Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:00:02 So we're back, we're back, we're back. We've not ceased to exist nor have we transcended to another plane of existence.
Speaker 1 00:00:12 Well, I just like spun it as like it seasoned too now.
Speaker 0 00:00:18 Sure. Right. I mean, we started October last year, so yeah. This is season two. Um, we had 19 episodes of the first season. That's a pretty good run for the first season. It's a pretty good run. Yeah. We're then one a month if you average it out.
Speaker 1 00:00:30 Yeah. So I, I think that it makes sense now, you know, if we can get onto a regular schedule, but I mean, I think everybody's been on this crazy roller coaster ever since COVID and everything where it got really, really hard to live normal life. And I dunno, maybe now is now's the time to get back to it. I dunno,
Speaker 0 00:00:54 I need it. Yeah. Some of our listeners have emailed me as well and they were like, I need more episodes. And I was like, okay. Yeah. Or Hillary and I are going to make that happen,
Speaker 1 00:01:06 Working on it. Yeah. And we've been really excited to do this episode in particular and we, we really wanted to do it in August. And now Jeff, it's November.
Speaker 0 00:01:15 I know we're terrible people. Um, but we're doing it. It's about suffrage. We're really excited about it. And
Speaker 1 00:01:26 For years out, and it's really, really exciting to talk about it, especially this week, because we just had an election where women voting changed the outcome of the election. Most certainly
Speaker 0 00:01:39 Record numbers. Yes. Record numbers. So join us today. Welcome to an incomplete history. I'm Hillary and I'm Jeff. And we're your hosts for this week? We history podcast.
Speaker 2 00:01:53 <inaudible>
Speaker 0 00:02:15 So has how's the weather been in Mississippi?
Speaker 1 00:02:20 I was sitting before we started recording and I thought we haven't talked about the weather in a long time. And I was just thinking about how lovely the weather is in Mississippi, in the fall here. Now I've lived here a full year. Now the fall here is incredible. It is so comfortable out. It's so pretty. You get the leaves changing colors. You get like the fall vibes, but it's not cold. I mean, it's like in the high sixties today, it just feels great. I was able to shove the kids outside to play. They're running around. It's great. It's really nice out. And San Diego has actually been colder than here. I've been checking.
Speaker 0 00:03:06 Well, it's funny, you mentioned that we're experienced a little ice age here in California at the entire state. We're all freezing our butts off right now. And I know people from outside California laugh at what we consider freezing temperatures, but we're just not built to handle 50 degrees equipped for it. You don't ready? Like what flip-flops do I wear when it's 50 degrees?
Speaker 1 00:03:34 Yeah. Your, your toes get a little chilly in 50 degree. Flip-flops
Speaker 0 00:03:39 Like, it's, we are just not equipped for this. And, and it's still like every night it's just chilly and is, and we're not used to that. November is not supposed to be like that for us. No. Um, but anyway, well, I mean, that's wonderful that you're having a great autumn there in Mississippi. Um, we're freezing every night. I watched the glaciers grow here. That's where I saw a wooly mammoth, like running down park Boulevard the other day, fishing, ice, fishing ass, all of those things. Um, so women's suffrage, it's a hundred years. It's actually technically a hundred years, uh, back in April, right? Yeah. It was when it was actually, that was the 100th anniversary or not April, August, August, August 20 snakes. Are we counting the 20th of the 26th?
Speaker 1 00:04:38 It was August 20th. No, I don't know.
Speaker 0 00:04:42 The dates are weird. Right. And we'll talk about that
Speaker 1 00:04:46 Waits for it. Right. There's there's a lot of different days. And actually like 2019 was a 100 year Mark as well. Right. So it's, uh, it can be a little shifty and that sounds really awful. I was like, I don't know. I don't know what stage it is, but it it's true that there's like different dates that people celebrate. But August 19, I think the month of August is oftentimes celebrated. And actually the whole year, this whole entire year has been considered the Centennial year.
Speaker 0 00:05:18 Right. And the 20, the 1920 presidential election is the first person lunch election women nationwide are allowed to vote it.
Speaker 1 00:05:27 Well, not on, not all of them though. Technically you're supposed to be able to vote in the election, but shocker, Mississippi, no, no, no. Didn't allow it. Women did not vote in Mississippi. Um, in the November, 1920 election or 19. Yeah. The November, 1920 election women did not vote. Um, even though the federal amendment had passed, there was a bunch of weird stuff going on in the state that stopped it from, and the state of Mississippi didn't ratify suffrage until 1984, which is another whole other topic. But, uh, there were, and I think Tennessee was another state that really slowed down, even though the federal amendment had passed. There was a lot of dragging of the feet of getting the ballots out and allowing it. Um, so yes, November, 1920 technically was the first time that women were allowed to vote nationwide, but there were still restrictions in some States that didn't actually allow for women to go to the polls.
Speaker 0 00:06:33 So I think there's an important distinction there, right? The, the, the constitutional amendment is fine and dandy, but there are women who are able to vote in presidential elections long before the ratification.
Speaker 1 00:06:45 Yes. And that has to do kind of trailing back to season one and our discussion of the American West, um, so much about women's suffrage. Um, and you know, the state by state approach that women were taking since the 19th century, um, to allow women the right to vote within particular States or territories has a lot to do with settlement in the West, um, in the frontier areas of the American West because of the low population.
Speaker 0 00:07:16 Well, what is, do you know what the first state to grant women's suffrage,
Speaker 1 00:07:20 Wyoming, wrong, wrong, wrong
Speaker 0 00:07:27 New Jersey. There was a little window from 1776 to 1807. Women were allowed to vote.
