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Men stopping to read anti-suffrage materials outside the National Anti-Suffrage Association Headquarters.

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September 3, 1920
Spending time in a British jail for her participation in suffrage protests in England. Alice describes her experience during a hunger strike, a tactic she later employed at the Occoquan Workhouse in Virginia.

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Picketing the white house

I am focusing on the event of Picketing the White House, during the women's suffrage.

There was a peaceful protest of over 5,000 women for the suffrage but it was disrupted by the Washington police. There was 10 arrests on August 28, 1917 for picketing the white house. The women were there to convince President Woodrow Wilson to pass the Anthony Amendment, which gives women the right to vote. Dozens of women testified they were insulted or injured. The suffragettes were all lead by Dr. Alice Paul. It was difficult to get the President on board with these ideas, during the first message to Congress Wilson failed to even mention the issue of women's suffrage. The suffrage parade women's suffrage members wore a red cross on their clothing to ruin the color scheme banners and the appearance of female solidarity. “The least tribute we can pay them is to make them the equals of men in political rights as they have proved themselves their equals in every field of practical work they have entered, whether for themselves or for their country.” President Woodrow Wilson.

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Rubenstein Center Scholarship

In the second half of the nineteenth century Americans headed west to seek greater opportunities for themselves and their families. As settlements and territories emerged, new residents actively participated in creating the political systems they lived under. In fact, it was in these sparsely populated areas that the women's suffrage movement quickly gained momentum. Near the turn of the century, the territories of Wyoming, Utah, Washington, and Montana granted full voting rights to women. There were also a number of states that allowed women to vote prior to the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment: Wyoming, Colorado, Utah, Idaho, Washington, California, Arizona, Kansas, Oregon, Montana, Nevada, New York, Michigan, Oklahoma, and South Dakota. Others such as Illinois, Nebraska, Ohio, Indiana, North Dakota, Rhode Island, Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Missouri permitted women to vote only for president before 1919. Needless to say, voting rights for women varied widely across the country. As more state legislatures granted these rights to female residents, suffragists launched a national campaign to persuade Congress to pass a constitutional amendment. ¹

The national struggle for women's suffrage mobilized on March 3, 1913, the day before Woodrow Wilson's inauguration in Washington, D.C. The National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA), in collaboration with activists Alice Paul and Lucy Burns, organized a suffrage parade down Pennsylvania Avenue. The march began at the Peace Monument near the Capitol, passed alongside the White House, and ended with a rally at Memorial Continental Hall. ² Over 5,000 women marched for suffrage but their peaceful procession was disrupted by a "surging mass of humanity that completely defied the Washington police." Army cavalry stationed at nearby Fort Myer restored order for the parading women. The suffragists were led by Grand Marshal of the procession May Jane Walker Burleson, "General" Rosalie Jones, Inez Milholland, and Dr. Anna Howard Shaw, president of NAWSA. ³ The chaos prompted a Senate inquiry into the mishandling of the crowds. Legislators questioned policemen and their tactics, as wells as dozens of women who testified that they were insulted or injured by the throngs of people. ⁴

Afterwards suffrage leaders prepared the next phase of their campaign: persuade the president and secure his support for a constitutional amendment. Suffragists wasted little time, meeting with President Wilson just two weeks after he was sworn into office. Five women-Alice Paul, Anna Wiley, Edith Hooker, Ida Harper, and Genevieve Stone-gave the president a variety of reasons to back their cause. Harper even referenced Wilson's 1912 campaign promise of "The New Freedom," reasoning that a "perfect new freedom cannot come until women as well as men are given the right to vote." ⁵ The president, however, declined to commit, informing the women that the focus of his domestic policies would be tariff, banking, and business reforms. Undeterred, the suffragists continued to schedule meetings with President Wilson to discuss the right to vote over the next two years. ⁶ Some were more spontaneous in nature, such as the delegation of 71 New Jersey women who marched on the White House and demanded an audience with the president in November 1913. The women insisted that the president publicly support a committee on women's suffrage; Wilson assured his uninvited guests that such a committee was "under consideration," but again refused to promise anything. After their exit the women marched on the United States Capitol to lobby New Jersey representatives for their cause. They even chased down Senator William Hughes, riding in an automobile on Pennsylvania Avenue, with "a parade of taxis." ⁷ At the NAWSA convention later that month, leaders unveiled a new "White House Campaign" strategy. Women were asked to join state committees and schedule frequent visits to the White House to remind the president of their mission. ⁸

