You don’t need to do anything lawless to arrest attention. All that is needed is something novel.
Alice Stone Blackwell
We march in a spirit of protest against the present political organization of society from which women are excluded.
From the event program, March 3, 1913
As of 1913 there had been no political marches up Pennsylvania Avenue. No women. No men. No one had taken their politics to the White House fence. The seat of American government was seen as an office space where men and a woman performed the work of governing. It was designated as an “officially isolated district.” A law was enacted in 1882 declaring it illegal to carry a banner or make a raucous of any kind in the streets or on the steps of federal buildings. The first to test this was in 1894 as half a million unemployed men marched to Congress petitioning for funding to build roads across the country: Coxey’s Army. Jacob Coxey led the action and was arrested, charged for walking on the grass. Mounted police with clubs attempted to control the men and Congress was put on notice that that citizens were going to come to the district to state their case, make their claim and demand action. The next national march petitioning the government was unexpected and remains unsurpassed.
To understand the 1913 suffrage procession and pageant one needs to know what life was like for women. Measuring that contrast, it was revolutionary on all counts. At that time, mothers told their children to be quiet in public, girls were told to stay in their place and, mostly, DO NOT make a spectacle of yourself. Wives, mothers, sisters; all women were held hostage in highly defined roles, proper attire which always included a hat and restricted social participation. There was lots of backbreaking work but somehow women were still thought to be frail and expected to be docile.
Many believed that if women were allowed to vote, it would be the end of the harmonious home. Once women found their voice, they would start wearing pants and leave childrearing to the men. Some of the Wild West states had given women the vote but the South and the East were not going to dismantle women’s roles by allowing them the political voice of the vote. It was a matter of domains. Men managed public space and complex thinking. Women were to raise children, care for the home and leave the rest to the men.
However two American women had been to Britain and seen women on the move. Alice Paul and Lucy Burns had been working closely with the militant suffragettes, often directly for the movement leaders, the Pankhursts. They had broken convention, broken the law, broken windows and broken any outdated ideas about women. They had driven across the country, spoken to large masses of people, been arrested, served jail time and force fed when on hunger strikes. Most importantly they had crossed over accepting male dominance and would never return. Sights were set on full equality and it was evident that such progress would only occur when women organized to aggressively take their rights.
In 1910 Alice returned to New Jersey. She finished her PhD in economics, at the University of Pennsylvania. Her dissertation was, “The Legal Position of Women in Pennsylvania,” asserting that woman suffrage was critical. Alice saw that the American Suffrage movement had fallen into a sleepy rut. The National American Woman Suffrage Association had slipped right into the very role suffrage was supposed to change. These women knew their place, wanted tea at the White House and held their breath as if not rocking the boat was their only option. They were sustaining convention with no talk of breaking it.
In Philadelphia, November, 1912, at their national convention, Alice and Lucy asked to reignite the NAWSA Congressional Committee in Washington D.C. With Jane Addams convincing the organization it was a wise choice, they were given $10, a membership roster and the address of the NAWSA DC office. December 7th Alice arrived and went to work creating an event to rival the inauguration of the President-elect Woodrow Wilson. Not only was it an impossible amount of time but the membership list was unusable because of deaths and people moving in and out of the capital, the headquarters was no longer open and fundraising was now critical. Lucy arrived, classmates were drafted and basement rooms rented at 1420 F Street NW.
The rejuvenated Congressional Committee met on January 2, 1913. The idea of a procession was on the table. Among those in attendance was Elsie Hill, daughter of Connecticut Congressman Hill, who became Alice’s longest and closest friend. Maybe her only close friend. Alice said, from that day forward, “there was never a day from that time until she died that we didn’t work together over something.” An invaluable friend as well with useful connections. When the chief of police declined granting a permit, “It’s totally unsuitable for women to be marching down Pennsylvania Ave,” Elsie and her mother changed his mind, leaving with permit in hand for March 3, 1913.
Two months was very little time to mount this enormous project but the entire idea, both procession and pageant were precisely what they needed. It was entirely without precedent. At that time, women were not speaking or performing in public. They were not collecting in groups seeking visibility. Some were visible “out West” but it was considered unsophisticated and, to many, shameful. Suffrage tea was more the preferred method, not driving automobiles or selling papers on street corners. This Washington DC event would change the suffrage identity from state to state battles to a national movement. Alice wanted to make a permanent and public statement that this movement will stand in the center of the US: ALL women should be fully enfranchised.
