The new—the Sixty-fourth—Congress did not meet until December in 1915. This is the first and only summer in President Wilson’s administration in which Congress was not in session. Normally, Congress meets every other summer, but President Wilson has called three special sessions in the alternate years. In consequence, that year in Washington is less full than others with work with Congress or the President. In the meantime, however, the Congressional union did not permit the people of the United States to forget the Suffrage fight.

Alice Paul now felt that it was necessary to swing in the support of the country back of the Suffrage demand for the Federal Amendment. She felt that this could only be accomplished by a nation-wide organization which, dissipating no energy in State work, would focus on Congress.

At a meeting of the Advisory Council in New York City on Wednesday, March 31, she outlined plans for the coming year. She said in part:

We want to organize in every State in the union. We will begin this by holding in each State a Convention on the same lines as this Conference, at which we will explain our purposes, our plans, and our ideals. At each of these Conferences, the members will select a State Chairman, who will appoint a Chairman of each of the Congressional constituencies in her State. Each Convention will also adopt a plan of State organization, suited to the needs of their locality. Each Convention too will send Representatives to a culminating Convention of women voters, to be held at San Francisco during the course of the Panama-Pacific Exposition, on September 14th, 15th, and 16th. At this first Convention of women voters to be held on their own 100territory in behalf of the National Suffrage Amendment, delegates will be appointed to go to Washington, D. C., the week Congress opens, to lay before their Representatives and the leaders of the majority Party in Congress, the demand of women voters for the national enfranchisement of women. During the opening week in Congress, too, the pageant on the life of Susan B. Anthony, along the lines which Hazel Mackaye has just outlined to you, will be given. We want to make Woman Suffrage the dominant political issue from the moment Congress reconvenes. We want to have Congress open in the midst of a veritable Suffrage cyclone.

During the Sixty-third Congress, we have been able, with very little organized support, to force action on the Federal Suffrage Amendment. When we have an active body of members in every State in the union uniting in this demand, I believe that we will be able to get our Amendment passed.

The organization of the various State Conventions progressed rapidly from week to week. An incredible amount of work was done—and done with the swift, broad, slashing strokes which always characterized the Congressional union work. This, of course, brought the Congressional union into prominence everywhere; but the eye of the country was held by a new type of demonstration which, following her genius for picturesque publicity, Alice Paul immediately began to produce. The stage was the entire United States of America, and the leading woman in the—one would almost call it a pageant—was Sara Bard Field of California. The prologue opened at the Panama-Pacific Exposition of 1915.

Through Mrs. Kent an exhibit booth for the Congressional union for Woman Suffrage was secured in the Educational Building at the Panama-Pacific Exposition. The Record of the Sixty-third Congress was exhibited there, and the people in charge invited detailed inspection from visitors. All American visitors were asked to look up the record of their Congressman, to discover how he voted on the Suffrage Amendment: they were asked to sign the monster petition to Congress. This booth, always decorated with purple, white, and gold, was to become during the year the scene of meeting 101after meeting; all characterized by the picturesqueness which would inevitably emerge from a combination of the Congressional union with California.

Sara Bard Field, in the Suffragist of September 11, thus describes it:

A world passes by. It looks reverently at the firmly-sweet face of Susan B. Anthony, whose portrait hangs upon the wall. It scans the record of the vote of the Sixty-third Congress.... It peers with curious smiles at the brief array of lady dolls which mutely proclaim the voting and non-voting States for women, and the forces which prevent Suffrage....

The first California Conference of the Congressional union was held in San Francisco June 1 and 2. Every part of the State and every political Party was represented at the gathering. Florence Kelley, National Secretary of the Consumers’ League, appealed to the women of the West for aid in the battle of Eastern women for Suffrage in the following eloquent words:

I come from a State in which women have been trying to get Suffrage for twenty-seven years. We are forced to come to you women of California and ask you to stand behind us; and we are thankful that California has re-enlisted for Suffrage. Women in California have talked to me about the ease with which they won Suffrage, and praise their men-folk. I would like to say there was nothing the matter with my father. He was a Suffragist. There is nothing the matter with our men in the State of New York. Our trouble is with the steerage. They inundate our shores year after year. We slowly assimilate and convert; but each year there is the same work to do over—the same battle with ignorance and foreign ideas of freedom and the “place of woman.”

