DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.[30]
While the women in the District of Columbia rejoiced with those in the
States over the successful end of the long, hard fight for the Federal
Suffrage Amendment their joy was tempered by the fact that they still
had before them a struggle for an amendment which would enfranchise
the residents of the District--one really for equal suffrage, men and
women alike being without the vote. The Congress itself now has entire
jurisdiction, each branch appointing a committee for the purpose.
The district is a municipal corporation, administered by a Board of
three commissioners, two of whom are appointed by the President of the
United States from civil life, confirmed by the Senate, the third
being detailed by him from the engineer corps of the army. The
argument for the citizen's franchise is that representation in
Congress for the residents of the District would only give them a
voice in the governing body without impairing the "exclusive
jurisdiction" given to Congress by the National Constitution. It has a
population greater than six of the States and pays taxes in excess of
twenty-two States--each of which has two Senators and Representatives
based on its population. Local self-government also is advocated by
some residents but the majority are behind the movement to obtain
representation in Congress and the vote for presidential electors.
From the time this matter was first agitated the woman suffrage
association of the District has insisted that women should have the
same rights granted to men.
Although the suffragists of the District had no hope of
enfranchisement from the Federal Amendment, nevertheless their
interest in the cause never flagged and they gave freely of their time
and money to aid the movement for it. From 1869 to 1895 they assisted
every year the convention of the National Woman Suffrage Association
in Washington, and afterwards whenever it was held in this city. Its
great celebration of Miss Susan B. Anthony's 80th birthday in
February, 1900, gave a new impetus to the cause. The various societies
had been organized in 1898 into the District of Columbia State Equal
Suffrage Association, corresponding to those in the various States.
The old parent society formed in 1868 and the first Junior Club were
augmented by the Political Study Club organized in 1900, to study the
origin, growth and government of cities and later agitating the
question of placing women on boards of charities, schools, etc.; by
the Elizabeth Cady Stanton Club, organized in 1901, to take up the
study of general taxation, methods of carrying on the public schools,
tariff, finance and city government; by the College Equal Suffrage
League, organized in 1909 and doing excellent work, and in 1916 by the
Anthony League, organized in 1911 primarily for suffrage, but taking
up civic affairs. The Woman Suffrage Council was formed from these
societies in 1914 to aid the Congressional Committee of the National
Association at its branch headquarters in Washington. The name was
afterwards changed to Equal Franchise League when it was decided to
keep the organization intact for the purpose of working for suffrage
in the district. Mrs. Glenna Smith Tinnin was the first chairman,
followed by Mrs. George A. Mosshart and Mrs. Louis Brownlow.
The D. C. State Association held regular meetings about four times a
year and some special sessions. It kept the woman suffrage sentiment
active and was responsible for a great deal of progressive work. The
following served as presidents: Mrs. Helen Rand Tindall, 1898; Mrs.
Ellen Powell Thompson, 1899; Mrs. Carrie E. Kent, 1900; Mrs. Tindall,
1901; Mrs. Kent, 1902-3; Mrs. Mary L. Talbott, 1904-5; Mrs. Jessie
Waite Wright, 1906-7-8; Miss Harriette J. J. Hifton, 1909-10; Mrs. Le
Droit Barber, 1911; Miss Florence Etheridge, 1912; Mrs. Nina E.
Allender, 1913; Mrs. Kent, 1914; Miss Mary O'Toole, 1915 to 1920.[31]
A number of prominent women in the District were officers of the local
suffrage clubs and worked under their auspices, being connected
through them with the D. C. State Association. A part of the program
of the latter in 1904-5 was a study of Fisk's Civil Government of the
United States, Laws affecting Women and Children, taxation and other
subjects of public interest. There was also discussion of bills before
Congress of special interest to women and the association supported
those for the protection of neglected and delinquent children,
compulsory education and restriction of child labor. A bill to raise
the salaries of public school teachers was strongly pressed. Among
those especially active were Mrs. Ellen Spencer Mussey, Dr. Emily
Young O'Brien and Mrs. Alice Stern Gitterman. Through their efforts
two truant officers were appointed, one white and one colored. During
this period the work was being done which led to the establishment of
a Juvenile Court with one probation officer, Mrs. Charles Darwin. In
1906 and 1907 the suffragists were active in agitating for women on
the Board of Education and succeeded in having two white women and one
colored woman appointed, as well as thirty women supervisors of the
public playgrounds. In 1908, also as a direct result of the efforts of
Mrs. Helen Rand Tindall and other members of the association, two
public comfort stations were built at a cost of $35,000, with bath,
rest rooms and all sanitary conveniences, the first in the city. The
association and the College Equal Suffrage League sent representatives
to a hearing before the Commissioners to ask that if a referendum on
the excise question should be taken women should have a vote as well
as men. In 1909 the association assisted in the petition work of the
national organization and paid the secretary who was in charge of
their headquarters in Washington for keeping them open evenings. Under
the auspices of the association lectures were given by Mrs. Emmeline
Pankhurst and Mrs. Ethel Snowdon of England.
