Helen Ring Robinson: Colorado Senator and Suffragist

Preface

© 2011 by the University Press of Colorado Published by the University Press of Colorado 5589 Arapahoe Avenue, Suite 206C Boulder, Colorado 80303 All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America The University Press of Colorado is a proud member of the Association of American University Presses. The University Press of Colorado is a cooperative publishing enterprise supported, in part, by Adams State College, Colorado State University, Fort Lewis College, Metropolitan State College of Denver, Regis University, University of Colorado, University of Northern Colorado , and Western State College of Colorado. The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of the American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials. ANSI Z39.48-1992 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Pascoe, Pat. Helen Ring Robinson : Colorado senator and suffragist / Pat Pascoe. p. cm. — (Timberline books) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-1-60732-146-0 (hardcover : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-1-60732-147-7 (e-book) 1. Robinson, Helen Ring, 1860–1923. 2. Women legislators—Colorado—Biography. 3. Legislators—Colorado—Biography. 4. Colorado—Politics and government—1876–1950. 5. Colorado. General Assembly. Senate—Biography. I. Title. F781.R63.P37 2011 328.73092—dc23 [B] 2011030828 Design by Daniel Pratt 2 0 1 9 1 8 1 7 1 6 1 5 1 4 1 3 1 2 1 1 1 0 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1  Contents Foreword by Thomas J. Noel vii Preface ix Acknowledgments xiii 1. Origins 1 2. Path to Victory 15 3. “The Housewife of the Senate” 47 4. The Ludlow Massacre and Special Session 77 5. The “Silly” Twentieth General Assembly 103 6. Citizen of the World 129 Afterword: Women in Colorado State Politics, 1894–2011 153 by Stephen J. Leonard Selected Writings by Helen Ring Robinson 163 Notes 167 Index 215 vii Helen Ring Robinson (1860–1923) was the second woman state senator in the United States. An activist senator serving from 1913 to 1917, she pushed through the Colorado legislature a minimumwage law for women and tenaciously fought for other causes, including repeated but unsuccessful efforts to pass a law allowing women to serve on juries. A popular and eloquent proponent of national women ’s suffrage, she traveled and lectured through the country. Robinson proclaimed government and politics “in need of motherliness ” and welcomed women’s roles as the “housekeepers” needed to clean up government and make it more efficient. As Robinson was in the middle of many pacifist, reform, and women’s issues of the early twentieth century, this biography provides unique national as well as local perspective on progressive age battles. Sadly, Robinson is a littleknown public figure—even her marriage is a puzzle. Foreword ...