Alice Paul
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| Alice Paul | |
|---|---|
Alice Paul, circa 1915
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| Born | January 11, 1885 Moorestown, New Jersey |
| Died | July 9, 1977 (aged 92) Moorestown Township, New Jersey |
| Alma mater | University of Pennsylvania, Swarthmore College, American University |
| Occupation | Suffragist |
| Parents | William Mickle Paul I (1850-1902) Tacie Parry |
| Relatives | Siblings: Willam, Helen, and Parry |
Alice Stokes Paul (January 11, 1885 – July 9, 1977) was an American suffragist, feminist, and women's rights activist, and the main leader and strategist of the 1910s campaign for the Nineteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution which prohibits sex discrimination in the right to vote. Along with Lucy Burns and others, Paul strategized the events, such as the Silent Sentinels, which led the successful campaign that resulted in its passage in 1920.[1]
After 1920 Paul spent a half century as leader of the National Woman's Party, which fought for her Equal Rights Amendment to secure constitutional equality for women. She won a large degree of success with the inclusion of women as a group protected against discrimination by the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Historian David Chalmers concludes:
- Alice Paul was challengingly militant, but despite its fight for an Equal Rights Amendment, her National Women's Party was otherwise conservative, uninterested in social reform, race issues, birth control, and changed gender roles.[2]
Contents
[hide]Early life[edit]
Alice Paul was born on January 11, 1885 in Moorestown, New Jersey, which is today a suburb of Mount Laurel. She was a descendant of William Penn, the Quaker founder of Pennsylvania. She grew up in the Quaker tradition of public service, in a family that included a foreign aid worker to Russia and a founder of a Christian Science church, and the Quaker view of recognizing women as separate people from men. Her mother, Tacie, was even a member of the National American Woman Suffrage Association; Paul would sometimes join her mother in attending suffragist meetings. The Quaker tradition is where Paul first learned about the suffrage movement and formed her deep commitment to social justice.[3]
Education[edit]
Paul attended Moorestown Friends School, where she graduated at the top of her class.[4] She then went to Swarthmore College, co-founded by her grandfather, and earned a B.A. in Biology. Partly in order to avoid going into teaching work, Paul completed a fellowship year at a settlement house in New York City after her graduation, living with and mentoring settlement residents as part of the College Settlement Association. While working in the settlement taught her about the need to right injustice in America, Paul quickly saw that social work was not the way she was to achieve this goal: "I knew in a very short time I was never going to be a social worker, because I could see that social workers were not doing much good in the world... you couldn't change the situation by social work."[5]
Paul then earned her M.A. in sociology from the University of Pennsylvania in 1907.[3] She continued her studies at the Woodbrooke Quaker Study Centre in Birmingham, England, not far from the University of Birmingham, while returning to social work to make an income. During time in London she made the acquaintance of the Pankhursts. After returning from England in 1910, Paul continued her studies at the University of Philadelphia, earning a Ph.D. in economics. Her dissertation was entitled "The Legal Position of Women in Pennsylvania"; it discussed the history of the women's movement in Pennsylvania and the rest of the U.S., and urged woman suffrage as the key issue of the day.[6]
Paul later received her law degree (LL.B) from the Washington College of Law at American University in 1922, after the suffrage fight was over.[7] In 1927, she earned an LL.M, and in 1928, a Doctorate in Civil Laws from American University.[8]
Life work[edit]
Early Work in British Woman Suffrage[edit]
After her graduation from the University of Pennsylvania, she moved to England where she first became acquainted with women suffragists and their work. Alice Paul encountered Emmeline and Christabel Pankhurst, the militant founders of the Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU) in Britain.[9] It was through working with these women that Paul found her true calling, not as a social worker, but as a soldier in the battle to win equal rights for women.
After a "conversion experience" seeing Christabel Pankhurst speak at the University of Birmingham, Alice Paul realized that radical reform was what the world needed, not slow changes to the status quo - and that was to be found in the political power of woman suffrage, which would enable women of all stripes to enact reforms to better their lot. Paul joined the WSPU and began participating in demonstrations and marches. While associated with the WSPU, Paul was arrested seven times and imprisoned three times, and participated in hunger strikes while in prison.[9]
She met Lucy Burns during a London march led by Emmeline Pankhurst, at which all of the participants were arrested. They continued to work together in the WSPU, and the relationship would continue for the duration of the suffrage fight, first in England, then in the United States. Paul quickly took on a leadership role in the WSPU, organizing demonstrations and symbolic events. Paul put herself physically on the line during dramatic attempts to increase the visibility of the women's cause. Before a political meeting at St. Andrew's Hall in Glasgow in August 1909, Paul camped out on the roof of the hall so that she could address the crowd below. She was cheered by the crowd as police forced her to come down; later, when Paul, Burns, and fellow suffragists attempted to enter the event, they were beaten by police while sympathetic bystanders attempted to protect them.[6]
During the fall of 1909, Paul and another suffragist, Amelia Brown, disguised themselves as cleaners at the Guild Hall, where the Lord Mayor was hosting a banquet for Prime Minister Asquith and other cabinet ministers. When Asquith stood up to speak, Paul and the other suffragist threw their shoes and broke stained glass windows in order to gain attention, while screaming “Votes for women!”.[9] The women were arrested and sentenced to one month's hard labor.[6] During previous arrests, Paul had secured a quick release by going on hunger strike, but during this incarceration, she was force-fed, a process which caused great bodily harm. Paul had to be carried out of the prison at the end of her sentence.