In his first annual message to Congress, President Wilson failed to even mention the issue of women's suffrage. ⁹ A week later, Dr. Anna Shaw and her NAWSA delegation visited the White House again, pleading with Wilson to reconsider his priorities. The president demurred, explaining that his reluctance stemmed from his political belief that all three branches of government should remain independent and autonomous. While he expressed his support for a Congressional committee on women's suffrage, Wilson explained that his private opinions were irrelevant to the legislative process. ¹⁰ Without the president's full support the suffragists faced political obstruction and denigration from anti-suffragist groups. During a suffrage parade on May 9, 1914, the National Association Opposed to Woman Suffrage encouraged its members to wear red roses on their clothing, hoping that these red flowers would ruin the color scheme of the suffrage banners and the appearance of female solidarity. Despite the rosy resistance, more than 5,000 women marched from the White House to the Capitol, demanding that Congress take up the issue of women's suffrage. This time, local police authorities were prepared for the protest, ensuring that the women participating would "not be subjected to the indignities" they experienced during the 1913 march. ¹¹

Later that summer "five hundred members of the General Federation of Women's Clubs" called on President Wilson and were ushered into the East Room. When the president entered the room "there was no applause" to greet him, a gesture of dissent that many commentators later decried as disrespectful. Wilson permitted the leaders to air their grievances and afterwards he answered several questions raised by the suffragists. Wilson privately opposed women's suffrage but evaded answering the question publicly. The suffragists pressed him to elaborate more on his private opinions; with no other recourse at hand, Wilson admitted that he believed women's suffrage "is a matter for settlement by the States and not by the Federal government." The public rebukes made by women leaders were quite extraordinary for their time. Lucy Burns, Vice Chairman of the Congressional Union, noted the irony: "For a disfranchised class seeking political freedom to be informed that they may not question the views of the ruler of their country on the matter of their own political status is really difficult to comprehend." Alice Paul, Chairman of the Congressional Union for Woman Suffrage, responded by reminding women that Wilson had "put his party on record as refusing help to the suffrage cause. The several million enfranchised women cannot fail to remember this fact in deciding upon their party affiliations next November." ¹² The confrontation between the president and the members of the women's clubs also sparked conflict between suffragist groups as well. Dr. Anna Shaw of the NAWSA sent President Wilson a letter of apology, denouncing "any act in the name of woman suffrage which mars the record of dignity, lawfulness, and patriotism." ¹³ Disagreements over strategy grew over time, as the leaders of NAWSA continued to embrace a more moderate approach to suffrage while avoiding other contentious issues. The Congressional Union for Woman Suffrage (later the National Woman's Party) favored public actions that would draw attention to the movement while taking positions on other political and social issues.

When meeting with the president failed to deliver concrete results, suffragists attempted another strategy: obtain closer proximity to the White House to protest and garner public support. NAWSA moved into its new national headquarters at 1626 Rhode Island Avenue, just six blocks north of the White House. ¹⁴ Alice Paul and Lucy Burns' Congressional Union for Woman Suffrage (now the National Woman's Party) set up shop at Cameron House on the east side of Lafayette Square, a stone's throw from the Executive Mansion. Inspired by the more extreme tactics of Emmeline Pankhurst and the British suffragette movement, members of the NWP attended President Wilson's 1916 address to Congress. Sitting in the gallery of the House of Representatives, the women patiently waited until the president was speaking about the political rights of Puerto Rican citizens. On cue the women unfurled a suffragette banner inscribed with "great black letters: Mr. President, What Will You Do For Woman Suffrage?" The president gave a "suspicion of a smile" as he read their words, but quickly returned to his address. ¹⁵

Suffragists began their next campaign on January 10, 1917, when twelve "Silent Sentinels" picketed the White House gates to confront and shame the president for his inaction. This strategy continued even as the United States entered World War I on April 6, 1917. As part of the mobilization for war, government officials promoted national unity and industry; they also identified possible agitators and accused them of undermining the American war effort. The suffragists were no different. When asked whether her party followers were anarchists, Alice Paul replied, "It makes no difference to us what a woman's political tendencies may be...We are working for a common cause-that of equal suffrage for women-and when we get the vote it is immaterial to us whether the women are Republicans, Democrats, Progressives, Socialists or anarchists. We have nothing to do with their politics." ¹⁶ NAWSA's president Dr. Anna Howard Shaw was brought before the House committee on suffrage to answer allegations that the suffragists were "pro-German" and pacifists who "would welcome peace at any price." Shaw pointed out that American women, including suffragists, were aiding the war effort both at home and abroad. When her colleague Mrs. Travis Whitney was asked about recent suffrage legislation passed in New York, one committee member insinuated that Socialist and pro-German sentiment made its success possible. Whitney retorted, "No political party, no class, no 'isms,' can lay exclusive claim to the suffrage victory. It was the people's victory." ¹⁷