Speaker 3 00:07:42 They took it back.
Speaker 0 00:07:45 But I mean, there is this win, right? There is this that's true where women are allowed to vote in New Jersey. So, I mean, New Jersey can tactically claim. They're the first state to allow women to vote. Although then they have to put a big footnote on it. And it was like, yeah, but then we took it away for a hundred plus years. So don't look too quick, too closely. But I mean, so here's the interesting thing. I mean, Wyoming definitely stands is like the first state that allows women to vote in presidential elections, but States had already been allowing women to vote in certain issues. So Kentucky actually allows an 1838 Kentucky institutes school suffrage. And this becomes a common theme across a lot of the West as well. The first place women are allowed to vote is on local school issues. And if you kind of think if you put yourself back in the mindset of people in the 19th century, how they're thinking about this, it becomes a fairly logical extension, right? It's like women are responsible for raising children at the time they're responsible for children's education. So they would be the ones who would vote in school board elections. Um, but I mean, there's an interesting question to ask. Does that school suffrage pave the way for later kind of presidential suffrage?
Speaker 1 00:09:07 Um, I don't think that the two movements were necessarily related, I think because the issues were different. And I think that the women who started fighting for, uh, suffrage in the mid 19th century. So I'm thinking about like the Seneca falls convention in 1848, and you have Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton. I think that they were trying to separate the idea of separate spheres. So, I mean, I guess it's definitely debatable to say, you know, that they're not related, but I think that the idea that women should vote in only particular areas like in school board elections or something kind of cements the idea that men and women operate within different spheres and that they should only be allowed to participate in certain things. So the idea that women, you know, kind of run the home that they have, um, you know, say over what happens in domestic space and that politics are for men. The idea of those two things being separate, I think is further cemented by saying that women can vote in school elections, but not national election. So I think when women came along in the mid 19th century and said, no, we really want to be a part of the political arena. I think that they were kind of rejecting the idea that women should only be in certain areas. Is that, would you consider that fair to say that they're probably on different on different, I, you know, like different ends of the spectrum maybe?
Speaker 0 00:10:41 Well, I mean, I think it's an interesting thing because there are a couple of myths or not myths. There are a couple of myths. I'll use the word myths and miss doesn't necessarily mean untrue, myths, mean ideas. We kind of create to understand something. So this idea of the cult of domesticity.
Speaker 1 00:10:58 Yeah. That's a really important concept to understand if you're going to understand 19th century America or the United States, I guess, is that there's this idea that women belong in one space and men belong in another space. And so the cult of domesticity is that women belong in the private sphere, meaning that they have, uh, their domain is in the home. Their domain is with, you know, everything that happens, uh, you know, inside the home with raising the children, cooking the food, um, making clothes, whatever else goes on, you know, the home economics kind of stuff. And this idea is cultivated for the white middle upper class women. Um, the idea that women are too fragile to go out into the public sphere, where to out to get dirty, to work, um, to get their hands dirty kind of a thing. Um, and that that space was for men.
Speaker 1 00:12:01 And one of the damaging things about that is that that idea, this cult of domesticity idea is very racially and class based. Um, this is not talking about women who are enslaved in the mid 19th century. This is not referring to indigenous women. This is not referring to immigrant women, lower working class, maybe Irish immigrant women who are out working in other people's homes. Um, so this idea that women belong in the home, again, race and class based, but it becomes kind of the bedrock for discussing white womanhood in the 19th century. And this idea carries over. I think, you know, when you, when you think about the 1950s and the idea of women in the home, and like you can see that on television shows in the 1950s, um, that idea carries over for a really long time. And it's pretty ingrained in our imagination as, um, as we think about women, uh, in us history,
Speaker 0 00:13:07 Well, you've got June Cleaver on leave it to Beaver Wright who waits for her husband to get home and kind of gives ward a drink and kind of makes this comfortable kind of perfect environment at home. And in many ways that becomes the middle-class imagination about what should happen, right. That the wife is there to offer a, a L M to her husband as he withdraws from the public world for the day, kind of the rough and tumble marketplace and comes back home and, and to this perfect miniature society over which he's King or ruler or whatever. Yeah.
Speaker 1 00:13:44 Clean, comfortable, warm, cozy domestic space. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:13:49 Predictable also, right now there's a lot of critique about that, right? The cult of domesticity is kind of imagined as a way. People envision things. And there definitely is evidence that they see that there is some coherence to it, but it's also not like an absolute historical fact. I mean, it's, it is this kind of, kind of looks like it's here. Um, but it becomes a way for white middle-class people to differentiate themselves from others. And so when you start to have like Lucretia Mott and Martha, right, and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and Mary McClintock starting to push for women's suffrage, it's an assault on that barrier, right? It is. It's an assault on the barrier between the private and the public.
Speaker 1 00:14:38 Exactly. Yeah. It's trying to blur the lines between the domestic space and the public space and the idea of politics and women getting involved in politics. It's just considered far too, um, rough for them. It's considered that they wouldn't be able to stomach it. Um, and you know, really when you look at politics in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, it was, it was nasty. I mean, um, there's a book that just came out recently that I got, um, field of blood and it's talking about the actual violence that took place in Congress, where they were like caning each other and there's blood spilled on the floor. And I mean, it's, it's not a, a lily-white environment, politics, uh, art can be nasty, it can be down and dirty. And this whole idea of like being in the mud and mudslinging and all that, the idea of like, well, women just can't be a part of that. We want to protect our women from being a part of that because women shouldn't have to get themselves muddied. And, you know, I think that there's another aspect to this that I think we could maybe explore a little bit, is the idea that well, women would just vote the way that their husbands voted anyway, or is that like the, maybe that there's like a family vote? Well, there's something for the family, excuse me.