Mrs. Kelley gave instance after instance of the humiliation to which women working on the New York Suffrage petition had been put by naturalized foreign residents. She pointed out the curious, paradoxical inconsistency of granting foreigners the vote, and yet denying it to American women.

102She described with a real dramatic effect the incident of the President’s trip to Philadelphia, when he welcomed a great army of naturalized immigrants, and denied a hearing to American women.

“There are some of our men,” she commented, “the mechanics of whose minds we do not understand. George Washington, you may remember, in Woodrow Wilson’s History of the United States, had no mother.”

Mrs. Kelley told of the battle women, themselves sworn to enforce the law, have to fight if they are without the ballot. She went into her experiences as a voteless citizen of Illinois, when she was a factory inspector there.

Eastern women have been degraded by sixty-eight years of beggary. They have begged of the steerage; they have begged of politicians; now they find it possible to come West and ask the co-operation of their own sisters. But I come to you with a nobler argument when I ask you to support the work of the Congressional union for Woman Suffrage. Do not do it for us, even though we have borne the rigor and heat of the day in the long fight for enfranchisement. Do it for the children of the future: let them come into a noble heritage through us.

The climax of this Conference came the final day when, at the Inside Inn ball-room of the Exposition, the representatives of the eleven enfranchised States, the Territory of Alaska and in addition the enfranchised nations, meeting on the same platform, told what freedom for women had accomplished in their nations and States. The great ball-room was decorated with purple, white, and gold banners of the union, and massed with golden acacia. Many of the women representatives wore the costumes of their native land. Mayi Maki, a Finnish girl typically blonde, in the striking peasant costume of Finland, spoke. Mrs. Chem Chi, a Chinese woman, in the no less striking costume of China, spoke. Representatives of New Zealand, the Isle of Man, Norway, Iceland, and Denmark spoke.

The Congressional union celebrated Bunker Hill Day, 103June 17, by another charming occasion. It dedicated to the Massachusetts exhibit a miniature reproduction of Bunker Hill monument, thrown into relief by a black-velvet background, which bore the history of the notable women of the State.

It was a brilliant day, sunny and clear. The Massachusetts Building, a facsimile of the noble State House of Boston, situated between the gorgeous bay of San Francisco and the iridescent Marin shore on the one hand, and the long line of orientally colored Exposition Buildings on the other, was decorated for the occasion with the red, white, and blue of the national flag, and the white of the great State flag.

A procession of Suffragists, headed by Gail Laughlin, wearing the purple, white, and gold regalia, and escorted by a special military band, marched behind a large purple, white, and gold flag, and between an avenue of purple, white, and gold flags up to the Massachusetts Building, where they were confronted by a great banner, bearing the words of the Susan B. Anthony Amendment.

Gail Laughlin, who was educated in Massachusetts, said in part:

There were Pilgrim mothers in those days, as well as Pilgrim Fathers, though they were singularly absent from history. You will find nothing of them in the schoolbooks; you have to go to the sources from which histories are made. Then Mary Warren, advisor of Knox and Adams and Jefferson; and Hannah Winthrop and Abigail Adams begin to stand out beside the men who are said to have made the history of that time. Was it not Abigail Adams who wrote to her husband at the Continental Congress when the very document we women are now striving to change was drawn up: “If you do not free the women of the nation, there will be another revolution.” I consider Abigail Adams the first member of the Congressional union for Woman Suffrage.

There was Julia Ward Howe, the author of The Battle Hymn of the Republic, and Harriet Beecher Stowe, who so largely helped in the freeing of the slaves; and Lucy Stone, that staunch Abolitionist and Suffragist—all closely linked with Massachusetts’ 104great history. It was Lucy Stone who, when protest was made that she injected “too much suffrage” into her Abolitionist speeches, declared, “I was a woman before I was an Abolitionist.”

