Womens' Suffrage Marches

WHY YOU MUST MARCH

Because this is the most conspicuous and important demonstration that has ever been attempted by suffragists in this country.

Because this parade will be taken to indicate the importance of the suffrage movement by the press of the country and the thousands of spectators from all over the United States gathered in Washington for the Inauguration.

So said the broadsheets handed out and so they gathered. There were three notable marches recorded for posterity - the first in Washington, the next two in New York.

Suffrage Parade - 6th May 1912 - New York City

It was a bold tactic, adopted by suffragists and the more militant suffragettes shortly after the turn of the century. Although some women chose to quit the movement rather than march in public, others embraced the parade as a way of publicizing their cause and combating the idea that women should be relegated to the home. (Source: World Digital Library)

Suffrage Parade - 3rd March 1913 - Washington.

In 1913, the first major national efforts were undertaken, beginning with a massive parade in Washington, D.C., on March 3 -- one day before the inauguration of President Woodrow Wilson. Organized by Alice Paul for the National American Woman Suffrage Association, the parade, calling for a constitutional amendment, featured 8,000 marchers, including nine bands, four mounted brigades, 20 floats, and an allegorical performance near the Treasury Building. (Source: The Atlantic - March 1st, 2013)

Women from countries that had enfranchised women held the place of honor in the first section of the procession. Then came the “Pioneers” who had been struggling for so many decades to secure women's right to vote. The next sections celebrated working women, who were grouped by occupation and wearing appropriate garb—nurses in uniform, women farmers, homemakers, women doctors and pharmacists, actresses, librarians, college women in academic gowns. Harriet Hifton of the Library of Congress Copyright Division led the librarians' contingent. The state delegations followed, and finally the separate section for male supporters of women's suffrage. All had come from around the country to “march in a spirit of protest against the present political organization of society, from which women are excluded.” (Source: Library of Congress - Official Program: Woman Suffrage Procession).

Read more here:
- The Atlantic
- Library of Congress
- Women of History - Suffrage March of 1913
- Smithsonian - Original Women's March

- Activist New York


Suffrage March - 23rd October 2015 - New York

On October 23, 1915, over 25,000 women marched up Fifth Avenue in New York City to advocate for women’s suffrage. At that point, the fight had been ongoing for more than 65 years, with the Seneca Falls Convention in 1848 first passing a resolution in favor of women’s suffrage. Unfortunately, they wouldn’t find success for another five years. New York’s 1915 suffrage parade was the largest held in the city until that time. (Source: Behind the Scenes: New York History)

Read more here at:
- The Bowery Boys: New York City History
- The Feminist Majority Foundation


Suffrage March - October 1917 - New York

This NY Times article covers the Fifth Avenue Parade in 1917. Many leaders from various groups, including NAWSA, were a part of this event that used the fighting for democracy in World War I to help promote their cause for fighting for democracy at home. This parade, filled with patriotism for our troops, also used President Wilson’s suffrage endorsement to support their cause. While women, like Carrie Chapman Catt, walked in the parade, NWP members were in the crowd passing out their newspapers and encouraging the protest of the war time President. (Source: New York Times)

Read more here at:
- Women's Suffrage in the United States (wikipedia)
- New York Times: 1917 - When Women Won Right ToVote
- Yates County History Centre
- Night of Terror
- Timeline of Women's Suffrage in United States (wikipedia)
- National Archives - Women's Suffrage Party Petition
- New York Rediscovered
- Digital Documents - Women's Suffrage

Welsh Women

From Wales Online comes these three interesting articles on Welsh women:

Welsh Women & The Vote:

In the summer of 1913 many Welsh women took to the roads. They were usually quite well-off, professional women themselves or married to professional men, and could afford to travel by train or sometimes even by car or carriage. They were walking to make a political point. They wanted the vote and they were using a peaceful way to campaign for it. Read More HERE

Kate Bosse-Griffiths:

Kate Bosse-Griffiths was born in Wittenberg, the German town where Martin Luther had initiated the birth of Protestantism, in 1910. Having studied Archaeology and Egyptology in Berlin, Bonn and Munich, she gained a doctorate for her thesis on the human figure in late Egyptian sculpture in 1936 and was appointed to a post in Berlin, poised for a career curating the world-renowned collections in its museums. Read More HERE about this Egyptologist who fled Nazi persecution.