In 1910 at a hearing granted to the National Association by the
Judiciary Committee of Congress the District was represented by Miss
Emma M. Gillett and Mrs. Katharine Reed Balentine, who overheard one
of its members say that if the women really wanted suffrage they
should do something more than come up there to make speeches so as to
have them cheaply printed and mailed without postage. Miss Gillett,
who soon afterwards was made chairman of the National Congressional
Committee, was so stimulated by this remark that at her request the D.
C. State Association raised $100 and she herself contributed $100 and
used the fund to circularize every candidate for Congress in the 1910
campaign. She appealed through the _Woman's Journal_ for
contributions, but only $14 were received. The circular asked seven
searching questions covering all forms of woman suffrage. The answers
were tabulated and sent out by the Associated Press. [See Chapter X,
Volume V.]
President Seth Low, of the National Civic Federation, called a
conference in Washington Jan. 17-19, 1910, of delegates to be
appointed by the Governors of States and "presidents of commercial,
agricultural, manufacturing, labor, financial, professional and other
bodies national in extent." The program was to include discussions of
"public health, pure food regulations, uniform divorce law and
discrimination against married women as to the control of their
children and property." The suffragists asked the Commissioners to
appoint women among the twelve delegates to represent the District,
but this was not done. Mr. Low in answering Mrs. Carrie Chapman Catt's
criticism that women delegates had not been invited, said it had not
occurred to him that women would be interested but that he would
place the name of the National Suffrage Association on the list for
future calls of a like character.
This year the clergymen of Washington were circularized to ascertain
their position on woman suffrage and the great field of usefulness it
would offer for women in moral and social reforms was pointed out.
Miss Hifton and Miss Anna C. Kelton (afterwards Mrs. Harvey W. Wiley)
took charge of this work and the 129 letters they sent received only
eight answers, five in favor, two non-committal, one opposed. For the
first time permission was obtained from the school board to post
notices of the national suffrage convention in the school buildings,
Miss Anna MacLaren arranging for it.
In 1911 representatives of the association addressed many conventions
in Washington and asked that resolutions favoring suffrage for women
be passed. They were not successful but presented their cause. In
1912-13 the suffragists were busy among other things in agitating the
question of having a woman as Juvenile Court Judge. President Taft
practically promised the appointment, but the male incumbent was
allowed to hold over another year. A meeting of women lawyers was held
and a committee appointed to call on Attorney General Wickersham to
urge the name of Mrs. Ellen Spencer Mussey, then Dean of the
Washington College of Law. She was endorsed by several thousand men
and women, over six hundred of whom were teachers in the public
schools and familiar with Mrs. Mussey's excellent work on the Board of
Education, but no woman was appointed. (In 1918 Miss Kathryn Sellers,
president of the College Women's Equal Suffrage League, was appointed
by President Wilson.)
On March 3, the day before the inauguration of Woodrow Wilson, for the
first time women marched on Pennsylvania Avenue. The parade was
arranged by the Congressional Committee of the National Association,
of which Miss Alice Paul was chairman. Objection being made by
Superintendent of Police Sylvester to giving a permit, the women
appealed to the Senate Committee for the District on the ground that
as citizens and tax-payers they had the right to use the avenue, and a
joint resolution was passed by Congress granting it. Adequate police
protection, however, was not given, indeed some of the police
themselves hooted and jeered with the mob which attacked the paraders.
Doubtless it was composed of persons who had come from outside to the
inauguration. It took three hours to march the mile from the Peace
Monument to the Treasury, where tableaux were given on the steps.
Finally it was necessary to call the troops from Fort Myer. The Senate
ordered an investigation and the Police Superintendent resigned. It
was said that this parade won thousands of friends for the cause of
woman suffrage.
This year the Congressional Union was organized to work in the
District and the States solely for the Federal Suffrage Amendment,
with Miss Paul chairman, Miss Lucy Burns, Mrs. Crystal Eastman, Mrs.
Mary Beard and Mrs. Lawrence Lewis the other officers. It had its own
headquarters and was not affiliated with the National American
Association.