Later, at a mass-meeting of the Congressional union, Maud Younger, who, in Washington, was to become so steadfast a worker for the Congressional union, spoke. Maud Younger is one of the most picturesque of the many picturesque figures among the native daughters of California: a student of economic conditions; a feminist; much traveled; an ex-president of the Waitresses’ union; her life is as inextricably mixed with the Labor and Suffrage history of California as later it was bound with the Woman’s Party. On this occasion, she said:

The burden of the women of the unenfranchised States, their struggles, is ours more than it ever was; our freedom is not our own while they are unenfranchised. I realized in the East that we women can spend a lifetime for Suffrage, if we continue to work State by State only. Do you realize that, since we won our vote in California, Ohio has been twice defeated, and Michigan twice defeated?... I heard Frank P. Walsh, Chairman of the Industrial Railways Commission, say in Washington: “The ballot for women will only come through the persistent and unremitting effort of the women in the free States.”

Maud Younger was followed by Andrew Gallagher, equally important, and equally as picturesque a figure among the Native Sons of California. Mr. Gallagher is an ex-champion amateur heavyweight of the Pacific Coast; a labor leader; a power in California politics. He said in part:

In those days when Suffrage hopes were dark in California, Labor stood by women; as we stood for State Suffrage, so now we stand for National Suffrage. If Labor can help to bring about the passage of the National Woman Suffrage Amendment, then Labor will put its shoulder to the wheel, and do all in its power to force its adoption.

105The Political Convention of Woman Voters held in San Francisco in September at the Panama-Pacific Exposition, carried out all these traditions of picturesqueness. Mrs. O. H. P. Belmont opened the Convention. Mrs. Fremont Older, the novelist, spoke. Dr. Yami Kin, the first woman physician in China—bringing to the event a picturesque touch of internationalism by wearing a pale blue brocaded mandarin coat—spoke in excellent English. Mme. Ali Kuli Khan, the wife of the Persian Minister, and Mme. Maria Montessori, the famous Italian physician and educator, also spoke.

Mrs. Belmont said:

We women of the North, of the South and of the East, branded on account of sex, disfranchised as criminals and imbeciles, come to the glorious West, where the broad vision of its men has seen justice.

Mrs. Older said:

I thought that Woman Suffrage was like Utopia; when women were good enough to vote, the men would give it to them; but I have learned that Utopias are not given away; they must be fought for.

Dr. Yami Kin said:

All countries look to North and West for inspiration and help in their march toward freedom.

Mme. Montessori said:

We have watched individual States in your country give justice to women, one by one. Now we are waiting for the United States to declare its women free.

The Convention passed Resolutions calling upon the Sixty-fourth Congress to vote for the Susan B. Anthony Amendment. Sara Bard Field and Frances Joliffe were selected as envoys to carry the Resolution across the country 106to Congress. A plan was made for the envoys to travel slowly eastward, holding meetings and collecting signatures to the petition; arriving in Washington the day Congress assembled. Mabel Vernon acted as advance guard for this expedition and was more responsible than anybody else for its success.

The final ceremony of the Convention took place in the Court of Abundance on the night of the day which had been designated by the directors of the Exposition as the Congressional union for Woman Suffrage Day. On that evening, Mr. M. H. DeYoung, on behalf of the directors of the Exposition, presented Mrs. Belmont for the Congressional union with a bronze medal in recognition of the work of the Congressional union. Ten thousand people gathered there to witness it. They listened rapt to the speeches, and then—lighting their way by thousands of golden lanterns—accompanied the envoys to the gates.

