No Votes for Women: The New York State Anti-Suffrage Movement

4. Suffragists Win the New York State Campaign, 1915–1917

4. Suffragists Win the New York State Campaign, 1915–1917 On April 23, 1914, Josephine Jewell Dodge, president of the National Association Opposed to Woman Suffrage, sent telegrams to President Woodrow Wilson and Mabel Boardman of the Red Cross affirming that antisuffragists believed in leaving the “decision of the policy of peace or war to the men of the nation, but in case of war” the organization stood “ready to render to the nation such service as American women have always rendered in like emergencies.”1 It was one day after three marines were killed in Veracruz during the invasion and occupation of Mexico by the United States.2 That same day, suffragists held a mass meeting at the Cooper Union; although invited, the antis declined to attend. Suffragists insisted that Wilson “withdraw our troops from Mexico and thus with true courage and a high sense of honor repair the harm he has already done.”3 After the June 28, 1914, assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife, Sophie, and Germany’s August 4 invasion of Belgium sparked the Great War in Europe, anti-suffragists reiterated their support for the nation and war preparedness. When on May 7, 1915, a German submarine sank the Lusitania, sending twelve hundred passengers, including 124 Americans, to their deaths, antisuffragists reaffirmed their patriotic support of the president and his policies.4 Dodge announced that the anti-suffrage association would spend $5,000 to oppose woman suffrage instead of the $15,000 they had planned to spend that year. She called for a “truce,” saying that if suffragists would agree to set aside their campaign until the war in Europe ended, antis would donate the entire 94 Chapter four sum to the Red Cross.5 Issues of the Woman’s Protest focused on patriotism and war preparedness more than on suffrage, regularly publishing appeals for workfortheRedCross.6 Theanti-suffrageparties,fundraisers,andenthusiasm of the 1915 referendum campaign almost disappeared from the campaign for the 1917 referendum. Although it was self-serving for anti-suffragists to argue that they were more patriotic than suffragists, virtually all anti-suffragists fully cooperated with governmental decisions, committed the resources of their organizations to the government and the American Red Cross, and turned their attention to the war effort. Patriotic fervor dominated and significantly altered the anti-suffrage movement in New York. The almost total immersion in war relief work was detrimental to the antisuffrage campaign. Anti-suffrage women essentially reframed their organizationasthepatrioticchoiceforwomen .Butnewalignmentswithreliefandwar preparedness organizations, the American Red Cross, and nativist patriotic leagues usually obligated female antis to defer to male leadership. These alignments , as well as American entry into the Great War, constitute the most significant reasons anti-suffragists lost the 1917 referenda campaign. The tone of anti-suffragism changed drastically in this campaign as the men’s anti-suffrage organization strong-armed itself in to fill the void, ultimately dominating the campaign to oppose women’s suffrage. Little attention has been paid to the importance of the passage of the 1917 New York State referendum, yet it opened the gate to the passage of the federal amendment, especially in the heavily populated eastern states.7 Carrie Chapman Catt wrote in her memoirs that the nation’s suffrage workers hung on New York State “all their hopes for winding up referenda campaigns and compellingfederalactionbytheCongress.”8 WarinEuropedistractedsuffragists as well, but they harbored a greater range of attitudes to it than did their adversaries. Individually, suffragists’ views ranged from full support of war to absolute pacifism, but officially, the National American Woman Suffrage Association did not commit to the war effort until February 1917, when the executiveboardandcouncilmembersfinallyreachedacompromise.9 Throughout the war years, suffrage organizations spent vast sums of money and energy refuting anti-suffrage accusations ofdisloyalty.10 Even thoughmanysuffragists joinedthepeacemovement,thesuffragemovementwasfortifiedbythevisible involvement of its members in various war relief efforts. Itwasnotthatanti-suffragistsfavoredwar.Rather,theyarguedthatwarwas the business of men and relief was the business of women. But anti-suffrage Suffragists Win the State Campaign, 1915–1917 95 womencouldnoteffectivelycampaignagainstsuffrageanddowarworksimultaneously . Individually and collectively, anti-suffragists put extensive efforts intowarrelief.11 Fromthefallof1914theNewYorkStateAssociationOpposed to Woman Suffrage turned its headquarters over to the Red Cross Auxiliary CommitteeeveryMondayafternoon.Sewingmachineswereinstalledinplace oftypewriters;headquartersservedasoftenforsewingmilitaryandreliefitems as for disseminating anti-suffrage literature.12 Antis sold pink roses to raise funds for the Red Cross. The women also donated all proceeds from the Cort Theater presentation of the play “The Spur,” by well known and outspoken anti-suffragist Annie Nathan Meyer...