In 1914 the suffragists protested again, this time to the Chamber of
Commerce, against a constitutional amendment sponsored by it to
enfranchise the residents of the District, because it did not
definitely state that women should be included. This protest was also
taken up in the Federation of Women's Clubs through the auxiliaries of
the State Suffrage Association, which were affiliated with it. During
1915 and 1916 suffragists addressed all the civic bodies in Washington
on the necessity of including women in any measure looking to the
enfranchisement of the residents of the District. As a result of this
continuous agitation a compromise was reached to hold the question in
abeyance until a constitutional amendment was passed enabling Congress
to grant suffrage to the District. The association as usual
participated in commemorating the birthdays of Mrs. Stanton and Miss
Anthony and placed wreaths on the bust of Lincoln in the rotunda of
the Capitol. It joined in the contest with the school board which
tried to exclude married women as teachers.
During the closing years of the long campaign for woman suffrage
street meetings were held. Among those who helped in this work were
Mrs. Frank Hiram Snell, Miss Florence F. Stiles, Miss Elizabeth
Eggert, Miss O'Toole and Miss Sellers. Receptions were given to the
"yellow flier," the automobile sent across the continent by the
National Association, and to the "prairie schooner," the car sent by
the Just Government League of Maryland to tour its southern counties.
Miss O'Toole travelled with the "schooner" two weeks, speaking several
times a day. A delegation from the College League met it at the
District line and a procession accompanied it into the city under
police escort. In the evening a public reception was given at the
Washington College of Law. From 1916 the association assisted the
National Association at its new headquarters, 1626 Rhode Island
Avenue, by serving tea afternoons and raising money through bazaars,
rummage sales, card parties, etc.
During 1918 all the suffrage societies in the District devoted their
energies to war work and co-operated in every possible way with the
Woman's Committee of National Defense, whose headquarters were in
Washington, Dr. Anna Howard Shaw chairman. They rejoiced in the
submission of the Federal Suffrage Amendment by Congress in 1919 and
its ratification in 1920, although notwithstanding their many years of
loyalty and assistance to the National Association they could receive
no benefit from the victory.
More women hold office in Washington than in any city in the world
because of their very extensive employment by the National Government.
When Volume IV of the History of Woman Suffrage was written in 1900 an
official statement gave the total number of government employees in
the District as 20,109 men, 7,496 women, a total of 27,600. At the
request of Mrs. Helen H. Gardener, a vice-president of the National
Woman Suffrage Association and a member of the U. S. Civil Service
Commission, the following information was sent in 1920 to be used in
this volume, by the president of the commission, Martin A. Morrison:
In 1907 the Bureau of the Census issued a report in which it was
stated that men outnumbered women in the Government service by
about eleven to one in Washington, D. C., and outside. The
percentage of women in the District was much larger than outside
for the reason that the great bulk of the employees in field
branches are in services the duties of which are not ordinarily
performed by women--the mechanical forces at navy yards, ordnance
establishments, engineer departments, reclamation service
projects, lighthouse service and the like; also the
letter-carriers, city and rural, railway mail clerks and such
classes.
It is believed that the proportion of women to men in the entire
service did not change materially until the beginning of the war.
When the United States entered the war, there were approximately
38,000 employees in the executive civil service in the District
of Columbia, approximately two-fifths of them women. The force
was increased by 80,000 during the war, of whom approximately 75
per cent were women. The force has now been reduced to about
90,000, of whom approximately 50,000 are women. The proportion of
women is being constantly reduced by the return of former
soldiers and sailors to civilian employment, who are allowed
preference under the law. The Federal Civil Service outside the
District of Columbia increased by approximately 280,000 during
the war period, possibly one-third of this increase made up of
women. That force numbers now about 550,000 as compared with
450,000 before the war and it seems safe to say that twenty per
cent. are women.
These positions are open to any who pass the civil service
examinations but the chiefs of the bureaus and departments are
appointed by the President, and Secretaries of Departments, and
they have always been men. Men have succeeded also in getting the
highly paid positions under civil service.
No law excludes women from the District offices. There are, of course,
no elections. Some officials are appointed by the President, some by
the Commissioners, and the Supreme Court of the District appoints the
Board of Education, three of whose members must be women. In 1920
President Wilson appointed Miss Kathryn Sellers, a member of the
District bar, to be Judge of the Juvenile Court. This was largely due
to the efforts of Justice William Hitz, of the District Supreme Court.
The President appointed also Mrs. Clara Sears Taylor a member of the
Rent Commission, created to consider rent problems growing out of the
war, and Miss Mabel T. Boardman as Commissioner of the District. The
Commissioners appointed two women trustees of the public library.