Speaker 0 00:16:05 That becomes a big critique of it. Right? Yeah. Women are just going to duplicate the voices, the votes of their husbands. But I mean, the interesting thing is that critique doesn't make much sense though. Like, wouldn't you want, wouldn't it be good if you're middle class to have your vote amplified?
Speaker 1 00:16:32 Well, that's the thing is I think that there's the fear that women may not vote like their husbands, like they think say, well, it doesn't make sense. It doesn't make sense for women to vote folks. They would just, you know, go with what the husband says, but then there's the actual palpable fear that will, what if she doesn't? What if we stuff? Yeah,
Speaker 0 00:16:53 Yeah. Yeah. I think that's the thing. I think if you, if you take that argument at face value, it makes no sense. It's like, it's like, yeah, dude. So why are you afraid your wife's going to vote? If she's just going to double your vote, that's good for you. Right. I think it is this fear that in secret, when a woman's able to cast that, that secret ballot, she is not going to vote the same way her husband does
Speaker 1 00:17:18 Well. And I keep thinking this idea keeps coming to my mind. And, um, maybe we can post this into the website and stuff. Is that cartoon, that famous cartoon from the 19 teens that shows a woman putting on her bustle and her gloves, and she has her hat and she's heading out the door to go vote. And there's a man sitting just helpless with like crying babies on his lap. And he just looks so just distraught, you know, and this woman's just like, bye I'm off to vote. And so there's this idea. I think that like emasculating demand number one, and that if a woman leaves the house will, then who's going to take care of the children, will the man have to stay and take care of the children. And so there's this idea that like, if you give women that freedom to go out and participate in the public sphere, they're going to neglect their duties at home to go off and influence policy when we don't really want their influence in policy because they have different, um, policy issues in which they're interested in. And so I think that that could bring us into the discussion about temperance, which we've discussed in different episodes about women's heavy involvement in the temperance movement.
Speaker 0 00:18:31 So, so I want to lead with this question then, does temperance setback the suffrage movement?
Speaker 1 00:18:37 Well, I think that there's definitely a fear, uh, on behalf of men that, well, if women start to vote and become involved in politics, then they could very well pass. Um, you know, legislation that could stop us from drinking more, perhaps more pertinent to the 19th century, the mid 19th century discussions, women are heavily involved in abolitionist societies. So there's a lot of men who don't want women to be voting because then that would stop, you know, the slate, you know, slave trade and slavery. I mean, there are issues that women involved themselves in. And then in the 19 teens, I'm thinking about, you know, the eight hour Workday and labor laws and stopping children working in factories. I mean, women involve themselves in causes in these progressive causes. Yeah. Yeah. They're trying to like lobby for change to make things, you know, to challenge the status quo. And when you challenge the status quo, you're challenging white men. So I think that there's a huge fear. So to say, did the temperance movement set suffrage back perhaps, but that's just one facet of it. I would say,
Speaker 0 00:19:55 I think it's definitely something men latch onto, right. As a fear that look, if we allow women to kind of have the vote, the franchise, um, half the nation is made up of women, what it means is some of the things that we like out in the public space that aren't actually allowed to happen in the private sphere at home, the domestic sphere over which women, ostensibly hold sway, those it's going to spill out. Right. And that women are going to start to seek, to ban morally corrupting things.
Speaker 1 00:20:33 Exactly.
Speaker 0 00:20:33 I mean, and, and that's the whole thing it's, it's like, and I think if you look at the group that has real power here, which is white middle-class men, I think that's, those are the ones who kind of most terrified of this. Um, there's a great book. I would point listers to it's by charity. It's called slumming it. Oh yeah. And it's about these white middle-class men and upperclassmen who would, uh, and not just them, but kind of couples as well, young couples at the beginning of the 20th century, who would go to places that were definitely not middle class, most often, not kind of white Protestant, and sometimes not even heterosexual and kind of sample this other worlds. But then at the end of the day, they would return back to their house, to the safety and comfort of this kind of idealized middle-class white space.
Speaker 0 00:21:28 And I would say another book, and I know you get tired of me mentioning that this book all the time, um, no magic bullet, it's a history of venereal disease. It's fascinating. And well, I mean, these things is some of these men would go and they would have sex with prostitutes or other men, and they would contract venereal diseases and then they would come back home and they would give their wife and Ariel disease. And what you end up with at the end of the 19th century and beginning of the 20th is this whole idea that you can catch syphilis from a hairbrush or sitting at a bus seat or, or any of these,
Speaker 1 00:22:04 They make up these myths to cover for.
Speaker 0 00:22:09 It reinforces the idea that a proper woman should not be out in public.
Speaker 1 00:22:14 Yeah, well, because there's just so much danger out there, but really what it is, it's there, there's this great. You write all these books are great at pointing there's these issues that aren't related, but they are related. Right. And so when you're looking at the way that men behave outside of a domestic space, it's morally questionable and it's not, it's not what they want their wives to see. It's probably not what they want their children to see or know about them. And so if you invite women into that world, you, your wives into that world, then you're corrupting them and they're may begin to see it and go, Hey, this isn't cool. Like stop it. But the other point about it too, just to kind of go back and touch on it again, it's, it's about class though, because women are very much in the public sphere in these spaces.