As the country prepared for war, tensions and conflict emerged between different groups of Americans. Many government officials and citizens interpreted wartime protests as public acts of disloyalty; as such, both authorities and crowds directed their anger toward any dissidents. As the "Silent Sentinels" picketed the White House during the summer of 1917, White House policemen continuously arrested the suffragists on charges of unlawful assembly, disorderly conduct, and disrupting traffic. Suffragists were fined but they generally refused to pay out of protest. As their actions became more disruptive, authorities levied harsher sentences, sending the picketers to Occoquan Workhouse and Penitentiary in Lorton, Virginia. Masses appeared to watch the women demonstrate, though these spectators were not always peaceful themselves. Some incited violence by accosting the women and destroying their banners. In one instance, a group vandalized the NWP headquarters with "eggs, tomatoes, missiles of various sorts." ¹⁸

As this neighborhood melee unfolded, President Wilson began to soften his stance on women's suffrage. Perhaps it was the president's daughter, Jessie Woodrow Wilson Sayre, who persuaded her father to soften his stance - though the more likely explanation was that Wilson realized this anti-suffrage position would cost the Democratic Party seats in Congress. ¹⁹ That fall he expressed verbal support for the suffrage campaign in New York, but ultimately the reports of how suffragists were mistreated in Occoquan convinced Wilson to intervene on moral grounds. One Washington Post story described how Alice Paul, recently sentenced to six months in a workhouse for picketing, was subjected to physical and mental examinations by five physicians against her will. When Paul started a hunger strike out of protest at the District workhouse she was "forcibly fed twice...through a tube." ²⁰ Several days after the printing of Paul's experience, the "Night of Terror" took place on November 14. The 33 suffragists imprisoned at Occoquan were "brutally handled by the guards and subjected to indignities" for refusing to work or eat. In obtaining a writ of habeas corpus for the women, NWP counsel Dudley Field Malone argued that the women "were being subjected to cruel and unusual punishment," citing Lucy Burns' diary and their injuries as proof. ²¹ The reports of abuse appalled President Wilson, prompting him to immediately pardon the prisoners and join the suffrage crusade.

The least tribute we can pay them is to make them the equals of men in political rights as they have proved themselves their equals in every field of practical work they have entered, whether for themselves or for their country.

President Woodrow Wilson

In December 1917 the president forcefully advocated for women's suffrage in his sixth annual address to Congress, arguing that women had earned the right to vote by performing traditional duties while bearing the burden of new wartime responsibilities. "The least tribute we can pay them is to make them the equals of men in political rights as they have proved themselves their equals in every field of practical work they have entered, whether for themselves or for their country," articulated Wilson. "These great days of completed achievement would be sadly marred were we to omit that act of justice." ²² Nearly a month later, President Wilson delivered his famous "Fourteen Points" speech to Congress on January 8, 1918. The president outlined his vision for a new world order built on the American ideals of democracy and freedom. At a White House conference the next day, Wilson stunned everyone by publicly declaring his support for a women's suffrage constitutional amendment. ²³ In November, the news of an armistice sparked celebration for many Americans. The influx of U.S. troops, war materials, and monetary credit gave the Allied Powers much needed momentum to break the stalemate. American mobilization efforts had saved Western Europe and established the United States as a formidable global power.

