the lusitania note; the neutrality was rigidly maintained; the great german fleet guarded, captured, and repaired; substantial economies and reforms have been concluded, and my ardent industry has been given to this great office of your appointment. but now i wish to leave these finished tasks, to return to my profession of the law, and to give all my leisure time to fight as hard for the political freedom of women as i have always fought for your liberal leadership.
it seems a long seven years, mr. president, since i first campaigned with you when you were running for governor of new jersey. in every circumstance throughout those years, i have served you with the most respectful affection and unshadowed devotion. it is no small sacrifice now for me, as a member of your administration, to sever our political relationship. but i think it is high time that men in this generation, at some cost to 242themselves, stood up to battle for the national enfranchisement of american women. so in order effectively to keep my promise made in the west, and more freely to go into this larger field of democratic effort, i hereby resign my office as collector of the port of new york, to take effect at once, or at your earliest convenience.
yours respectfully,
dudley field malone.
on september 13, six pickets left headquarters at half-past four in the afternoon. they were: katherine fisher, mrs. frederick willard kendall, mrs. mark jackson, ruth crocker, nina samardin, eleanor gwinter. the two lettered banners were borne by miss fisher and mrs. kendall:
how long must women wait for liberty?
mr. president, what will you do for woman suffrage?
they marched straight to the lower gate. a crowd had already collected there. another crowd lined the edge of the sidewalk across the street on lafayette square. there were two police officers on the white house sidewalk, and several across the way.
the crowd made way for the group of pickets, and they took their accustomed places at the gate. for a few minutes nothing happened. during all these days of roughness and riot, it had been very difficult to take pictures. it seemed as though the thing the police most feared was the truth. they would not permit the moving-picture men to record these vivid events. they even confiscated cameras. photographers ran the risk always of having their cameras destroyed. on this day, gladys greiner, a suffragist, was taking pictures of the crowd. as she leveled her kodak at a police captain, he kicked her. she continued to take her pictures nevertheless. a sailor and a marine, both in uniform, instead of moving as the police had ordered, came closer and closer to the pickets. suddenly, the sailor snatched the banner from the pole. the two men tore the 243banner into pieces; passed the scraps to their friends. the police looked on without interference. then they arrested the women. they were taken to judge mullowny.
judge mullowny had been away for two months from the bench. in the meantime, his ideas on the offense of picketing had undergone another change. his first decision in regard to the suffragists was that they obstructed traffic, and, in regard to the banners, that they “had nothing to do with the case.” later, he decided that the banners were “treasonable.” now, in regard to their banner, how long must women wait for liberty?, he decided: “since this banner is unlikely to give offense, i will give you women a light sentence this time.”
all evidence except that of the two policemen was ruled out. in regard to the conduct of the police captain in kicking miss greiner, the judge said: “i have nothing to do with those things; they have nothing to do with the case.”
he asked, “would you pay a fine instead of going to prison, if i made the fine fifty cents?”
“not if you made it five cents,” replied mrs. kendall, who spoke for the six prisoners.
he therefore sentenced them to thirty days in the government workhouse.
on september 22, four more suffragists were arrested. they were peggy baird johns, margaret wood kessler, ernestine hara, hilda blumberg. they carried a new banner this time, quoting words from an early work of the president. it said:
president wilson, what did you mean when you said, “we have seen a good many singular things happen recently. we have been told that it is unpatriotic to criticize public action. well, if it is, there is a deep disgrace resting upon the origin of this nation. this nation originated in the sharpest sort of criticism of public policy. we originated, to put it in the vernacular, 244in a kick and if it is unpatriotic to kick, why, then the grown man is unlike the child. we have forgotten the very principle of our origin if we have forgotten how to object, how to resist, how to agitate, how to pull down and build up even to the extent of revolutionary practices if it be necessary to readjust matters. i have forgotten my history if that be not true history.”
the suffragist of september 29 describes this event:
when the pickets this week took up their stations at the east gate of the white house, and unfurled the “seditious” utterance of the president himself, the banner was almost immediately confiscated by the two police officers who had hurried to the spot. they seemed anxious to keep from the little pressing crowd the fact that the president had once been not only a democrat, but a democrat.
the two officers then stood directly in front of the little group of women carrying tri-colored flags, with their backs to what crowd there was. more than half of the wide white house sidewalks were vacant of pedestrians. the officers had evidently been ordered to let the crowd collect for a certain number of minutes before they arrested the women. they betrayed not the slightest interest in the spectators, but watched their victims with bored attention as they waited for the patrol....