Women & the National Library of Wales:

The National Library of Wales opened to the public in 1909 in a temporary location at the Assembly Rooms in Aberystwyth before moving to its permanent home on Penglais Hill in 1916. Between the years 1909 and 1912 around 350 individual readers used the library’s reading room and consulted more than 1,300 books, manuscripts, maps and prints.

Unsurprisingly, men were in the majority, but 14% of the readers during this period were women. It was predominantly a younger female generation who used the library, as almost two-thirds of the female readers were under 30 and many were enrolled as university students. Read More HERE and meet the women academics of the 19th Century.

Victoria Woodhull - Candidate For US President

From: The Times Leader:

Nearly a century and a half before Hillary Clinton, a fiery activist from Ohio became the first woman nominated for U.S. president.

Victoria Woodhull’s varied and colorful life makes her difficult to pigeonhole. The suffragist, medium, businesswoman, stockbroker and newspaper publisher was “Mrs. Satan” to some, a visionary champion of women’s and children’s rights to others.

She rode motorcycles, preached “free love” and followed the guidance of an ancient Greek orator she believed had presented himself to her as a spirit guide.

The Equal Rights Party nominated Woodhull to face incumbent Republican Ulysses S. Grant in 1872 and Democrat Horace Greeley, nearly 50 years before women had the right to vote. At 34, she was a few months shy of the required age, but most historians still view her nomination and run as the first.

Woodhull lost, of course, but by how much is unclear.

Read rest of article here at The Times Leader

Saudi Women in Elections 2015

From the Washington Post:

Women in Saudi Arabia will not need a male guardian’s approval to run or vote in municipal elections in 2015, when women will also run for office for the first time, a Saudi official said Wednesday.

The change signifies a step forward in easing the kingdom’s restrictions against women, but it falls far short of what some Saudi reformers are calling for.

Shura Council member Fahad al-Anzi was quoted in the state-run al-Watan newspaper saying that approval for women to run and vote came from the guardian of Islam’s holiest sites, the Saudi king, and therefore women will not need a male guardian’s approval. The country’s Shura Council is an all-male consultative body with no legislative powers.

Saudi Women Welcome Suffrage

From Voice of America:

Saudi women are hailing King Abdullah's promise of expanded political rights, with the hope it is another step toward equality in the ultraconservative kingdom.

The king's announcement that women may run for office and cast votes in the next round of municipal elections, set for 2015, is the latest in a string of reforms -- modest compared to most countries but domestically radical and long opposed by members of the Saudi elite.

The monarch's promises also include their appointment to the largely ceremonial Shura council, an advisory body. Women will not be allowed to take part in municipal elections this Thursday, however, and some Saudi women are continuing to push for other basic freedoms such as the right to drive a car or leave the country without a male relative's permission.

The initiative comes as leaders across the Arab world struggle to meet the demands of their people, or risk going the way of the ex-leaders of Tunisia, Egypt and Libya. Already this year, King Abdullah announced a $130 billion program to boost salaries, build housing and fund other popular measures.

But Basmah Omair, director of the al Sayeda Khadija bin Khawlid Center at the Jeddah Chamber of Commerce, says it would be a mistake to think the latest move is a result of only the Arab Spring.

"In recent years, you have seen women take leadership positions like the deputy of the ministry of education and vice mayor of Jeddah," he said. "So it's not something [new], but maybe the media is concentrating [on these events] now and that is why they are just thinking of the recent events of 2011."

Saudi Women Have Right To Vote

From the New York Times:

King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia on Sunday granted women the right to vote and run in future municipal elections, the biggest change in a decade for women in a puritanical kingdom that practices strict separation of the sexes, including banning women from driving.

Although political activists celebrated the change, they also cautioned how deep it would go and how fast, given that the king referred to the next election cycle, which would not be until 2015. Some women wondered aloud how they would be able to campaign for office when they were not even allowed to drive. And there is a long history of royal decrees stalling, as weak enactment collides with the bulwark of traditions ordained by the Wahhabi sect of Islam and its fierce resistance to change.