Wilson's policy reversal did little to appease suffragists. They continued to picket the Executive Mansion and hold public burnings of any speech where Wilson mentioned the words 'democracy' and 'freedom.' After the Senate initially failed to pass the amendment in early 1919, suffrage supporters ramped up public protests and demonstrations. Their persistent pressure on the president and the incoming Congress produced political results later that spring. On May 21, 1919 the Susan B. Anthony Amendment passed 304-89 in the House of Representatives; on June 4 it cleared the Senate by a vote of 56-25. ²⁴ In order for the amendment to become law, three-fourths of the states needed to ratify it. Suffragists shifted attention back to their respective states, petitioning their representatives relentlessly for the next year. On August 18, 1920, Tennessee became the 36th state to ratify the 19th Amendment. ²⁵ Alice Paul, who suffered appalling treatment at Occoquan, celebrated the news by unfurling a massive ratification banner at 14 Jackson Place. The banner, decorated with 36 stars, each representing a state that had approved the Nineteenth Amendment, symbolized the national and state-level successes achieved by the suffragists. While some of their tactics were considered radical for the time, suffragists persevered by demonstrating their willingness to fight for equality. Their struggles-with members of Congress, angry crowds, policemen and guards, anti-suffragists, and President Wilson himself-gave momentum to the movement, drawing more supporters to their cause. The gross mistreatment of suffragists gave them a moral high ground, one that President Wilson eventually felt compelled to join. As the United States projected the merits of democracy abroad, its representatives now answered to citizens, both male and female, at home.

This was originally published on April 14, 2017

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In the second half of the nineteenth century Americans headed west to seek greater opportunities for themselves and their families. As settlements and territories emerged, new residents actively participated in...

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Picketing For Suffrage

I am focussing on the event of Picketing the White House, during the women's suffrage.

There was 10 arrests on August 28, 1917 for picketing the white house. The women were there to convince President Woodrow Wilson to pass the Anthony Amendment, which gives women the right to vote. It all started on January 10, 1917, more than 1,000 women across the country joining in. In the time between June- November 1917, 218 women were arrested, with the only intention to protest silently and hold up signs. The protesting became even more popular when the war came to Europe in April, with women holding signs saying that the United States was Democracy in name only. The whole protest and picketing act was led by Alice Paul.

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On August 28, 1963, one-hundred years after the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation, approximately 200,000 to 250,000 people arrived in Washington, D.C., and peacefully marched down Constitution and Independence Avenues to the Lincoln Memorial, to rectify, in the words of A. Philip Randolph, "old grievances and to help resolve an American crisis." Precipitating factors included the subjugation of African Americans to Jim Crow segregation and laws in practically every sector in society, a disproportionate level of high unemployment and unequal wages, and other forms of legal, economic, and social inequality.

A. Philip Randolph,...at the Lincoln Memorial, during 1963 March on Washington. United Press International, 1963. New York World-Telegram and the Sun Newspaper Photograph Collection. Prints & Photographs Division

The marchers, representing rural and urban areas from every corner of the nation, arrived by train, plane, bus, and car. Newspapers reported that the marchers were young and old; black, white, and brown. They were sharecroppers and socialites. The marchers were prayerful, jubilant, and tearful; embraced each other throughout the day and sang traditional spirituals such as "Oh Freedom," "Ain't Gon' Let Nobody Turn Me Round," and "We Shall Overcome." These supporters of the March were in Washington to introduce ten levels of demands, of which the first was the demand for comprehensive and effective civil rights legislation that would guarantee all Americans: (1) access to all public accommodations, (2) decent housing, (3) adequate and integrated education, and (4) the right to vote. Other demands included: withholding Federal funds from all programs in which discrimination exists; a massive federal program to train and place all unemployed workers -black and white-on meaningful and dignified jobs with decent wages.

Signs Carried By Many Marchers, during the March on Washington, 1963. Mary S. Trikosko, photographer, [Aug. 28, 1963]. U.S. News & World Report Magazine Photograph Collection. Prints & Photographs Division

The six primary organizers and organizations for the March were: (1) James Farmer, National Director of the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), (2) Reverend Martin Luther King, President of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), (3) John Lewis, Chairman of the Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), (4) A. Philip Randolph, President of the Negro American Labor Organization, (5) Roy Wilkins, Executive Secretary of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), and (6) Whitney Young, Executive Director of the Urban League. These leaders of prominent civil rights organizations came together to commemorate the centennial of the Emancipation Proclamation and to call attention to the atrocities African Americans were still experiencing. The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King gave his iconic "I Have a Dream"External speech on this occasion.

Copy of Photograph Showing Left to Right: John Lewis, Whitney Young, A. Philip Randolph, Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., James Farmer, and Roy Wilkins. Bill Sauro, photographer, July 4, 1963. U.S. News & World Report Magazine Photograph Collection. Prints & Photographs Division.

