Jailed for Freedom | Page 8

carry her point in
spite of scorn and misrepresentation.
Among the thousands of telegrams sent Miss Paul the day the
amendment finally passed Congress was this interesting message from
Walter Clark, Chief Justice of the Supreme
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Court of North Carolina, Southern Democrat, Confederate Veteran and
distinguished jurist:
"Will you permit me to congratulate you upon the great triumph in
which you have been so important a factor? Your place in history is
assured. Some years ago when I first met you I predicted that your
name would be written `on the dusty roll the ages keep.' There were
politicians, and a large degree of public sentiment, which could only be
won by the methods you adopted . . . . It is certain that, but for you,
success would have been delayed for many years to come."
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Part II
Political Action
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Chapter 1
Women Invade the Capital
Where are the people?" This was Woodrow Wilson's first question as
he arrived at the Union Station in Washington the day before his first
inauguration to the Presidency in March, 1913.
"On the Avenue watching the suffragists parade," came the answer.
The suffrage issue was brought oftenest to his attention from then on
until his final surrender. It lay entirely with him as to how long women
would be obliged to remind him of this issue before he willed to take a
hand.
"The people" were on the Avenue watching the suffragists parade. The
informant was quite right. It seemed to those of us who attempted to
march for our idea that day that the whole world was there-packed
closely on Pennsylvania Avenue.
The purpose of the procession was to dramatize in numbers and beauty
the fact that women wanted to vote that women were asking the
Administration in power in the national government to speed the day.
What politicians had not been able to get through their minds we would
give them through their eyes-often a powerful substitute. Our first task
seemed simple actually to show that thousands of women wanted
immediate action on their long delayed enfranchisement. This we did.
This was the first demonstration under the leadership of Alice Paul, at
that time chairman of the Congressional Com-
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mittee of the National American Woman. Suffrage Association. It was

also the beginning of Woodrow Wilson's liberal education.
The Administration, without intending it, played into the hands of the
women from this moment. The women had been given a permit to
march. Inadequate police protection allowed roughs to attack them and
all but break up the beautiful pageant. The fact of ten thousand women
marching with banners and bands for this idea was startling enough to
wake up the government and the country, but not so startling as ten
thousand women man-handled by irresponsible crowds because of
police indifference.
An investigation was demanded and a perfunctory one held. The police
administration was exonerated, but when the storm of protest had
subsided the Chief of Police was quietly retired to private life.
It was no longer a secret that women wanted to vote and that they
wanted the President and Congress to act.
A few days later the first deputation of suffragists ever to appear before
a President to enlist his support for the passage of the national suffrage
amendment waited upon President Wilson.[1] Miss Paul led the
deputation. With her were Mrs. Genevieve Stone, wife of Congressman
Stone of Illinois, Mrs. Harvey W. Wiley, Mrs. Ida Husted Harper, and
Miss Mary Bartlett Dixon of Maryland. The President received the
deputation in the White House Offices. When the women entered they
found five chairs arranged in a row with one chair in front, like a class-
room. All confessed to being frightened when the President came in
and took his seat at the head of the class. The President said he had no
opinion on the subject of woman suffrage; that he had never given it
any thought;[2]
[1]There had been individual visits to previous presidents.
[2]At Colorado Springs in 1911, when Mr. Wilson was Governor of
New Jersey and campaigning for the Presidential nomination, a
delegation of Colorado women asked him his position on woman
suffrage. He said, "Ladies, this is a very arguable question and my
mind is in the midst of the argument"

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and that above all it was his task to see that Congress concentrated on
the currency revision and the tariff reform. It is recorded that the
President was somewhat taken aback when Miss Paul addressed him
during the course of the interview with this query, "But Mr. President,
do you not understand that the Administration has no right to legislate
for currency, tariff, and any other reform without first getting the
consent of women to these reforms?"
"Get the consent of