Woman Suffrage and the New Democracy by Sara Hunter Graham (review)

Book Reviews J47 of truth m,q rest in such an interpretation, it completely ignores the fundamental sources of economic oppression in our socioeconomic system. However much other ethnics compete with poor blacks in the labour market there ,s absolutely no basis for believing that an end to immigration would bring an end to the black underdass in America. Ragin marshals an impressive array of learning to bolster a rather shaky thesis. In the end the argument docs more to obscure than to illuminate the structural causes making for an Americ,m underclass. Even more disturbing is the suggestion it carries that the competition among disadvantaged groups is at the root of social incqt11ty rather than a reflection of it. Rogin extends his analysis to the two most popular films of the 1940s dealing with issues of discrimination, Gentlemen's Agreement (1947) and Pinky (1949). He argues that the different outcomes for the Jew and the black "goes back to the split upon which the original mixed-genre film, The fi1zzSinger, depends: that between the Jew who can change his identity and the African American who cannot change hers" (221). My argument with Rogin rests with the emphasis he gives to the alleged causal relation between the two. "Since the condition of white ethnic mobility," he writes, "is that blacks be kept in place, mobility cannot extend from blackface to black passing'' (225). There is a striking contrast between the richness of texture m this narrative and the reductionism of its major premise. Richm·d Weiss University ol California at Los Angeles Sara Hunter Graham. Woman Suff°nzgetmd the Neu..1 Democr11cy.New Haven: Yale University Press, 1997. Pp 256. Sara Hunter Graham's Woman Suff1·ageand the Neu, Democracy is a valuable contribution to the growing body of literature examining the lengthy campaign to enfranchise American women. Graham's contribution lies in her characterization of the suffrage movement as one of the first manifestations of pressure group politics in the United States. The book focuses on the National American Woman Suffrage Association, or NAWSA,\Vhich formed the core of the American suffrage movement's more moderate wing, tracing the changing strategies and tactics employed by the group during the period from 1890 until the vote was won in 1920. 148 Cmadian Review of American Smdtes Revue omad,emre dNudes m11h1cames Drawing on a range of arL~hivalmaterials, Graham traces the evolution of NAWSA's strategy over a thirty-year period. This encomp,:1sses the orgc1nization 's efforts to cultivate .1 "respectable" im.lge for their cause, the local and state-level campaigns, the pursuit of congressional approval to a constitutional amendment and the state-by-state c.1mpaign to win ratification for the constitutional amendment. Graham's account of NAWSA'sstrategies establishes that, typiL'nlly for c1 pressure group, the org,rniz.ltion adopted ,l combination of 011tsider ,ltld insider strategies. The outsider strategy L~oncentratedon improving the public image of suffrage and exerting pressure on politici,ms in their home distrkts. The insider strategy involved a professiorrnl lobby and publiL~itybureau not very different from those found in Washington today. By ch,tractenzing NAWSA as one of the first modern pressure groups in the United States, Graham offers a necessary reminder to historians and political scientists studying the emergence of contemporary pressure group politics that women 's organizations were, in fact, significant innovators in this reg,1rd. By studying NAWSAas a pressure group, Graham is also able to trace an organizatiorMl history that understands suffragist activists not as heroes, but as strategic actors who made choices that had consequences for the success of their cause. Without taking away from the importance of the suffragists' achievements, Graham carefully documents the suffragists' cynical use of working class women, the anti-democratic tendencies within NAWSA from 1915 on, and the suffragists' decision to fight only for white women's right to vote. As a feminist historian, Graham clearly struggles with the ambiguous legacy of the suffrage movement. The strategic acumen of Carrie Chapman Catt and the organizational centralization she imposed within NAWSA contributed significantly to the success of the suffragist cause. Nonetheless, democratic practice inside the organization was sacrificed in favour...