Speaker 1 00:23:08 Um, you know, the men who are, like you said, slumming, it like the book explorers, it's like they are going to bordellos, right. I mean, they're, they're engaging in homosexual activity, heterosexual activity, but it's sexual in nature oftentimes. And it's, it's often fueled with booze and, um, you know, there's just this whole underground world of fun, basically that's happening outside of the domestic space, outside of their marriage. And they they're wanting to keep those things separate. Uh, so the threat of women entering politics, there's this guise of, well, we're just trying to protect you, but really they're trying to protect their recreation.
Speaker 0 00:23:55 Yeah. I mean, it's who knew we would get to venereal disease at a discussion about something
Speaker 1 00:24:00 It's really easy to get to venereal disease. You know, it means
Speaker 0 00:24:06 So, so let's do a clunky segue here and talk about like, so I know you and I both use Eric voters' textbook when we teach intro us history classes and Foner makes, it's an interesting textbook. I don't think it's as good as his monographs. Um, it's a textbook first of all. But I think he makes something of a kind of dangerous argument about the progressive nature of suffrage in the country. He basically presents the argument that you have to have white, you have to have universal white male suffrage first, then you can expand it to black men only then only once those two groups have it. Can you think of expanding it to women? So it's this idea that there are these stepping stones to, to fuller participation in the democracy. I mean, what do you think of that?
Speaker 1 00:25:01 Well, I do use the book and I think that it's accessible and there's a lot of really great things about it. And I think, you know, Eric Foner has had huge contributions to this field. So like, I'm just so plebs discussing what I think about this huge scholar. But I do find the argument to be a problem because I think it's a cop-out to say, well, you know, history, first of all, the history is an upward trajectory of progress that we started in one place. And then things just got better and better and better on these stepping stones. So it's a bit dismissive of the ebb and flow. It's a bit dismissive of the highs and the lows right first, but then it's also, to me a cop-out to say, well, eventually everybody was included, but it's almost excusing the discriminatory, sexist, racist, xenophobic behaviors that motivated
Speaker 1 00:26:04 Suffrage in the first place, the, you know, the discrimination of people being able to have a voice in government and it goes against everything that's actually written, right. Liberty and justice for all does not mean for all. It has never meant for all. And we're still fighting for that. And so I think to make an argument that well, things got better. So it's cool. It's, it's a little bit of a problem and it's a little over simplified version. And I also think that it excuses to me that absolutely disgusting and not Democrat, non democratic of, you know, our founders. Um, this is not a democracy. It wasn't intended to be a democracy. We're not intended to have everybody vote. And we still see the impact of that today. You know, last week we see the impacts of disenfranchisement and, um, Owner's book is a problem for that reason.
Speaker 0 00:27:08 Well, I told students last week, I was like, you know, African-Americans in this country, I've been fighting for the right to exercise their right to vote yes. That they get after the civil war, since the civil war. And even in this last election, they're still fighting to exercise that. Right. And I think, you know, and this is where it's like, well, aren't you, aren't you talking about women's suffrage. Yes. But I think it's all part of a package, right? The idea of who's allowed to vote. And, and this is not to get too political on this, but this is why when people talk about originalists interpretations or constitution, I just, I roll my eyes because I was like, uh, originalist interpretations of the constitution, then reject on some level, the humanity of African rejects, the humanity of African-Americans, it classifies them as three-fifths of a person, originalist interpretations would be that women shouldn't allow to vote. Originalist means you have to take every single one of the amendments, including
Speaker 1 00:28:13 The founders said that the constitution should be revisited once every 20 years. And so
Speaker 0 00:28:20 Right. Which is why they embed the whole ability to amend it right. To override parts that maybe don't work anymore to introduce new parts that are necessary. So I, you know, I would, I would tell Lister is whenever somebody says their original list of the constitution, be very skeptical about what they're going to say, because there's going to be a lot of picking and choosing. Nobody wants to
Speaker 1 00:28:44 Take the Bible literally or something, you know?
Speaker 0 00:28:47 Yeah. Nobody wants an originalist view of the constitution.
Speaker 1 00:28:52 That's scary.
Speaker 0 00:28:55 I mean, there's some irony in a woman advocating for an originalist interpretation of Hillary. Hillary said that not me. I know we're both very passionate on this because it's, we do see the constitution as this kind of living document that can be changed. It is supposed to be changed.
Speaker 1 00:29:17 It is supposed to be changed. It's supposed to be revisited to, uh, to work for the people at every juncture. Right. And there are just some facets of it that don't really work today. And you know, this, this whole idea of that. That's another thing about phoneless texts about this upper trajectory of like, well, nobody could vote and then some people vote and then other people vote. There are still people today fighting for the right to go and cast a ballot and to be counted. Um, and you see that in particular States with the voter suppression is so strong and it's meant to suppress the vote of the same people that it always suppressed. So working class people, uh, women, people of color. Um, so for example, if it's not too off topic thinking about, I stood in line to vote M in Mississippi, I stood in line to vote for two hours, two hours standing.
Speaker 1 00:30:20 And it was in the like direct sunlight. Um, not everyone can stand in a line to vote for two hours. Right? A lot of people have to go to work people with kids, you know, like mothers who are expected to stay home with their kids, like what should like mom go vote and then go. And then dad stays home with the kids and then dad go vote and dads say something, you know, mom stays home with the kids. And then, you know, that person stays in line for two hours and the other person stays in line for two hours. Those kinds of things are designed to stop people from voting because in the state of Mississippi, you can't vote absentee unless you have a valid, like medical reason in which to do it, or that you, you can prove that you're out of the state.