Anniversary of 19th Amendment

From Campbell Patch:

Today is the 91st anniversary of the 19th amendment to the US Constitution taking effect, giving women the right to vote. It's a milestone in the Women's Suffrage Movement in the United States and one that still resonates with modern women.

Swiss women celebrate 40 years of suffrage

From Swiss Info:

Swiss women have come a long way since 1971, the year they were granted the right to vote at the federal level.

Exactly 40 years after their first chance to do so, around 125 representatives of the Swiss political, social and economic scenes celebrated the milestone in Bern on Monday.

On February 7, 1971, 66 per cent of Swiss men voted in favour of allowing women to vote as well. The first opportunity came on June 6 of that year – when nationwide issues included environmental protection and financial regulations.

Many women who remember that momentous year were at the Bernerhof on Monday to reminisce and discuss what still needs to be done.

“This is a very important event because we still have a number of problems and challenges in terms of equality. Some examples include equal pay for equal work and the glass ceiling,” said former parliamentarian Rosmarie Zapfl-Helbling, president of alliance F, an umbrella organisation for 140 women’s groups in Switzerland.

A Century of Battling Women

From the Indian Express:

“There are some defeats more triumphant than victories” said Michael de Montaigne.

Indeed, the women candidates who contested in the AMU student union elections got more than victory could have given them. Though there have been some women who have contested the elections in the past — and won too — this was never for the top three positions together. In the 136-year history of union elections, this was the first time that as many as 11 young women expressed the desire to lead. They were followed by hundreds of young men and women that chanted election slogans, who heard their eloquent speeches and clapped for them too.

Also, for the very first time, the undergraduate students of the women’s college (Abdullah College) were allowed to exercise their right to vote for the candidate of their choice, though within the hostel’s four walls. So far they have had a separate union, a separate election and of course a female president elected by them. So, in more ways than one, this election was special for women students at AMU. AMU students, teachers and of course the administration, deserve appreciation for providing a conducive environment for women to present their candidature.

Edmonton Revolutionary: Roberta MacAdams

From the Edmonton Journal:

The Edmonton Public School district announced Friday that it's looking for names for two new schools, one being built in Summer-side-Ellerslie in south Edmonton, the other in the Hamptons-Grange areas of west Edmonton.

Not earth-shattering news, perhaps. But for me, it offers an ideal opportunity to correct a historic injustice, to celebrate the life and contributions of an unsung Edmonton revolutionary: Roberta MacAdams

So why don't we know MacAdams's name? In part, it's because she retired from politics in 1921, after one term. At 40, she married, raised a family, excused herself from public life. She was never one of the Famous Five, who fought the Persons Case. Unlike Nellie McClung or Emily Murphy, she never wrote a book. She was never flamboyant or controversial or ideologically partisan -- just smart, brave, funny, independent and utterly competent.

Vida Golstein

Feminist and Political Activist (1869-1949)

Vida Jane Mary Goldstein was born in Portland, Victoria. She became involved in women's suffrage activities through her mother (1890). Vida soon became active in the National Anti-Sweating League and the Criminology Society. Her primary aim was to achieve women's suffrage - and she campaigned for this (1899-1908).

Australian women were granted the federal vote (1902). Vida stood for the Senate (1903) as an Independent Candidate backed by the Women's Federal Political Association, which was dedicated to the principals for compulsory conciliation and arbitration, equal rights and pay, redistribution of wealth and the appointment of women to official posts. Though she polled well, Vida did not get elected.

Through the renamed Women's Political Association and her own newspaper "Women's Sphere" (owner and editor 1900-1905), Vida began a program of education women voters. She campaigned for and achieved (1908) State Franchise for women. Vida returned to national politics (1908), and founded a second paper "Woman Voter" (1909). Vida continued to stand as Independent Woman Candidate - twice for the Senate (1910 and 1917) and twice for the House of Representative (1913 and 1914). She did not stand again after her second Senate defeat (1917).

Vida also had influence in Australia Legislation with the Childrens' Court Act which she helped draft and which was made law (1906). Vida wrote articles which lead to the implementation of the concept of the basic wage (1907). Vida became increasingly involved with Christian Science, and helped found the Melbourne Christian Science Church. In her last years, Vida lived with her two sisters, one Aileen was also a practitioners within the Christian Science Church. Vida died of cancer (1949) - her death went almost unnoticed - almost.