the four young women were, on the following day, after the usual court proceeding, sentenced to thirty days in the government workhouse for “obstructing traffic.”
a brief statement was made by each of the little group. “we are not citizens,” said these young women. “we are not represented. we were silently, peacefully attempting to gain the freedom of twenty million women in the united states of america. we have broken no law. we are guilty of no crime. we have been illegally arrested. we demand our freedom, and we shall continue to ask for it until the government acts.”
they were given thirty days in the workhouse.
the last picketing of the emergency war session of the sixty-fifth congress took place on october 6, the day congress adjourned. there were eleven women in this picket line: dr. caroline spencer, vivian pierce, louise lewis 245kahle, rose winslow, joy young, matilda young, minnie henesy, kate heffelfinger, maud jamison, lou c. daniels.
alice paul led them. congress was adjourning. the work of the woman’s party was going on smoothly. for the first time, alice paul felt that she had the leisure to go to jail.
in the suffragist of october 13, pauline jacobson of the san francisco bulletin thus describes their arrest:
i had had much of the western prejudice against the “militant movement” that the live suffrage battle had become in this country. i had thought from the newspaper reports that have gone forth concerning the action of these “militant suffragists,” that “picketing” was rowdy and unlovely. i found it a silent, a still thing—a thing sublime....
the sun, which never seems bright to me under these paler eastern skies, slanted chill and thin through the falling golden foliage of autumn trees lining the broad avenue on which the white house stands. diagonally across, flying the suffrage colors, stands the handsome old cameron house, the headquarters of the woman’s party.
suddenly that chill avenue vista became vibrant with color, with fluttering banners, wide-striped of purple, white, and gold, borne aloft on tall, imposing, war-like spears. down the avenue they fluttered slowly, as if moved by some mysterious force. then i saw the force that was sending those banners forward through the careless crowds.
there were eleven women, each bearing high her colored banner. the leader, a woman frail, and slight, and very pale, her eyes and face really lit with exaltation of purpose, carried a white flag on which was printed: “mr. president, what will you do for woman suffrage?” then behind them followed the others with the vivid purple and gold flags on the spear-headed staffs. they looked neither to the right nor to the left. they seemed to me to walk so lightly that the great banners carried them; and there was the glow in all of their eyes though their faces were quite unsmiling.
the street in an instant had become alive with people who gathered about, followed, or lined the curbs, men and women—the women for the most part curious, the men for the most part disdainful, insolent, or leering. it was not a western crowd; there was no generosity in it.
but silently, perceived by all but perceiving none, the women 246marched straight ahead. as they neared the white house a sailor sprang forward and tore the banner from one picket, threw it on the ground, and trampled on it. the young girl who had carried it stooped down and silently rescued her banner. i thought there was tenderness in the way she smoothed it out and tried to fasten it again to her tall staff. four banners were torn and mutilated like that. each girl, without a word, like the first, tried to protect her flag.
and then, like a flash, those eleven women, a few feet apart, were flanking either side of the wide white house gates like living statues, only their colored banners fluttering upward. they stood facing the coming and going crowd silently. there was the pale little leader with her staff bare; the crowd had torn away that simple question on the white flag....
then came shouted orders, the sudden waving of blue-coated arms, and the elbowing to the front of blue coats with much gold braid. the police were scattering the curious crowd. above their orders came the clang of the patrol. next the eleven statues had disappeared from the white house gates. they were being crowded to the front by the fat officer in the uniform. they were still silent and still proud. there was something majestic even in the way each stooped her head to enter the small door of the patrol wagon. and the last uniformed officer who had gathered together the brilliant flags sat in front, where they still fluttered triumphant in the wind as the patrol clanged off and the crowd shouted.
i followed them to the police station. it seemed to me there was strange delay in the procedure of accepting bail for people charged with so simple an offense—for they were charged with “obstructing traffic.” that same day, i had seen dense crowds watching the world series returns, with mounted police to clear a space for the cars. there were no arrests for blocking traffic. they were finally released on bail for trial the following monday.
the eleven women were tried on october 8. they refused to recognize the court. they would not be sworn. they would not question witnesses. they would not speak in their own behalf.
alice paul said—i quote the suffragist:
we do not wish to make any plea before this court. we do not consider ourselves subject to this court since, as an unenfranchised class, we have nothing to do with the making of the laws which have put us in this position.