Speaker 1 00:31:04 So I'm not trying to get off topic entirely because I'm, I want to bring us back to this idea, first of all, to the phone or text, which we were talking about, that there's an upward trajectory of progress of allowing people to vote. But also that suffrage has people have been white men have been hesitant to extend suffrage because oftentimes the people who are disenfranchised are going to vote against their interests. And so when we're talking about women voting, I think that, you know, we can go back and talk about venereal disease again, too. But I feel like if women go start voting, they're going to start voting on policy issues that are directly going to impact the happy-go-lucky carefree life. That a lot of wealthy white upperclassmen had that they've designed for themselves. Right.
Speaker 0 00:31:56 Well, I think, and I think you bring up an interesting point that if we, if we do kind of stick to this, like, well, what is the original constitution the same about who should get to vote? And all of that, I mean, before we hit universal white male suffrage, which is phoner is kind of entree into this leads to this leads, to this prior to that moment. And we talked about this, go back and look at our, our listen to our episode about rebellions, right? About Shay's rebellion, particularly, um, you had to be a property owner,
Speaker 1 00:32:28 And if you
Speaker 0 00:32:28 Didn't and by property, they meant actual land property. They did not mean they did not mean property in some kind of abstract fashion. And it becomes a point of contention between people who live in rural spaces and people who live in these burgeoning cities, but like you had to own property to have a right to vote in almost every state. Yeah.
Speaker 1 00:32:48 What did that make? The percentage of people who actually could vote is a very,
Speaker 0 00:32:55 Very small by design, by design, by design. Now the logic was only white men who owned property actually could vote with the best interest of the Republic in mind that nobody else actually had a stake in it. And they might vote for their own personal interest. So, I mean, this is always been the tension about voting is this idea of you're supposed to vote with what's in what's best for the Republic, but has a hall
Speaker 1 00:33:31 What's best for the Republicans what's best for these crippling institutions. Right.
Speaker 0 00:33:38 Is that a convenient, isn't that a convenient coincidence?
Speaker 1 00:33:42 Yeah,
Speaker 0 00:33:44 This is the thing. So, I mean, it's, it's like any discussion of women's suffrage is automatically going to start to include these other discussions because it's so tightly bound together. But I mean, so let's so post civil war, um, we have the reconstruction amendments, slavery is abolished, um, except for prison slavery, which is still allowed. Um, we should have a whole separate podcast about that. I've got a lot to say about it. We have a book, a lot to say about that. Um, uh, and, um, black men specifically are given the ability to vote the theoretical ability to vote.
Speaker 1 00:34:34 Yeah. And during the reconstruction era, you actually do see the election of black men into Congress in States like Mississippi. And, um, there is a short window of time where suffrage actually is extended to black men, but then during the Jim Crow era, which we've also had a segment about those restrictions become tight and access to the polls for black men is completely restricted in the 1870s and beyond. And that becomes another one of the contentions for women's suffrage because the South does not want to abide by federal amendments. Right? So there's this huge, you know, rebirth of restrict. I mean, well, there's this birth of restrictions to, um, to black men in the wake of reconstruction when the, the North really isn't kind of overseeing anything anymore. Um, pardon, I'm sorry, what the bargain
Speaker 0 00:35:38 With the corrupt
Speaker 1 00:35:38 Bargain. Yes. And so which,
Speaker 0 00:35:41 Which ends kind of the occupation of the South by federal soldiers and basically allows places like Mississippi to do whatever they want.
Speaker 1 00:35:52 Yeah. The South still needs to be occupied by federal soldiers.
Speaker 0 00:35:57 Well, I mean, it's, it's, the federal soldiers are put in there to make sure that these constitutional amendments are abided by that are they're followed. And they are, as long as federal soldiers are there for the most part, but the minute federal soldiers are withdrawn and that's part of a corrupt bargain. It's part of the, there's a, there's a contested election and 1876. And as part of the resolution of it, a group of senators agree to kind of, uh, a group of congressmen, agree to vote a certain way. If federal soldiers will be removed from the South and they do Y, and this is basically when Jim Crow kind of kicks off, but I mean, it's keeping women from voting. I mean, I think that's a great point. You bring up, it becomes part of the bulwark against letting African-Americans vote.
Speaker 1 00:36:51 Yeah. Because it becomes an issue because, well, I think we should go into a little bit about the approaches that women take to vote. There's a state by state approach, and then there's an approach for federal amendment. And this is all to me, it's so related to a lot of the issues with the civil war and in the wake of the war about who gets to tell you what to do, is it your state government, or is it your federal government? And you have women lobbying an a state-by-state approach to say a federal Amendment's not going to work because a federal amendment didn't work for black men down here in the South after the occupation ended. And so a lot of women, you know, who were fighting for the right to vote within the state of Mississippi, they were like, we have to just do it through the state because they're not going to listen to a federal amendment. And so they were, they were right to a certain extent, but then, you know, the federal government obviously wins in the end, but not until 1920. It takes a really long time for a federal amendment to pass a women's start lobbying heavily for the right to vote in 1848. I mean, Susan B, Anthony doesn't even get to see women voting, you know? And so it is
Speaker 0 00:38:14 Right. And by 1868, you know, um, by 1868 things start to change. So the 14th amendments ratified it's specifically uses male in association with voting and for suffragettes, this is horrible. They could have left that word out and they would've been able to vote, but it's very consciously put in, but 1868 is actually when the first amendment is introduced to Congress. It fails. It's not for another 10 years that they actually get an amendment that kind of sits and simmers until 1925 only. But I mean, all through the end of the 60 1860s, women are really expanding this, um, women are casting. Um, I know in 1868, women are casting parallel votes in the presidential election. Um, those votes aren't counted, but it's a protest, right? They show like, look, we're going to cast this vote cause we should be allowed to cast this vote, but it doesn't get counted. And then 1870 Wyoming kind of pulls the trigger and allows women to vote. Why?