Politics & Afghan Olympian Robina Jalali

From the Washington Post:

Amid the warlords, ex-mujahideen fighters, hard-line clerics and shady businessmen running for a seat in the Afghan parliament, Robina Jalali, a 25-year-old candidate from Kabul, offers a more inspiring biography.

Raised during a Taliban regime that was brutal toward women, Jalali nevertheless trained as a sprinter and, after the Taliban fell, followed her passion to the Olympics. No matter that she finished second-to-last in the 100 meters in Athens in 2004 and last in Beijing in 2008. In Afghanistan, a conservative Muslim nation where many women still wear the identity-shielding burqa, Jalali's story is like a fairy tale.

Now comes the sequel: Jalali is running again - for a seat in the Wolesi Jirga, the lower house of the Afghan parliament. Though interest among women was initially sparse, a recruitment drive from the Independent Election Committee has resulted in a record 406 female candidates standing in the Sept. 18 elections for at least 64 seats reserved for women under the Afghan constitution, which guarantees them 25 percent of the 249 seats. (More than 2,000 men are running.)

Afghanistan: Rise In Female Candidates

From Bloomberg Businessweek:

The number of Afghan women candidates for September’s parliamentary elections has risen 22 percent over the tally for the vote five years ago, according to a United Nations Security Council report released today.

The number of women pursuing legislative seats increased to 400 out of 2,635 candidates. That compares with 328 women out of 2,707 candidates in the 2005 elections, the UN said.

“This number ensues that, at a minimum, women candidates will fill all of the 68 allocated seats and are likely to get additional ones,” the world body said in the study. There are 249 seats in the Afghan National Assembly’s Wolesi Jirga or House of People, according to the parliament’s website.

Sudan: Women Voting In Numbers

From VOA News:

Despite extreme logistical and organizational challenges facing the Sudanese elections, the women of Sudan appear to be more determined to have their voices heard in these landmark elections.

It will take days to determine exact figures, but visits to Southern Sudan polling stations in the past three days have shown that women clearly outnumber men in voting queues. Reports from other parts of Sudan also indicate that more women have cast their votes, most of them for the first time in their lives.

Women have also proven to be more tolerant to the frustrating moments during the voting process, patiently waiting for their turn to vote. This reporter witnessed a number of men turning their back and leaving the polling stations with frustration, but many women stayed on to cast their votes.

History of International Women's Day

From the Washington Free Press:

Women are a revolutionary force. That fact shows in their holiday, International Women's Day (IWD), both its past and present.

The holiday's roots are in the struggles of working women and their socialist supporters. It's believed that a mass protest by women garment and textile workers in New York City in 1857 occurred on March 8, and that in March two years later the same women won a drive to unionize. They were fighting against brutal working conditions, low wages, and the 12-hour day.

On March 8, 1908, socialist women organized a demonstration of 15,000 in New York. Their demands were pay raises, shorter hours, the vote, and an end to child labor. After that, the Socialist Party of America decided to celebrate a women's day in the US, the first of which was held in 1909.

League of Women Voters

From the Newton Daily News:

Ninety years ago, Iowa native, Carrie Chapman Catt first proposed a League of Women Voters to “finish the fight” and work to end all discrimination against women.

And so the League of Women Voters was founded on Valentine’s Day in 1920, six months before the ratification of the 19th Amendment, giving women the right to vote. In 1920, after a 72-year struggle, passage of the 19th Amendment appeared to be imminent, and members of the National American Woman Suffrage Association met to form the League of Women Voters, the organization to educate the newly franchised women to effectively use the vote.

The Newton unit of LWV was organized 1934 through the efforts of Mrs. E. L. Gladys Nelson, who lived in Grinnell. After she and her husband moved to Newton, Nelson organized a unit in 1934 in Newton at the urging of Grinnell League members.

Tonga: Hunger Strike To Oust PM - Continues

From Radio New Zealand International:

A daylight hour protest fast involving about 800 women in Tonga is continuing.

Tongan Women’s National Congress members have been fasting for about three weeks between six am and six pm to protest against what they describe as poor governance of the prime minister, Feleti Sevele, and to call for his and his deputy’s resignation or removal.