247the judge did not sentence the eleven women. he suspended sentence and restored the bail furnished by the suffragists for their appearance. for this surprising change of front, no reason was given. though apparently inconsistent, it was perfectly consistent with the policy of an administration quite dazed and uncertain in regard to its treatment of the picketing women.
in point of fact, the court did not sentence the women because congress was adjourning. they did not dismiss the charge, however.
regarding the freeing of the pickets miss paul said:
we are glad that the authorities have retreated at last from their untenable position, and grown wary of prosecuting women for peacefully petitioning for political liberty.
the action of the court this morning makes more glaring than ever the injustice of holding nineteen women on sixty and thirty day sentences in occoquan workhouse for the same offense of petitioning for liberty which we committed. we will use our unexpected freedom to press our campaign with ever-increasing vigor.
on october 15, four pickets, under suspended sentence from their picketing of october 6, went out again. they were rose winslow, kate heffelfinger, minnie henesy, maud jamison. the police were taken absolutely by surprise. it was ten minutes before the patrol wagons appeared. in the meantime, of course, a crowd gathered to see what was going to happen. when the patrol stopped at the curb, an officer approached the pickets. “move on!” he ordered, and, before the pickets could move on, or even make a reply—“i will put you under arrest,” and immediately, “you are under arrest.” rose winslow, one of the pickets, lifted her banner high, and marched with the air of a conqueror to the waiting patrol. the crowd burst into spontaneous applause.
in court rose winslow said:
we have seen officers of the law permit men to assault women, to destroy their banners, to enter their residences. how, then, can you ask us to have respect for the law? we thought that 248by dismissing the suffragists without sentence this court had finally decided to recognize our legal right to petition the government. we shall continue to picket because it is our right. on the tenth of november there will be a long line of suffragists who will march to the white house gates to ask for political liberty. you can send us to jail, but you know that we have broken no law. you know that we have not even committed the technical offense on which we were arrested. you know that we are guiltless.
judge mullowny gave them the choice between a twenty-five dollar fine and six months in the district workhouse. they, of course, refused to pay the fine.
at half-past four on october 20, alice paul led a deputation of three pickets to the west gate of the white house. the others were dr. caroline spencer, gladys greiner, gertrude crocker. alice paul carried a banner with the words of president wilson which had appeared recently on the posters for the second liberty bond loan of 1917:
the time has come to conquer or submit. for us there
can be but one choice. we have made it.
dr. caroline spencer’s banner bore the watchword of ’76:
resistance to tyranny is obedience to god.
they were arrested as soon as the police had permitted what seemed a sufficient crowd to gather, placed in the patrol wagon, and taken to the district jail.
the officer testified as follows—the italics are my own:
i made my way through the crowd that was surrounding them, and told the ladies they were violating the law by standing at the gates, and would not they please move on.
assistant district attorney hart asked: did they move on?
lee answered: they did not, and they did not answer either.
hart: what did you do then?
lee: placed them under arrest.
249the two women who carried the banners—alice paul and caroline spencer—were sentenced to seven months in jail; the other two pickets were offered the choice of a five dollar fine or thirty days, and, of course, took the thirty days.
on the same occasion, rose winslow and those who were arrested with her, maud jamison, kate heffelfinger, minnie henesy—both on october 4 and october 15—came up for further sentence. rose winslow described very vigorously the confusion of the suffragists who, she admitted, were not more nonplussed than judge mullowny admitted the court was. she said:
you sentence us to jail for a few days, then you sentence us to the workhouse for thirty days, then sixty, and then you suspend sentence. sometimes we are accused of carrying seditious banners, then of obstructing traffic. how do you expect us to see any consistency in the law, or in your sentences?
the court smiled, and pronounced an additional thirty days, saying: “first, you will serve six months, and then you will serve one month more.”
alice paul had been in jail ever since october 20. when the news first got out, women came from all over the country to join the picket forces. it was decided that on november 10, forty-one women should go out on the picket line as a protest against her imprisonment. but on the night of november 9, these forty-one women—accompanied by sympathizers and friends—went down to the jail where their leader was confined. headquarters had heard from alice paul from time to time, and alice paul had heard from headquarters—by means of a cleaning-woman in the jail. in her jailed for freedom, doris stevens tells how she went down to the jail and talked to alice paul from the yard. catherine flanagan and mrs. sophie meredith had communicated with her in this same manner. and once vida milholland came and sang under her window. but this was the first time that a deputation visited their imprisoned leader.