Speaker 1 00:39:33 Well, because it's a frontier.
Speaker 0 00:39:37 So I, I subscribe to the argument that it's a way to attract women into this space.
Speaker 1 00:39:43 Well, they don't ha yeah, there aren't many women there. Number one, um, it was a territory, right. And so I think if they allowed women to vote, um, then they could bring women over into that region because you've got all these men there who were just like, kind of hanging by themselves. There's nobody to have sex with, I guess, is the cruel way to put her a crude way to put it. But yeah, they want to attract women to the territory. There's a lot of them
Speaker 0 00:40:13 You're not going to have, you're not going to have families, which means you're not going to have the population you need to progress to statehood.
Speaker 1 00:40:18 Right. And they need to, yeah. They want to, because they're a territory at that point
Speaker 0 00:40:23 That, I mean, there's this whole go back to our American West episodes. I mean, there's this whole thing about territories want to become States as quickly as possible. Oftentimes for reasons you aren't entirely clear, um, to casual observers, right? A lot of it has to do with once their States, they can actually prevent a lot of federal involvement in their affairs. But as long as their territories, that's pretty heavy federal involvement. So why army like allows women to vote? I think it's a way to attract women, right? They're like, Oh yeah, I'll go to Wyoming because at least I'll be able to vote there. And this is, so you get this parallel thing, right? So you get Wyoming, you start to get these other Western States. Most of them initially start out with the school, the, the Dakotas, Minnesota, Michigan, Minnesota, start off with the idea of the school vote, right. That women can vote strictly in school elections, but slowly these get expanded. And then finally, 1878 is when we get, uh, a Sergeant from California, Senator introduces the women's suffrage amendment.
Speaker 1 00:41:36 It takes decades to pass. One thing that I really like in a discussion about women's suffered is the fact that women were not all on the same page as to which way that they should go about getting the right to vote. Right. It was different between, you know, between the group. It wasn't just, uh, you know, a single interest group, I guess.
Speaker 0 00:42:04 And, and people, scholars who kind of study women's history in the United States. Talk about this, right? I mean, it's so do you buy into this? The reason suffrage succeeds actually is this last cooperation between mothers and daughters.
Speaker 1 00:42:23 I could probably be persuaded, but I think that it finally succeeds because women start taking on militant tactics to get access to the polls. I mean, you, cause you watch this really slow March, and I'm not saying that these women weren't doing good work, but you see 1848. And then, you know, the, the years just roll on and roll on and roll on. And there's just no movement toward the ability to vote, except in these territories. And you have women who are part of the national women's organizations who are like, we've got to do it state by state. You know, we're trying to be, um, polite, you know, well, we've got to just go and ask the men to the right to vote. You. We just gotta be nice to them and it's not working. And it's not until you get this radical split of women who form the national women's party in the 19 teens who learn radical tactics to protest through their work in England.
Speaker 1 00:43:29 And you see women who were actually in England fighting for women's right to vote there, who start employing these militant tactics for the very first time in American history, you have people protesting outside of the white house and it's women. Women were the very first interest group to pick it the white house. And they did it every single day. Rain, sleet, snow. They were doing it in the dead of winter, standing outside the white house, like roasting the president. And it's this militant and this aggressive tactic where, and they are met with violence for their protest, but it's not until they start getting this really widespread national attention, showing the radicalism of their wanting to vote that people actually start to take it seriously. It becomes a crisis.
Speaker 0 00:44:24 Well, I mean, it's, yeah. I think this radicalism is really important because 1872, Susan B. Anthony tries to vote in New York. She's arrested along with some other women she's eventually convicted and fined. She refuses to fake face to pay that fine. Um, and then later on 1876, which is a big year for the United States, there's this big Centennial celebration in Philadelphia. She actually interrupts an official program so that she and Matilda gage can give the vice president this declaration of rights for women. So you can see the militancy kind of going up and up and up and up. And I think a lot of people look at that militant period and they just assume women went from not caring about the right to vote to full on militant overnight. And I think you have to understand it's 30 plus years of like, when are we going to do this?
Speaker 1 00:45:21 Well, and it's, it's all based off of that divide that I was saying, it's like, not all women were on the same page about the best way to go about this. And it had to do with class quite a bit. Um, and when you started having some working women who get really involved in the movement in the 19 teens, they just start, they don't have time to be sipping tea with their pinkies up and begging for the right to vote. They go out and they start like burning shit. You know, I mean, outside of the white house, burning the president's speeches and throwing them into a bonfire. It's so cool.