The 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom drew attention to the systemic racism and the discrimination which African Americans still experience in education, housing, and jobs. It also called for Federal legislation to guarantee the right to vote for all Americans.

View of the Huge Crowd from the Lincoln Memorial...during the March on Washington. Warren K. Leffler, photographer, [Aug. 28, 1963]. U.S. News & World Report Magazine Photograph Collection. Prints & Photographs Division

Learn More

Explore the Rosa Parks Papers to discover additional primary sources about the March on Washington. For example, in a Subject File folder on the March, read the Organizing Manual and other materials created by the organizers.

Listen to A. Philip Randolph, the organizer of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, at the National Press Club two days before the March, where he explains the reasons for the March on Washington (listen to 05.00-14.09), how it serves as a model against racial bias, what it will achieve in motivating people to do something about the problem of abolishing racial violence in America, and its goal to "highlight the idea of the struggle of Negroes in America to achieve the transition from second class citizenship, to first class citizenship," and..."bring world pressure upon the United States of America to step up the struggle to wipe out race bias."

Read Protests That Changed America: The March on Washington to review selected reasons the March on Washington is considered "the most significant protest for social justice in the nation."

Experience the March on Washington through images found in the collections of the Library's Prints & Photographs Division. Selections are included in the online exhibit, A Day Like No Other: Commemorating the 50th Anniversary of the March on Washington.

Explore the history and lyrics of the song "We Shall Overcome." Read "Tracing the Long Journey of "We Shall Overcome".

Search on the term civil rights leaders in Today in History to read more about the lives of civil rights leaders such as Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks, James Baldwin, Booker T. Washington, and Mary Church Terrell.

Explore the Civil Rights History Project. Included are interviews of several people who participated in the March on Washington as well as many other aspects of the Civil Rights movement to obtain justice, freedom and equality for African Americans. This collection seeks to record and make widely accessible interviews with people who participated in the struggles.

The First Picket Line-College Day in the picket line. Feb. 1917. Women's Suffrage: Pictures of Suffragists and Their Activities. Prints & Photographs Division

Alice Paul, full-length portrait.... Sept. 3, 1920. Women's Suffrage: Pictures of Suffragists and Their Activities. Prints & Photographs Division

I resorted to the hunger strike method twice...When the forcible feeding was ordered I was taken from my bed, carried to another room and forced into a chair, bound with sheets and sat upon bodily by a fat murderer, whose duty it was to keep me still. Then the prison doctor, assisted by two woman attendants, placed a rubber tube up my nostrils and pumped liquid food through it into the stomach. Twice a day for a month, from November 1 to December 1, this was done.
"Alice Paul Talks." Philadelphia Tribune, January 1910. Scrapbooks of Elizabeth Smith Miller and Anne Fitzhugh Miller. Scrapbook 8. Part of the National American Woman Suffrage Association Collection. Rare Book & Special Collections Division

Ten suffragists were arrested on August 28, 1917, as they picketed the White House. The protesters were there in an effort to pressure President Woodrow Wilson to support the proposed "Anthony amendment" to the Constitution that would guarantee women the right to vote. Daily picketing began on January 10, 1917. During that year, more than 1,000 women from across the country joined the picket line outside the White House. Between June and November, 218 protesters from 26 states were arrested and charged with "obstructing sidewalk traffic." Of those arrested, 97 spent time in either the Occoquan Workhouse in Virginia or in the District of Columbia jail. Initially, protesters stood silently, holding placards inscribed with relatively tame messages such as "Mr. President, what will you do for Woman Suffrage?" and "How Long Must Women Wait for Liberty?" President Wilson maintained decorum, greeting the protesters with a tip of the hat as he rode, his wife at his side, through the White House gates.

The First Picket Line-College Day in the picket line. Feb. 1917. Women's Suffrage: Pictures of Suffragists and Their Activities. Prints & Photographs Division

By late spring, the picketers brandished more provocative placards. They took advantage of the United States' April 6 entry into the war in Europe to press their case. Bystanders erupted in violence on June 20, when picketers met Russian envoys with signs that proclaimed the United States a democracy in name only.

The White House protest reflected a rift between the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA), led by Carrie Chapman Catt, and the more confrontational National Woman's Party, led by former NAWSA member Alice Paul.