In sharp contrast to women being assigned to home and family, marching on the most politically powerful avenue in the country was a vision which would shatter long held convention. In fact, women were not allowed to march at all the following day in Wilson’s inaugural parade. Ladies were to be seated in ticketed grandstands and watch the men process. Hotels were all booked and thousands of people, particularly from the South were already in town to cheer for their newly elected Democrat Wilson. Grandstands were in place for March 4th and the Suffrage committee made arrangements to make a bit of money selling the same seats for their event.
Brilliant strategist, always seeing the big picture and often not even stopping to explain, Alice knew that the contrast of all women on Monday and no women on Tuesday was a human banner demonstrating inequality. When asked, she said, “one half of the people have not participated in choosing the ruler who is being installed.”
This would be a visible collective, signaling a change that went far beyond the vote. Her goal was not to sell suffrage to the nation but to demonstrate power to one another and the government. By leaving home, assembling in public, walking down this most famous street, they shed their own inequality, even if for that single day. They tasted what they could be. They rejected dominance and the isolation of hearth and home. They were going to boldly claim their space which was most unladylike. It would not be festive but serious, calculated, and thoughtful, stating ~ I can examine issues, I can consider candidates, I CAN VOTE.
Lucy Burns was in charge of production and she contacted Hazel McKaye, the best pageant producer in the country. Hazel took charge of everything regarding the street theater production of The Allegory of the Women. On the front steps and large entrance of the US Treasury Building, across from the grandstands, the all-female cast would present Columbia and her Muse: Liberty, Justice, Peace, Charity and Hope.
Silent and costumed, with girls dancing and releasing doves, 20,000 spectators would see beauty, elegance, strength, dignity and grace. At the close there were over a hundred performers on stage showing this new portrayal of female patriotism.
The procession began at 3 PM. First was the Grand Marshall on horseback, Mrs. Richard Burleson. Then a wagon bearing a huge square sign, “We demand an amendment in the Constitution of the United States enfranchising the women of this country.” Next was Inez Milholland on a friend’s horse, Grey Dawn. Inez was to embody the Free Woman of the Future.
What followed was a highly organized procession of eight thousand marchers, twenty-six floats, ten bands, six chariots and decorated horses with women riders. The women on foot were arranged in the colors of the rainbow. They were directed to not speak, to walk in perfect formation and visually deliver the message that they would bring beauty and dignity to Washington, to Congress, to politics as fully enfranchised citizens. Voting would not break the home, the family, the roles of men and women.
There were seven themed sections, each representing different committees: doctors, nurses, lawyers, students, homemakers, farmers, all showing that women contributed to society. One section was women from foreign lands in their own costumes. Alice walked in the college section with Elsie, wearing caps and gowns “ours was a very dark and dignified section.” Artists, actresses, musicians and writers wore red. Social workers to librarians in pale blue. Bringing beauty and harmony to political life.
Then women from the enfranchised states, “Nine States of Light Among Thirty-Nine of Darkness.” Showing that women had public identities already, they had been wrongfully invisible. Not just to society but also to one another and mostly to themselves. No masses, nothing haphazard but rigorous disciplined order implying who they would be as citizens.
As Wilson’s train pulled into Union Station at 3:45 PM with no fanfare, he asked where is everyone. Everyone was at the Suffrage Pageant and Procession. Women, by the thousands, were marching in front of his new home with the loud, colorful, explicit message, Mr. President, we will not be ignored. We are going to make ourselves known to you and your entire administration. This is now a national movement. We are going to VOTE.
Ten blocks into the procession, chaos erupted. Onlookers began taunting the women with jeers, insults, tomatoes and eggs. The men poured into the street narrowing the road, choking the formation and floats. Mayhem broke out, banners were snatched and ripped, feet of those on floats were grabbed. There were very few police on duty, some of whom only furthered the confrontation by telling the women it was their doing by leaving their families unattended. Taking over three hours to cover one mile, there were over 175 ambulance calls and over 200 injuries reported. Serving at the request of Mrs. John Rogers, whose brother-in-law was the then Secretary of War, the US Cavalry was called in to restore the peace.
