Alice Paul and the Fight for Women's Rights by Deborah Kops

Author:Deborah Kops
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Boyds Mills Press
Published: 2017-03-13T04:00:00+00:00

Accounts of the ordeals suffered by Woman’s Party members at the district jail and at Occoquan had stirred up public sympathy for them. One writer for the New York Tribune called for an investigation. The editors of Philadelphia’s Evening Ledger criticized the harsh treatment demonstrated by the suffragists’ jailers. No doubt Woodrow Wilson, who had been so eager to keep the Woman’s Party out of the papers, winced at these expressions of support.

Alice Paul had repeatedly shown her genius for making use of the press to help the Woman’s Party. But she believed the party also needed to communicate directly with the public. She wanted people to understand the reasons behind the party’s protests. The newspapers were often more interested in the destruction of their banners than in the principles behind them. So Paul began sending Woman’s Party members on speaking tours around the country.

Sympathetic audiences grew loud and angry at stories of how mobs or prison staff mistreated the pickets. Sometimes officials tried to sabotage or muzzle the speakers.

When Anne Martin gave a speech in Los Angeles, U.S. government agents insisted on sitting on the platform with her. At one point, an agent interrupted her speech. “You’ve said enough about the President now,” he grumbled.

“If I’ve said anything seditious,” Martin replied, “it’s your duty to arrest me. Otherwise I’m going on with my speech.” The audience applauded, and in another show of their approval, they contributed $500 to the National Woman’s Party.

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