Speaker 0 00:45:55 Well, and I think a lot of that has to do with the labor, the, the intersection with the labor movement, right? I mean it's 1890, the American Federation of labor officially says they support a constitutional amendment to grant women's suffrage. And I, I think this is them throwing the gauntlet down against elites because
Speaker 1 00:46:15 You start seeing, yeah, you start seeing this teaming up of labor women in labor, but then also, um, black women, right. Who start getting heavily involved in the movement too, because it does become a class thing. And you're right, like throwing the gauntlet down against the elites and saying we have the working class and the labor are going to start working toward this amendment and we're, we're done playing nice, and this is what we're going to do now. And it takes that teaming up where we've talked about Bacon's rebellion, right? About like, it's always the idea to like split people up by their class and it's the women's movement. Um, the suffrage movement that just kind of throws that out the window and says like, we're just all gonna work together. Even though there was extreme, there were, there were huge issues with it. There were still segregation amongst parties. There were still, you know, it was fraught with issues and I'm not dismissing that or saying that women were somehow above, um, the racism that was just so prevalent, but there was a little bit more working together in an attempt to move, to move the suffrage amendment forward.
Speaker 1 00:47:29 So
Speaker 0 00:47:30 I would say from 1890 to 1913, we get a slew of States that actually either constitutional amendment or legislation enacts women's suffrage, but there's a part of the country that is very resistant, no state in a certain part of the country. Yes. Grants women's suffrage it's the South.
Speaker 1 00:47:58 Yes. But again, if it's related
Speaker 0 00:48:02 Montana, Nevada, Illinois, Alaska, as a territory, Arizona, Kansas, Oregon, um, uh, Michigan, Minnesota, Utah, Idaho, Colorado, all of these States grant women's suffrage. Um, but by 1913, it's just stalled in the South. So the Southern States, women's suffrage conferences formed and black women are heavily involved in this organization. Um, and it really does show a real regional disagreement over this issue.
Speaker 1 00:48:41 And again, it's so very much tied to strife that route is rooted in the civil war and the idea that you don't get to tell us what to do here, we run things the way that we want to run them, the federal government, isn't going to come in and tell us anything. And we don't want women to vote and we're not going to do it in the state level. And I find it so interesting that even when the federal amendment does pass, that it takes decades for the States to ratify it. Even though they, even though women can vote, it takes until the 1980s, eighties for States like Mississippi to say, Oh, okay, fine. Women can vote 1984. I mean, and it, and it all, again, stems from this idea that, well, if we start listening to federal amendments, if we start listening to the federal government, then that means that they control us.
Speaker 1 00:49:45 And there's this whole idea, you know, state's rights, states' rights, states' rights. And they're just still fighting the civil war. I mean, there's still, they still are in so many ways. Right. But it's like, there are just, there's just so much, um, consternation over, you know, federal law and federal rule. And, um, it all always boils down to just wanting to keep these regions run by a very small number of white men that have elite. Yeah. Have money. They're educated. They have generational wealth. Um, and not to who runs the state still. They still run the state. So,
Speaker 0 00:50:33 So my favorite act of suffragette resistance is December 2nd, 1916. So they fly, I love this. They fly something they couldn't have done before. They have a plane that flies over president Woodrow Wilson's yacht. And they litter the yacht with suffrage amendment petition.
Speaker 1 00:50:52 Yeah. They did so many cool things. They, I mean, they, they were so innovative and being pains in the asses, right. They were just out there as blocked traffic. Yeah. Parking up and down the streets. They have their little sashes on. And I mean, they were hardcore every single day, just complete civil disruption on a day-to-day basis, demanding, demanding the right to vote. And they were dragged through the streets. They were arrested, they were imprisoned. They went to work camps. They were forced fed when they would go on hunger strikes. They were, you know, in flea infested jail cells. And these are like white middle, upper class women who were getting thrown into jail. This starts to get a huge amount of national attention because it's like, Ooh, We don't want to see these ladies in jail. Right. I mean, and you can say a whole bunch about that, about, you know, trying to protect white womanhood. But, you know, there was, it was organized. It was an organized movement. And I, when I teach this, I often I'll show the film Hilary Swank in iron jawed angels. I don't know if you've seen that one. I liked that one.
Speaker 0 00:52:16 So I want to talk a little more about the acts of resistance, because I think they're so interesting. I mean, Wilson, Wilson promises a lot to many groups during world war one. Um, very few of those promises appear to be kept. And actually Wilson promises in 1918, he actually promises women. He addresses the Senate and says, we will grant women the right to vote after the war zone.
Speaker 1 00:52:49 And when did you participate in the bore effort with the intention, with the promise of being offered the right. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:52:58 So starting, so, uh, starting January 16th of 1919, women's set up this, this urn that can be seen from the white house front door, where they burn the hypocritical speeches of Woodrow Wilson about democracy. And they call it a Watchfire for freedom.
Speaker 1 00:53:23 Somebody Manning it, isn't it. 24. Yeah. 24
Speaker 0 00:53:26 Seven. They're keeping, it is like an eternal perpetual flame of wash fire for freedom. Right. And so they are, I mean, you can see this, that women are now just calling the president out on his BS. Um, so the house passes, the suffrage amendment May 21st, 19, 19, the Senate finally passes it with a couple of votes to spare, um, you know, for, so from 1878 to June 4th, 1919, that amendment has sat in Congress and not moved at all. So now June 4th, why it gets brought up a couple of times that it always fails for various reasons. Right. But I mean, this is a lot of critics would say, this is the problem with having a group that already has something like the vote voting on the ability of others who don't have it.
Speaker 1 00:54:21 Exactly, exactly. Cause it, what, what good does it do them?
Speaker 0 00:54:29 And there's a feeling
Speaker 1 00:54:31 It's uncomfortable to say that isn't it, what, what's their motivation or just out of the goodness of their hearts, not likely they have to be shamed publicly humiliated on a daily basis, a perpetual thorn in the side of the Woodrow Wilson before, before they're granted their right. Is that yeah.