Suffrage Work in the United States[edit]
After the ordeal of her final London imprisonment, Paul returned to the United States in January 1910 to continue her recovery and to develop a plan for suffrage work back home.[9] Paul's experiences in England were well-publicized, and the American news media was already covering her activities while she was still in London. She knew that she was positioned to bring greater attention and scrutiny to the woman suffrage cause, and used this power to shake up the stagnant American suffrage movement.
Paul reenrolled at the University of Pennsylvania, pursuing her Ph.D., while speaking about her experiences in the British suffrage movement to Quaker audiences and starting to work in United States suffrage on the local level. After completing her dissertation, a comprehensive overview of the history of the legal status of United States women, she began participating in NAWSA rallies, and eventually moved to Washington to chair NAWSA's Congressional Committee. NAWSA's work at the time was primarily focused at the state level; the passage of a congressional amendment seemed like an insurmountable challenge given the truculent opposition of the South and Northeast.
One of her first big projects was organizing a parade in Washington the day before President Wilson's inauguration. This scheduling was not a coincidence - Paul was determined to put pressure on Wilson. The lead banner in the parade said, "We Demand an Amendment to the United States Constitution Enfranchising the Women of the Country."[9] Over half a million people came to view the parade; with insufficient police protection, the situation soon devolved into a near-riot, with onlookers pressing so close to the women that they were unable to proceed. The Massachusetts and Pennsylvania national guards stepped in; eventually, students from the Maryland Agricultural College provided a human barrier to help the women to pass. Paul, with her experience using police mistreatment and brutality for publicity purposes in Britain, saw an opportunity to boost sympathy for the women's cause. She quickly mobilized public dialogue about the police response to the women's demonstration, producing greater awareness and sympathy for NAWSA.[6][9]
After the parade, the NAWSA's focus was lobbying for a constitutional amendment to secure the right to vote for women. Such an amendment had originally been sought by suffragists Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton who, as leaders of the NWSA, fought for a federal amendment to the constitution securing women's suffrage until the 1890 formation of NAWSA, which campaigned for the vote on a state-by-state basis.
Formation of the National Woman's Party[edit]
Paul's methods started to create tension between her and the leader of NAWSA, who thought that a constitutional amendment was not practical at that time. When her lobbying efforts proved fruitless, Paul and her colleagues severed all ties with NAWSA and formed the National Woman's Party (NWP) in 1916.[8] The NWP began introducing some of the methods used by the suffrage movement in Britain and would only support the suffrage amendment.[9]Alva Belmont, a multi-millionaire socialite at the time, provided funding. The NWP was accompanied by press coverage and the publication of the weekly Suffragist.[8]
In the US presidential election of 1916, Paul and the NWP campaigned against the continuing refusal of President Woodrow Wilson and other incumbent Democrats to support the Suffrage Amendment actively. In January 1917, the NWP staged the first political protest to picket the White House. The picketers, known as "Silent Sentinels," held banners demanding the right to vote. This was an example of a non-violent civil disobedience campaign. In July 1917, picketers were arrested on charges of "obstructing traffic." Many, including Paul, were convicted and incarcerated at the Occoquan Workhouse in Virginia (later the Lorton Correctional Complex) and the District of Columbia Jail.[8] When the public first heard the news they were stunned. Leading suffragists and very well-connected women were going to prison for sixty days for peacefully protesting. President Wilson received bad publicity from this event and was livid with the position he was forced into. He quickly pardoned the women on July 19, two days after they had been sentenced. But the damage had already been done, the Boston Journal stated, “The little band representing the NWP has been abused and bruised by government clerks, soldiers and sailors until its efforts to attract the President’s attention has sunk into the conscience of the whole nation.”[9]
Suffragists continued picketing outside the White House after this event and during WWI with banners containing slogans such as “Mr. President, How Long Must Women Wait For Liberty?”.[10] Although the suffragists protested peacefully, their protests were not always met kindly. While protesting, young men would harass and beat up the women, with the police never intervening on behalf of the protesters. Police would even arrest other men who tried to help the women who were getting beaten. Even though they were protesting during wartime, they continued peaceful, non-destructive protesting, so they still had some public support. Throughout this time, more protesters were arrested and sent to Occoquan, with no pardons offered.[9]
Prison and Hunger Strikes[edit]
By repeating offenses, Paul purposefully strove to receive the seven-month jail sentence that started on October 20, 1917. She had previously been incarcerated on a number of occasions for insignificant periods, but Paul did not believe that made enough of a statement about the persecution of women in America.[11]