250the house in which warden zinkham lived was close to the wing in which alice paul was imprisoned. the leader of the delegation, katherine morey, accompanied by catherine flanagan, went to zinkham’s door and rang the bell; asked to see him. they were told that he was ill and could not be seen. immediately, the two girls gave a prearranged signal to the silent crowd of pickets back of them. with one accord, they ran and grouped themselves under alice paul’s window. before the guards could rush upon them and push them out of the yard, they had managed to call up to her their names; the large sum of money which that day had come into the treasury; that forty-one of them would protest against her imprisonment on the picket line the next day.
the next morning, the picket line of forty-one women marched from headquarters in five groups. the first was led by mrs. john winters brannan.
as usual, the pickets bore golden-lettered banners. as usual, they bore purple, white, and gold flags. as usual, they walked slowly—always a banner’s length apart. they moved over to pennsylvania avenue; took up their silent statuesque position at the east and west gates of the white house.
the thick stream of government clerks, hastening with home-going swiftness, paused to look at them. involuntarily they applauded the women when they were arrested. this happened almost immediately, the police hurrying the pickets into the line of waiting patrols. suddenly the crowd raised a shout:
“there come some more!”
the second picket line numbered ten women.
they also bore golden lettered banners. they also bore flags of purple, white, and gold. they were arrested immediately.
the applause continued to grow and grow in volume.
251immediately a third group appeared, and after they had been arrested, a fourth; and, on their arrest, a fifth. for half an hour a continuous line of purple, white, and gold blazed its revolutionary path through the grayness of the november afternoon.
mary a. nolan of florida headed the fifth group of pickets. little, frail, lame, seventy years old, her gallantry elicited from the two lines of onlookers applause, cheers, calls of encouragement.
“keep right on!” one voice emerged from the noise. “you’ll make them give it to you!”
the women of the first group were: mrs. john winters brannan, belle sheinberg, l. h. hornesby, paula jakobi, cynthia cohen, m. tilden burritt, dorothy day, mrs. henry butterworth, cora weeks, peggy baird johns, elizabeth hamilton, ella guilford, amy juengling, hattie kruger.
the women of the second group were: agnes h. morey, mrs. william bergen, camilla whitcomb, ella findeisen, lou daniels, mrs. george scott, mrs. lawrence lewis, elizabeth mcshane, kathryn lincoln.
the women of the third group were: mrs. william kent, alice gram, betty gram, mrs. r. b. quay, mrs. c. t. robertson, eva decker, genevieve williams.
the women of the fourth group were: mrs. charles w. barnes, kate stafford, mrs. j. h. short, mrs. a. n. beim, catherine martinette.
the women of the fifth group were: mrs. harvey wiley, alice cosu, mary bartlett dixon, julia emory, mary a. nolan, lucy burns.
the forty-one women were tried on november 12. they were charged with “obstructing traffic,” and pleaded “not guilty.” the police sergeants and plain-clothes men gave their testimony which was refuted absolutely by witnesses for the defendants—helena hill weed, olivia dunbar torrence, marie manning gasch, mary ingham.
mrs. john winters brannan said:
252the responsibility for an agitation like ours against injustice rests with those who deny justice, not those who demand it. whatever may be the verdict of this court, we shall continue our agitation until the grievance of american women is redressed.
mrs. harvey wiley said:
i want to state that we took this action with great consecration of spirit. we took this action with willingness to sacrifice our personal liberty in order to focus the attention of the nation on the injustice of our disfranchisement, that we might thereby win political liberty for all the women of the country. the constitution says that congress shall not in any way abridge the right of citizens peacefully to assembly and petition. that is exactly what we did. we peacefully assembled and then proceeded with our petition to the president for the redress of our grievance of disfranchisement. the constitution does not specify the form of petition. ours was in the form of a banner. to say that we “broke traffic regulations” when we exercised our constitutional right of petition is therefore unconstitutional.
judge mullowny admitted the embarrassment of the administration.