Having spent time in a British jail for her participation in suffrage protests in England, Paul was no stranger to confrontation or its potential value to a political movement. In " Alice Paul Talks," she describes her experience during a hunger strike, a tactic she later employed at the Occoquan Workhouse in Virginia:

Alice Paul, full-length portrait.... Sept. 3, 1920. Women's Suffrage: Pictures of Suffragists and Their Activities. Prints & Photographs Division

I resorted to the hunger strike method twice...When the forcible feeding was ordered I was taken from my bed, carried to another room and forced into a chair, bound with sheets and sat upon bodily by a fat murderer, whose duty it was to keep me still. Then the prison doctor, assisted by two woman attendants, placed a rubber tube up my nostrils and pumped liquid food through it into the stomach. Twice a day for a month, from November 1 to December 1, this was done.
"Alice Paul Talks." Philadelphia Tribune, January 1910. Scrapbooks of Elizabeth Smith Miller and Anne Fitzhugh Miller. Scrapbook 8. Part of the National American Woman Suffrage Association Collection. Rare Book & Special Collections Division

Influenced in part by the publicity generated by the White House pickets and subsequent arrests and forced feedings of women protesters, President Wilson lent his support to the suffrage amendment in January 1918. The amendment was approved by Congress shortly thereafter. Women achieved the right to vote with the August 18, 1920, ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment, which is commemorated by Women's Equality Day.

Learn More

The Library's exhibit Shall Not Be Denied: Women Fight for the Vote celebrates the efforts of those who participated in the 1848 Seneca Falls Convention and who continued fighting until the Nineteenth Amendment granting women the right to vote became a reality over 70 years later.

Women of Protest: Photographs from the Records of the National Woman's Party includes photographs that document the National Woman's Party (NWP) push for ratification of the 19th Amendment as well as its later campaign for passage of the Equal Rights Amendment. Included are a "timeline of key events" in the history of the NWP as well as essays on major figures of the Party and tactics and techniques used during their suffrage campaign.

Search Chronicling America, a collection of historic American newspapers, to follow the women's suffrage movement and the activities of those who led the campaign to secure the right to vote for women. Start with the Topics in Chronicling America features on Alice Paul, Susan B. Anthony, and the Nineteenth Amendment.

View One Hundred Years Toward Suffrage: An Overview to learn about key events in the history of the women's suffrage movement. This timeline is referenced in the "Related Resources" section of Women's Suffrage: Pictures of Suffragists and Their Activities.

Read documents related to the women's suffrage movement in the National American Woman Suffrage Association Collection. This collection consists of books and pamphlets documenting the suffrage campaign. The bulk of the collection is derived from the library of Carrie Chapman Catt, president of NAWSA from 1900 to 1904 and again from 1915 to 1920. She donated the collection to the Library of Congress in 1938.

View the American Women Series of research guides to learn about the extensive collections of materials found throughout the Library. Each guide focuses on the resources available to study women's history and culture through a subject or format approach as provided by the different reading rooms at the Library.

Scrapbooks of Elizabeth Smith Miller and Anne Fitzhugh Miller, part of the National American Woman Suffrage Association Collection, document the activities of the Geneva (NY) Political Equality Club, founded in 1897 by Elizabeth Smith Miller and her daughter Anne Fitzhugh Miller, as well as efforts at the state, national, and international levels to win the vote for women.

Search Today in History on the term Seneca Falls to learn more about that landmark 1848 convention on women's rights. Other Today in History features on woman's suffrage include the 1854 Ohio Woman's Rights Convention, the 1869 decision by the Wyoming Territory to grant women the right to vote, the 1884 address by Susan B. Anthony to the House Judiciary Committee, and the 1885 birth of Alice Paul.

Explore resources provided on the Teachers Page related to women's suffrage and history such as the Women's Suffrage primary source set and the lesson plans on Women's History.

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March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom | Picketing for Suffrage

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Millions of women, who refused to give up, changed our lives forever from 1913-1920. It was the first ever Picket around the white house. It shocked the nation. The picketing was described by the New York Times as petty, others described it as dangerous. Many to this day celebrate January 10th, as the day women changed history forever.

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Suffrage Centennial Celebration - "The First Picket In Front of The White House"

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In 1917 Suffragist were the first to ever launch a protest in front of The White House. These brave, passionate women faced unlawful arrest and imprisonment. It is because of their bravery and passion that the 19th Amendment was passed and ratified giving women in the United States the Right to Vote.