When sent to Occoquan, the women were given no special treatment and had to live in harsh conditions, with poor sanitation, infested food, and dreadful facilities.[9] In protest of the conditions in Occoquan, Paul began a hunger strike,[12] which led to her being moved to the prison’s psychiatric ward and force-fed raw eggs through a feeding tube. "Seems almost unthinkable now, doesn’t it?" Paul told an interviewer from American Heritage when asked about the forced feeding. "It was shocking that a government of men could look with such extreme contempt on a movement that was asking nothing except such a simple little thing as the right to vote."[13]
On the night of November 14, 1917, at Occoquan, known as the Night of Terror, a group of returning protesters was beaten by guards to the point of unconsciousness. Some were choked and one was even stabbed between her eyes by her own banner; others received concussions, lacerations and broken ribs. None of the protesters received medical assistance after the event and they were thrown into concrete "punishment cells." [10] Despite the brutality of the intervention, Paul remained undaunted and on November 27 and 28, all the suffragists were released from prison.[9]
Paul's hunger strike, combined with the continuing demonstrations and attendant press coverage, kept pressure on the Wilson administration.[8] In January 1918, Wilson announced that women's suffrage was urgently needed as a "war measure," and strongly urged Congress to pass the legislation. The amendment passed the House in 1918 but the Senate was a different story. President Wilson even attended the Senate meeting and urged the senators to pass this amendment. The amendment still fell two votes short of passing. The next year, 1919, the amendment was one vote short of passing. In 1920 the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution was passed and secured the vote for women. Originally, the amendment wasn't going to pass, being short by one vote again, but the senator of Tennessee changed his vote when he received a telegram from his mother asking him to support women’s suffrage.[3]
Civil rights for women[edit]
Main article: Civil Rights Act of 1964 § Women's rights
Later in life, Alice Paul played a major role in adding protection for women in the Civil Rights Act of 1964, despite the opposition of liberals who feared it would end protective labor laws for women. The prohibition on sex discrimination was added to the Civil Rights Act by Howard W. Smith, a powerful Virginia Democrat who chaired the House Rules Committee. Smith's amendment was passed by a teller vote of 168 to 133. For twenty years Smith had sponsored the Equal Rights Amendment in the House because he believed in equal rights for women, even though he opposed equal rights for blacks. He for decades had been close to the National Woman's Party and especially to Alice Paul. She and other feminists had worked with Smith since 1945 trying to find a way to include sex as a protected civil rights category.[14]
Equal Rights Amendment[edit]
Paul was the original author of a proposed Equal Rights Amendment to the Constitution in 1923.[8] The ERA was passed by both houses in Congress in 1972 and was then submitted to the state legislatures for ratification. Approval by 38 states was required to ensure adoption of the amendment. Not enough states—only 35—voted in favor in time for the deadline. However, efforts to pass the ERA are still happening, as well as efforts to pass a new equality amendment. Although the amendment hasn't passed yet, almost half of the U.S. states have adopted the ERA into their state constitutions.[15]
Death[edit]
Paul continued fighting for equal rights until she had a debilitating stroke in 1974. She died at the age of 92 on July 9, 1977 at the Quaker Greenleaf Extension Home in Moorestown Township, New Jersey, near her family home of Paulsdale.[4]
Legacy[edit]
In 1979 Paul was inducted, posthumously, into the National Women's Hall of Fame.[16]
Paul's alma mater, Swarthmore College, named the Women Center and a dormitory in her honor. Montclair State University in New Jersey has also named a building in her honor.
Two countries have honored her by issuing a postage stamp: Great Britain in 1981 and the United States in 1995. The U.S. stamp was the 78-cent Great Americans series stamp.
In 1990 the Alice Paul Institute purchased the brick farmhouse, Paulsdale, in Mount Laurel, New Jersey where Paul was born. Paulsdale is a National Historic Landmark, and is on the New Jersey and National Registers of Historic Places. The Alice Paul Institute keeps Paul’s legacy alive with their mission to promote gender equality.[3]
Hilary Swank played Paul in the HBO 2004 movie Iron Jawed Angels, which portrayed her 1910s movement for passage of the 19th Amendment.
Paul appeared on a United States half-ounce $10 gold coin in 2012, as part of the First Spouse Gold Coin Series. A provision in the Presidential $1 Coin Program (see Pub.L. 109–145, 119 Stat. 2664, enacted December 22, 2005) directs that Presidential spouses be honored. As President Chester A. Arthur was a widower, Paul is shown representing "Arthur's era".[17]
See also[edit]
- Iron Jawed Angels, 2004 film about Alice Paul and Lucy Burns and their fight resulting in passage of the 19th Amendment.
- Paulsdale, birthplace and childhood home of Alice Paul in Moorestown, New Jersey.
- List of civil rights leaders
- List of suffragists and suffragettes
- List of women's rights activists
- Timeline of women's suffrage
- Women's suffrage organizations
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