“the trouble of the situation is that the court has not been given power to meet it,” he complained. “it is very, very puzzling.”
a little after three o’clock, he dismissed the pickets without imposing sentence. he said he would take the case under advisement.
an hour later, twenty-seven of the women who had just been tried—with, in addition, mrs. william l. colt, elizabeth smith, matilda young, hilda blumberg—emerged from headquarters. they walked twice up and down in front of the white house before they took their places at the gates.
the police were dumbfounded by their unexpected onslaught. there were no patrols waiting. but they pulled themselves together, arrested the pickets, and commandeered cars in which to take them to the police headquarters.
the thirty-one women were ordered to appear in court on november 14. there, after waiting all the morning, 253judge mullowny told them to come back friday.
at headquarters, it was believed that this was not only a challenge to the quality of their spirit, but to the degree of their patience.
many women had come from a long distance to make this protest. not all could spare the time, money, and vitality. their answer to that challenge was instant and convincing. on the afternoon of november 13, the picket line went out again—thirty-one of them.
the pickets blazed their way through dense, black throngs. the crowd was distinctly friendly.
suddenly one of the banners disappeared; another and another until six of them were destroyed; the bare poles proceeded on their way however. the same person accomplished all this—the uniformed yeoman who dragged alice paul across thirty feet of pavement on august 15. but this time, the crowd—friendly—manifested its disapproval, and the police arrested him. the pickets stood for a long time, their line stretching from gate to gate, until they began to think that the administration had changed its tactics. then suddenly the patrol wagon gong sounded in the distance. presently they were all arrested.
many of the pickets had been tried the day before. as their bail had not been refunded, they refused to give more. they were kept that night in the house of detention. as this institution had but two rooms with eight beds each, some of the women slept on the floor. they were tried and sentenced the next day. one of them—the aged mrs. nolan—got six days, three fifteen days, twenty-four thirty days, two—mrs. lawrence lewis and mrs. john winters brannan—sixty days, and one—lucy burns—six months.
it was this group of women who went through the night of terror, subsequently to be described.
on november 17, three more women—mrs. harvey wiley, mrs. william kent, and elizabeth mcshane—were sentenced to fifteen days on the november 10 charges.
254all these prisoners except four were sent to the occoquan workhouse.
habeas corpus proceedings became necessary—owing to conditions which will presently be set forth—and a writ was procured; but only after numberless obstacles were surmounted. the case came up in the united states district court at alexandria, virginia, with judge edmund waddill sitting. judge waddill ordered the prisoners transferred to the jail on the ground that they should have been confined there instead of at occoquan workhouse. later the court of appeals reversed this decision. in the meantime, brought to the jail, the government was faced with the necessity of forcibly feeding the majority of these women, already weakened from hunger-striking.
here, perhaps, is the place to tell of a curious incident that happened during alice paul’s jail term. for this to strike the reader with the force it deserves, he must remember that alice paul was held almost incommunicado, that she saw but two friends from the outside, and then only for a few minutes, that she could not confer with her counsel, dudley field malone, who had to overcome extraordinary obstacles—had finally to threaten habeas corpus proceedings and to see high officials who were his personal friends—to get to her. two newspaper men were admitted, but they were friendly to the administration.
one evening, at nine o’clock—an hour when all the prisoners were supposed to be in bed—the door opened and a stranger entered her room. he proved to be david lawrence, a newspaper man, very well known as one who was closely associated with the administration. he did not say that he had come from the administration, but, of course, it is obvious that if he had not been in favor with the administration, he would not have been admitted. he stayed two hours, and miss paul talked over the situation with him.
i now quote miss younger, who has told this episode on many platforms:
255he asked miss paul how long she and the other pickets would give the administration before they began picketing again. she said it would depend upon the attitude the administration and congress seemed to be taking toward the federal amendment. he said he believed the prohibition bill would be brought up and passed, and after that was out of the way the suffrage bill would be taken up.
he asked if we would be content to have it go through one house this session and wait till the next session for it to pass the other house. miss paul said that if the bill did not go through both houses this session, the woman’s party would not be satisfied.
then the man said he believed that the president would not mention suffrage in his message at the opening of congress, but would make it known to the leaders of congress that he wanted it passed and would see that it passed.
he said in effect: now the great difficulty is for these hunger-strikers to be recognized as political prisoners. every day you hunger-strike, you advertise the idea of political prisoners throughout the country. it would be the easiest thing in the world for the administration to treat you as political prisoners; to put you in a fine house in washington; give you the best of food; take the best of care of you; but if we treat you as political prisoners, we would have to treat other groups which might arise in opposition to the war program as political prisoners too, and that would throw a bomb in our war program. it would never do. it would be easier to give you the suffrage amendment than to treat you as political prisoners.
