Laura Clay and the Woman's Rights Movement by Paul E. Fuller

Author:Paul E. Fuller [Fuller, Paul E.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History, United States, State & Local, South (AL; AR; FL; GA; KY; LA; MS; NC; SC; TN; VA; WV), Social Science, Women's Studies
ISBN: 9780813184203
Google: 2kooEAAAQBAJ
Publisher: University Press of Kentucky
Published: 2021-10-21T22:13:11+00:00

VII

STRUGGLE FOR CONTROL OF THE NATIONAL SUFFRAGE MOVEMENT

1309-1911

THE INTERNAL DISSENSION that marred Laura Clay’s last months on the Official Board was similar, in some respects, to the bickering that both preceded and followed her sixteen years as an officer of the NAWSA. Jealousies and rivalries were, perhaps, to be expected in an organization that included individuals with strong personalities and firm opinions. The infrequent officers’ meetings contributed to failures in communication, and the lack of clearly delineated areas of responsibility made clashes among some leaders almost inevitable.

The dissension that existed from 1909 through 1911 differed from that of other years. While earlier troubles were most frequently occasioned by personal antagonism, those of this particular period were caused in part by the growth of the suffrage movement. By the end of 1909, the NAWSA had simply outgrown the small headquarters at Warren, Ohio, and the administrative methods that had once been adequate. Warren was a poor location for the advertising and selling of suffrage literature and an impossible one for exploiting the publicity that large newspapers and the wire services could give the suffragists. From an administrative viewpoint, greater centralization was badly needed at national headquarters. Decision making by correspondence, a method followed since 1890, except for a brief deviation during the Catt presidency, was required for every transaction, from buying a new typewriter to undertaking a state campaign. By 1909 this administrative system was too slow and cumbersome to allow an organization of some 75,000 members to function efficiently.

Both the personal differences among the officers and solutions to the organization’s growing pains might have been worked out under a more able president. Anna Howard Shaw, who led the NAWSA from 1904 to 1915, was not equal to the task. Quick to take criticism personally and prone to alienate people with whom she worked, she had achieved the presidency largely through her powers as a public speaker and her devotion to the movement. Lacking in tact, judgment, and administrative ability, she compounded, rather than solved, the problems that confronted the NAWSA during her tenure in the office.

Shaw’s deficiencies in leadership were not recognized at first because Upton was the actual executive of the association for the first five years of Shaw’s term. While the president was on the lecture circuit or at her home in Pennsylvania, the nerve center of the suffrage movement was at Warren, where, from 1903 to 1909, the headquarters answered the association’s correspondence, published Progress, the NAWSA’s monthly paper, solicited funds, and advised and supervised suffrage activities around the nation.1 The general tranquillity among the officers during these years was, no doubt, largely owing to the infrequency of Shaw’s visits to Warren.

Even during these years, Shaw felt that she was being abused by Upton and resented her central role in the direction of operations. As early as 1906 Shaw wrote Lucy Anthony, her companion and confidante, that Upton “is ready to misjudge me on the smallest provocation.” A little later she was complaining: “I must have my say about some things or let her [Upton] be president and run the whole shooting match.

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