However, the Congress head, Mele Amanaki, says she has ended her hunger strike and is now also fasting only during daylight hours.

“I believe it’s the Lord speaking to me telling me to eat. So I broke the fast on Monday evening at 6 o’clock after 21 days, but I still continue fasting daily from six o’clock in the morning to six o’clock in the afternoon.”

Mele Amanaki says they won’t give up until they reach their goal.

Namibia: Women Demand Action For Votes

From AllAfrica:

NAMIBIAN women from all walks of life have made it clear that political parties will have to earn their votes, and will be held accountable for the promises they make.

This message was communicated to political parties yesterday during a dialogue with women as part of the Women Claiming Citizenship Campaign, where a "women's advocacy brochure" outlining the demands of Namibian women was also launched.

The demands listed in the brochure include "freedom from violence and discrimination, freedom from harmful cultural practices and beliefs, freedom from hunger and poverty, access to resources and services, freedom from preventable diseases and access to quality healthcare for all, freedom from HIV and AIDS, and access to quality education and training."

Giving the keynote address at the event, Anna Beukes, Executive Director of the Namibia NGO Forum (NANGOF), pointed out that women make up 52 per cent of the country's population, and that their voices therefore needed to fully acknowledged.

She said that as women prepared to take to the polls for the fourth national elections since Independence, they wouldn't be voting simply for the sake of voting, but being conscious of their rights and the policies and legislation to which Namibia is party, they would hold politicians accountable for their work.

The parties present at the forum included the All People's Party (APP), the Congress of Democrats (CoD), the National Democratic Party (NDP), the Namibia Democratic Movement of Change (NDMC), Nudo, the Rally for Democracy and Progress (RDP), Swanu and the UDF.

Representatives of the eight parties present each stated their party's stance on some of the issues affecting women, and responded to a number of questions.

Kuwait: Scrap Sharia Hold Over Elections

From Associated Press:

Kuwaiti female lawmaker Rula Dashti on Sunday submitted an amendment to the Gulf state electoral law that aims to scrap a requirement that women must comply with Islamic Sharia law guidelines.

The guidelines were introduced four years ago when parliament voted to grant women full political rights but added a precondition that both women voters and candidates must comply with regulations dictated by Sharia law.

The law does not explain the nature of the regulations, but last week the emirate's Fatwa Department ruled that under Islamic law, it is an obligation for Muslim women to wear the hijab head cover.

Although the fatwa, or religious edict, was general in nature and did not specifically refer to Kuwait's election law, it triggered conflicting reactions from Islamist and liberal lawmakers and activists.

Islamist lawmakers called on female MPs and a minister to comply with the ruling while liberal and female legislators stressed the fatwa is not binding since it did not come from the constitutional court.

"The fatwa is not binding to the Kuwaiti society. The only reference for us is the constitution," issued in 1962, she told AFP.

Birtukan Mideksa

Article by Mintesinot Haile in Nazret.com:

Ethiopia's next national election is a year away, but tensions are already increasing as Birtukan Mideksa, one of the key opposition politicians has been jailed, possibly facing life in prison; and security forces have arrested several others, accusing them of plotting against the government on behalf of Geembot-7 conspiring with EPLF from Diaspora. With the recent election episodes taking place in Iran as a reminder, both the TPLF-regime and opposition leaders are seriously expressing their respective concerns about the potential for election-related violence in the 2010 election time within and outside Ethiopia.

Incidentally, in her long-standing history, Ethiopia is blessed in having women leaders coming to power from time to time. Since the time of Queen Sheba/Saba of the Old Testament few women of leadership caliber have happen to suddenly appear from no where and held power at times when Ethiopia faces critical danger and grave difficulties. Birtukan is one of those Ethiopian heroines in contemporary history without any parallel to draw in our time. I strongly inclined to have faith in that it is God's wisdom to have brought someone born in 1974 from an Oromo-Ethiopian humble household to lead this war-prickle country of ours to a peaceful transition and stability. That person is no one else but our Lady Liberty Birtukan Mideksa, who is charged not because she has done any criminal wrong but for telling nothing but the absolute truth to the whole world.