on november 27 and 28, a few days after miss paul’s strange experience—suddenly, quite arbitrarily, and with no reason assigned—the government released all the suffrage prisoners.
the speakers of the woman’s party began telling this story of the visit to alice paul’s cell, everywhere. it finally appeared in the milwaukee leader and in the san francisco bulletin in an article written by john d. barry. the national association opposed to woman suffrage immediately questioned the truth of this episode.
congress reconvened on december 3. the president, true to david lawrence’s prophecy, did not mention suffrage in his message to congress. however, on january 9, 1918, on 256the evening of the victorious vote in the house—as will subsequently and in more detail again be told—the president declared for the federal amendment.
minnie bronson, the general secretary of the national association opposed to woman suffrage, immediately sent alice paul a letter of apology for questioning the truth of her statement. in that letter, she repeats maud younger’s statement in regard to this visit to alice paul in prison, and says:
the inference contained in this article that the president of the united states would under cover assist a proposition which he had publicly and unqualifiedly repudiated, seemed to us unworthy of his high office, and we felt justified in defending him from what seemed an unwarranted and unbelievable accusation.
however, the president’s subsequent public support of the federal suffrage amendment, his announcement coming on the eve of the vote in the house of representatives, indicates the truth of your original assertion, and we therefore deem it incumbent upon ourselves to apologize for having questioned miss younger’s statement.
we are sending a copy of this letter to the president and members of congress.
very truly yours,
minnie bronson.
perhaps a word should be said of description—and even of explanation—in regard to the crowds who harried the suffragists. of course, in all crowds there is a hoodlum element, and if that element is not held down by the police, it rapidly becomes the controlling power; tends to become more and more destructive. the police, as has been indicated from time to time, adopted various policies. at first, they maintained order. then they began to permit the rowdy element in the crowds to do as it pleased. later, they even worked with these destructive forces.
men were heard to say, one to another, “stick around here. something’s going to happen this afternoon. i saw it this morning.” to them, of course, it was merely an entertaining exhibition.
obeying orders.
washington police arresting white house pickets before the treasury building.
photo copr. harris and ewing, washington, d. c.
the patrol wagon waiting the arrival of the suffrage pickets.
photo copr. harris and ewing, washington, d. c.
257an enlisting sergeant used often to make his way through the crowds saying, “now you have shown your spirit, boys, come and enlist!”
at all times, however, the people who annoyed, and later ill-treated the girls, were very young men—often in uniform. after a while there appeared men in plain clothes with groups of men in khaki, or yeomen, who were obviously in the crowd for the purpose of making trouble for the suffragists. these people did not like cameras, and the moving picture people who, appreciating the news value of the situation, tried to get views of the crowd, did so at the risk of having their cameras smashed. indeed, helena hill weed once dispersed a crowd by pointing a camera at them. this was the worst element the pickets had to deal with—unthinking young men of a semi-brutalized type. of course, boys took their cue from their elders, and snatched or destroyed banners where they could. after a demonstration, you would come across groups of them, marching with the tattered banners that they had managed to steal.
“when is the shooting going to begin?” one little boy was heard to ask once.
in the very midst of the riots, one would come across older men cutting up banners into small pieces which they gave away as souvenirs.
of course, there were chivalrous spirits who protested against the treatment of the pickets by the police—protested even after they were threatened with arrest. some of them were actually arrested, and one of them fined.
often—very often indeed—the waiting crowds broke into spontaneous applause when group after group marched from headquarters into the certainty of arrest. those who were anglo-saxons inevitably admired the sporting quality of these women.
perhaps a negro street sweeper summed it up better than anybody else. he said: “i doan know what them women want, but i know they ain’t skeered!”
the reader is probably asking by this time what was the 258effect of the picketing on the woman’s party itself. the first reaction was exactly what he would guess—that members resigned in large numbers. the second, however, was one which he might not expect—that new members joined in large numbers. in other words, the militant action which alienated some women brought others into the organization; women who were aroused by the simple and immediate demands of the woman’s party and by the courage and the forthrightness with which it pushed those demands; women who had become impatient at the impasse to which the older generation of suffrage workers had brought the suffrage amendment. the majority of the people who deserted came back later.
as far as money was concerned, the effect was magical. in some months during the picketing the receipts were double what they had been the corresponding months of the previous year when there had been no picketing. once those receipts jumped as high as six times the normal amount. this was what happened in england during the militant period.