Formerly it was necessary to make an effort to get women on the boards
of charities, hospitals, etc., but now such places are seeking the
women. Within the past ten years many women graduates of the law
schools have been appointed as law clerks in various departments, War
Risk, Treasury, especially the income and customs divisions, and in
the Solicitor's office for the State Department. The Interior
Department appointed Miss Florence Etheridge, at one time president of
the D. C. State Equal Suffrage Association, probate attorney for the
Cherokee Indians. Miss Marie K. Saunders was the first woman appointed
patent examiner, as the result of a competitive examination, and she
has been advanced until the next step is that of principal examiner.
Women hold important positions as secretaries of committees at the
Capitol.
The Board of Commissioners appoint the Superintendent of Police and
under Major Raymond J. Pullman a Woman's Bureau was established in
1918, after several women had been serving on the force. Mrs. Marian
C. Spingarn was made director. When she left Washington the following
year Mrs. Mina C. Van Winkle was appointed and continues to hold the
position. To give her power she was made Detective Sergeant and in
1920 was promoted to a Lieutenancy, so that she might legally be in
command of a precinct where the Woman's Bureau is on the first floor
of the house of detention and the preventive and protective work for
women and children is directed. The functions of this bureau are very
wide and very important and the work of the women police covers the
entire city.
The national appointments of women have attracted the attention not
only of this but of other countries. They began in 1912 with the
selection of Miss Julia C. Lathrop of Hull House, Chicago, by
President Taft as Chief of the newly created Federal Children's
Bureau, which position she still holds (1920). President Wilson
appointed Mrs. Frances C. Axtell in 1916 a member of the Federal
Employees' Compensation Commission; in 1920 Mrs. Helen H. Gardener a
member of the Civil Service Commission; Mrs. Annette A. Adams, U. S.
Attorney in San Francisco, Assistant Attorney General; Miss Mary
Anderson, chief of the Women's Division of the Department of Labor.
FOOTNOTES:
[30] The History is indebted for this chapter to Miss Mary O'Toole,
attorney and counsellor at law, president of the District of Columbia
State Equal Suffrage Association from 1915 to 1920, when the Federal
Amendment was ratified. Appointed Judge of the Municipal Court by
President Harding, Aug. 4, 1921.
[31] Vice-presidents: Justice Wendell P. Stafford, Commissioner Henry
B. F. McFarland, Dr. William Tindall, Mrs. Helen H. Gardener, Mrs.
Harvey W. Wiley, Mrs. Belva A. Lockwood, Mrs. Philander P. Claxton,
Mrs. Wesley, M. Stoner, Mrs. Anna E. Hendley, Miss Helen Jamison, Miss
Gertrude Metcalf, Miss Catharine L. Fleming, Miss Annie Goebel, Miss
Bertha A. Yoder, Mrs. C. C. Farrar, Dr. Margaret S. Potter, Mrs.
Monroe Hopkins, Mrs. Caleb Miller, Mrs. Henry Churchill Cooke, Mrs.
Ruth B. Hensey, Mrs. George Easement. There were few years when Dr.
and Mrs. Tindall did not occupy some official position.
Corresponding secretaries: Miss Henrietta Morrison, Mrs. B. B.
Cheshire, Mrs. Jennie L. Monroe, Mrs. L. M. Coope, Mrs. Ida Finley
McCrille, Miss Lavinia H. Engle, Miss Abbie R. Knapp, Miss Helen M.
Calkins, Francis Scott, Mrs. Rachel Ezekiel, Mrs. Edna V. Bryan.
Recording secretaries: Miss Emma M. Gillett (8 years), Miss Mary H.
Williams, Mrs. Jeannette M. Bradley, Miss Josephine Mason, Mrs. Sarah
Newman, Mrs. Louis Ottenberg.
Treasurers: Mrs. Kate Ward Burt (5 years), W. G. Steward, Mrs. Alice
P. Rand. Mrs. Kent served in some official capacity from 1898 until
her death in 1918.
Auditors: George A. Warren, Miss Edith Harris, William Lee, Mrs. R. G.
Whiting, Mrs. F. M. Gregory, Mrs. Jessica Penn Hunter, Miss Audrey
Goss, Mrs. L. Aveihle, Miss Alice Jenkins, Mrs. Jeanne F. Brackett,
Mrs. Sarah Beall, Mrs. Frank Pyle. Many of the above named also filled
other offices.
Among the names which appear in the records of the years as chairmen
of committees, in addition to many of the above, are those of Miss
Helen Varick Boswell, Dr. Clara McNaughton, Miss Nettie Lovisa White,
Mrs. Katharine Reed Balentine and Miss Abby T. Nicholls.