The national Suffrage Edition of the San Francisco Bulletin, edited by Mrs. O. H. P. Belmont, assisted by Doris Stevens as city editor, Mrs. John Jay White as art editor and Alice Paul as telegraph editor, charmingly described the scene:

The great place was softly and naturally lit except for the giant tower gate flaming aloft in the white light, which focussed on it as on some brilliant altar. Far below, like a brilliant flower bed, filling the terraced side from end to end, glowed the huge chorus of women, which was one of the features of the evening. Those at the top—hardly women—were the girls of the Oriental School, from midget size up, in quaintly colorful native costumes. In the foreground were the Finnish, Swedish, and Norwegian girls in their peasant costumes, and, stretching the length of the stage, like a great living flag of the Congressional union, were massed union members in surplices of the organization colors. The effect was one of exotic brilliancy.

Back of the stage, curtaining the great arch, fluttered the red, white, and blue emblem of the nation that women have sacrificed as much to upbuild as the men; but significantly waving with the Stars and Stripes hung the great Suffrage banner, that ringingly declared: WE DEMAND AN AMENDMENT TO THE 107CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES ENFRANCHISING WOMEN. And the great crowd in the Court joined in the swelling song that another band of women across the sea, fighting for liberty, had originated. Every one was catching the words:
“Shout, shout, up with your song!
Cry with the wind, for the dawn is breaking.
March, march, swing you along,
Wide blow our banners, and hope is waking.”

And then came the envoys, delegated by women voters to carry the torch of liberty through the dark lands and keep it burning. And the dark mass below the lighted altar-tower caught the choristers’ spirit, and burst into cheers.

The chorus also sang the Song of the Free Women, written by Sara Bard Field to the music of the Marseillaise.

The envoys spoke. Their words were greeted with cheers. One of the nation’s greatest actresses, Margaret Anglin, said a few fitting farewell words to them in the name of the women of the world.

Then, all at once, the great, brightly-colored picture and its dark background began to disintegrate and fade. The Court darkened, but bright masses of women were forming in procession to escort the envoys to the gates of the Exposition. Orange lanterns swayed in the breeze; purple, white, and gold draperies fluttered, the blare of the band burst forth, and the great surging crowd followed to the gates.

There, Ingeborg Kindstedt and Maria Kindberg, of Providence, Rhode Island, who had purchased the car that is to take the crusaders on their long journey, met the procession. The Overland car was covered with Suffrage streamers. Miss Kindberg was at the wheel. To the wild cheering of the crowd, Miss Joliffe and Mrs. Field, the two envoys for Washington, were seated. The crowd surged close with final messages. Cheers burst forth as the gates opened, and the big car swung through, ending the most dramatic and significant Suffrage Convention that has probably ever been held in the history of the world.

And so Alice Paul’s stupendous pageant—whose stage was the entire United States—opened.

The petition which the envoys were to carry across the country to Washington was, even when it left California, 108the largest ever signed in one place. It was 18,333 feet long, and contained 500,000 names.

Very soon after the envoys started, President Wilson made his first declaration for Suffrage. He also went to New Jersey and voted for it.

Frances Joliffe was called back to California by illness in her family at the beginning of the journey. Sara Bard Field, therefore, continued alone across the continent with her two Swedish convoys. It was a remarkable trip, filled with unexpected adventure. A long procession of Mayors and Governors welcomed Mrs. Field in her nation-wide journey. Everywhere she advertised the Democratic record in Congress. One of the early mishaps was to get lost in the desert of Utah. They wandered about for a whole day, and regained the highway in time to arrive in Salt Lake City at five o’clock in the afternoon. Later in Kansas came a more serious mishap. But let Mrs. Field speak for herself. No better picture can be given of her picturesque journey than her own reports, published from time to time in the Suffragist.

From Fallon, Nevada, Mrs. Field wrote:

Here we are in the heart of Nevada’s desert, having traveled already over three hundred and eighty miles of every kind of country—meadow land, green, luxurious ranches, rolling hill country, steep mountain grades, the grass lands of the Sierras, and now through the bare but beautiful desert.

We reached Reno at midnight on Sunday after a vision of the sublime chaos of the Sierras at night.

At night, from a car flying the Congressional union colors and the Amendment banner, Miss Martin and I spoke in the streets of Reno. The crowd listened with close attention, and pressed closely about the car to sign the petition.