The day after President Wilson’s inauguration, the first order of business in the US Senate was hearings on what happened at the Suffrage Campaign march. There were dozens of photos showing the congested streets and dangerous behavior of duplicitous police. They were supposed to keep spectators on the curb and keep the streets clear. Finally, the hearings generated 900 pages of testimony and many days of press coverage.
Harriet Stanton Blatch, “Some marchers were struck in the face by onlookers, spat upon, and overwhelmed with ribald remarks and the police officers, as a whole, did nothing.”
The Baltimore Sun "Women practically fought their way up Penn Ave.”
The Washington Post "An irresistible appeal to the artistic and completely captivated the hundred thousand spectators.”
The Chicago Tribune “Hoodlums vs. Gentlewomen”
New York Times “Suffragists danced on the razor thin lines between spectacular and outlandish, ridiculous and controversial.”
Reported at the hearings, “Only men had broken bones” “no woman badly hurt” “12 broken arms “ “Women fainting”
The crowning result was that Police Superintendent Sylvester was fired May 29, 1913.
Maybe people acted horrified, shocked or even cynical but Alice Paul knew full well what was in the works. She knew that most of the priceless publicity was the result of the riots and bad police work. She always knew it is all in the contrast. She was imagining a new way of life for women and to get the job done, it would require a whole new method of disruption. Unlike the British, she was unswerving in her commitment to non-violence. She actually put forth its opposite in the doves and muses and perfectly poised marchers.
She knew that for these women it wasn’t that they marched. It wasn’t that they kept in rows and columns. It is that they were breaking every habituated and accepted convention. It was a one way and major trip from the parlor to the street. Everyone saw them enter the public sphere but, possibly more importantly, these women saw one another. They were discovering themselves and sculpting a new role in society. They were shedding confinement, breaking the mold, never to return.
Another result was that the US Government was now on alert that they would have to protect citizens’ right to demonstrate in the nation’s capital. The riots of March 3rd was in strong relief to the calm regulated peace of March 4th, the differential was instantly demonstrated. Marching would become permitted, protected, tolerated. Maybe it would stop traffic for a bit but it would never again be the show-stopper or massive chaos as it was March 3, 1913.
She also knew, as all radical activists do, once the novelty was spent, they would have to escalate. They could not create change by repeating the expected. They would need to ratchet up to disturb and surprise. Pressure would have to increase, moving from polite to confrontational. Now their protests could not be scheduled and permitted. They might be rehearsed and rigorous but never predictable. She would have to expand the tension with unsuspected disruption. They had to create a whole new kind of spectacle.
The outcomes included Senate hearings and the firing of the Police Superintendent but even better, a thousand new members and twenty-five thousand dollars in donations and dues. The message was delivered to the citizens and the national legislators: suffrage was the central issue. Alice woke up the nation after a seven year nap. She forewarned Mr. Wilson that she would not disappear. She would escalate. She would be there when he sought his second term.
The press was reporting that the spectators were “lewd, dangerous and male.” The police were not just irresponsible but they joined in the harassment. A woman asking for assistance, the officer said, “Nothing would happen to you if you had stayed home.” Once again falling right into the plans of the lead organizers: perfect demonstration of what scoundrels men are when not tempered by women.
Unlike today with mobile devices, instant viewing and livestream, the success of this event rested with the number of spectators. Miss Paul could not have chosen a better day, a better path, a better form to “create an acute situation.” The hostile rioting, the glib police, the late arrival of the cavalry, the jeers and injuries ~ all that poured out from that moment ~ it was epic. The American Militant Suffrage had begun and they were solely interested in the vote for the entire nation
When asked about it all, Alice stated, “women should not only be allowed to vote, but to run things.”
Ultimately Miss Alice Paul showed us that creating change is all in the contrast, in the differential. As activists, we are called to make an unforgettable spectacle of ourselves. Anything less than novel will not do. At an unexpected and/or unwelcome time, create what the opponent will perceive as chaos. Always pressing for greater contrast from what was, what is and what is wanted. All in the interest of the mission. What do we have today to create the contrast? What can we do to demonstrate the outcome we want while permanently breaking convention. What can a person do that alerts them and all who see, that there is a possibility for a different Life? Liberty? Justice?