At noon today, we left Reno for the most trying and perilous part of our journey. We are traveling across some six hundred miles of barren land known as the “Great American Desert.” Our next destination is Salt Lake City.

From Salt Lake City, Mrs. Field wrote:

109The State Capitol, where each meeting was held, stands on a hill. The world is at its feet. The mountains wall the entire city.... While the earth was glowing in the light of a flaming sunset, and the mountains about stood like everlasting witnesses, Representative Howell of Utah pledged his full and unqualified support to the Susan B. Anthony Amendment in the coming session of Congress.

At Colorado Springs, their reception was almost a pageant. Marching to music, a procession of women clad in purple, white, and gold surplices and carrying banners, accompanied the Suffrage car to the City Hall where they sang The March of the Women and The Song of the Free Women. The Mayor of Colorado Springs greeted them with a welcoming speech.

In the bogs of southern Kansas, the Suffrage car had an adventure. The Suffragist says:

Pulling into Hutchinson on Monday evening over muddy roads, the car plunged suddenly into a deep hole filled with water. The body of the Flier was almost submerged. The petitioners, fearing to step out of the car, sat and called “Help!” into the darkness of the night until their voices were hoarse. No response came from the apparently deserted country. But they knew there was a farmhouse about a mile back. So Sara Bard Field, little but brave, slipped away from her place on the back seat; before her companions knew it, was almost up to her waist in slimy mud. Hardly able to pull one foot out of the mud to plant it ahead of the other, she finally, after a two hours’ struggle, reached the ranch, where the farmer and his son were roused from their sleep (for it was now midnight) and told of the women’s plight. In a little while, horses were harnessed and a rescue party was on its way; but not until three o’clock did the women start toward Hutchinson tired and wet, and covered with mud.

In Kansas City, Missouri, the Suffragists, accompanied by a procession of automobiles, impressively long, called first on Mayor Jost and then on Senator Reed. The difference between Suffrage and non-Suffrage States became immediately evident from Mayor Jost’s attitude; for, while he bade the envoys welcome, he declined to state his own convictions 110on the purposes of their journey. There was no doubt about Senator Reed’s conviction. He had voted against the Suffrage measure in the last Session. The women made speeches. In answer, Senator Reed spoke several sentences in such a low and indistinct manner that no one in the crowd that overflowed his office could understand him, and a man in the delegation called out, “You need say only one word, Senator.” There were more speeches from the women, and, when Senator Reed saw that something must be said, he finally declared he “would take the matter into consideration.”

Mrs. Field writing of Missouri, said:

“In the enemy’s country,”—that is what the newspapers said of our arrival in Missouri, the first non-Suffrage State we reached. Such kind, genial, hospitable “enemies.” I wish all enemies were of their disposition. For a whole day and night, Kansas City, Missouri, was alive with Suffrage enthusiasm; great crowds attended our advent everywhere. We never spoke that whole day, from our noon meeting on the City Hall steps until the last late street meeting at night, but we had more people to talk to than our voices could reach. As our auto procession passed down the street, crowds gathered to see it; and the windows of every business house and office building were lined with kindly faces. Often, there was applause and cheers; when these were lacking, there was a peculiar sort of earnest curiosity. And, oh the Suffragists! I wish that every western voting woman who is making a sacrificial effort at all for National Suffrage could have seen those grateful women. “The greatest day for Suffrage Kansas has ever seen,” said some of the older Suffrage workers: “How good of the western women to come to our aid!” At the City Club meeting, which was packed, Mr. Frank P. Walsh predicted National Suffrage in 1916. There was good fellowship over a Suffrage dinner, and earnest street meetings afterwards; gravely interested crowds attended, and the newspapers gave large space. The whole city talked National Suffrage for at least two days.

At Topeka occurred another adventure. A great crowd awaited the Suffrage automobile for two hours. But sixty miles away, afflicted with tire trouble and engine difficulties, 111the car stood stationary for those two hours. And all the time, the valiant Mabel Vernon talked, hoping against hope that the arrival of the car would interrupt her speech. Sh............