Speaker 0 00:54:59 So finally, August, 1920, we get the last required States, Tennessee officially becomes the state, um, that kind of tips it over, um, a Southern state. Right. Um, and then August 26th, the secretary of state signs it and it becomes law. Um, it becomes part of the U S constitution. Um, but even then, I mean, think about that August 26th, 1920 women now officially nationwide have the right to vote 100 years pass before a woman is elected to one of the top two positions of the country
Speaker 1 00:55:51 And the disparity still of women serving in government. We have made huge strides in the past couple of years, but it's still a big Hill to climb. And it's, you know, not until 2016 that you have a woman running for president that's a major, you know, considered candidate and she loses.
Speaker 0 00:56:18 But I mean, yeah, I mean, and that's the thing is you do have women who run even before women have the right to vote. You've got some women that run for president, but it's not until that 26, 2016 campaign that a woman is actually viewed as having a credible chance of actually winning and in fact, better than a credible chance to win. So, I mean, it's that right there. I mean the hundred year gap right there, hundred years, a hundred years. And we're, so I want to talk, I want to talk about kind of symbols of suffrage. And I want to talk about one that's very important because, um, our vice president elect wore a dress the other day, a white dress. So why is white important for suffrage? Why is the color white and address important for suffrage?
Speaker 1 00:57:08 Well, there's, there's white and there's, um, blue and yellow flowers and there's animals that are connected. Right?
Speaker 0 00:57:19 I thought it was purple.
Speaker 1 00:57:20 Purple. Well, the colors of the flag were purple, white and gold for the national women's party. Um, but then they would work. The men would wear flowers when they would go in to vote, to, to indicate which way their vote was going to go. Um, so the women who were white in the suffrage parades, um, they were, it's like this white color is white color wearing white, um, in the praise, it was like a symbol of femininity purity. Um, and so I, I'm a little, I'm a little confused as to why we've taken this as being a thing we should do, but go ahead.
Speaker 0 00:58:06 Well, it's one of the three colors, right. And it's just adopted as a, as a symbol of the purity of the woman's vote. And the idea that, um, that, that kind of is a hallmark of women's suffrage and it's a reminder of women's suffrage. Right. Um, and we actually have this, we've seen some women who are members of Congress have done this recently. Right. They say the eight address they were right. Because it's to raise awareness of kind of women are present here. Um, I mean, women constitute more than 50% of the population of the United States. Yes we do. But they don't even come close to constituting 50% of the elected positions. Um, there's a lot of work to do.
Speaker 1 00:58:56 I don't like the white thing though. I mean, I, I get it and like, I see it and I understand that it's like a solidarity thing, but the basis of the symbol is symbolizing purity, much like virginal purity of like a bride wearing white or something. I, I see that as like, kind of is the symbol in and of itself is rooted in a sexist idea. So I'm not pumped on it, but now I understand maybe it's being like repurposed.
Speaker 0 00:59:27 Well, I mean, we know this happens a lot in communities that have been previously marginalized, right. They take former symbols of their oppression and they repurpose them to something that actually they use as a symbol of prosperity. Right, right. Um,
Speaker 1 00:59:44 Maybe I just don't like wearing white. I don't,
Speaker 0 00:59:47 Well, especially after labor day, I mean, if you're in the South, you better, you better get with that program. Um, but I mean it's, if you think about it, it is, um, they have to agree on some color, right. When they want to do the symbols and, and it's a convenient one because it is one of these. So if you look back, so Shirley Chisholm, who's the first African American woman who's elected to Congress. She actually wears white in her victory speech, um, uh, Geraldine Ferraro, who's the 1984 democratic party, vice presidential nomination. The first time, one of the two major parties nominates a woman for one of those positions. She wears all white at the convention and her acceptance speech, Hillary Clinton in 2016 at the democratic convention, whereas all white, when she accepts the nomination, uh, Alexandra Ocasio, Cortez wears white when she's sworn in as a member of Congress.
Speaker 0 01:00:52 And then we have Camila Harris who wears white when she gives her first speech as vice-president elect. So I think it's, it's, even if we're kind of a little uncomfortable with kind of where this comes from, I think at this point it's been repurposed enough that maybe it's shed some of those older meanings and maybe that's the important thing, right. Is to kind of repurpose it. But I mean, it's, it's the reason I brought up there's a lot of work to do is there is right. I mean, it's why aren't 50% of elected officials, women.
Speaker 1 01:01:31 Yeah. And why, why is our government so old? I mean, I think that that's a huge part of it. Yeah. But that's, but that's a really big part of it. As you see the younger generation coming in, you do see a lot more women and that's exciting to see, because I do think that in my lifetime we will see perhaps a more equal represent equal representation, I think. Um, but it it's a ridiculous situation right. Where it has taken a hundred years to even start to see the swing in, um, in percentages. Um, the Supreme court is interesting, right? Because we do have women serving on the Supreme court now and, and rules, you know, these lifetime appointment roles. Um, and that's a great, uh, those there's been some great strides there for women.
Speaker 0 01:02:24 There's more equity in the Supreme court at this point, as far as women being represented than there is in Congress, I think. Correct?
Speaker 1 01:02:31 Yes. Oh, well certainly personally.
Speaker 0 01:02:35 Yeah. I mean, that's, that's a little surprising because the Supreme court is supposed to be the most conservative body of the government.
Speaker 1 01:02:43 Well, I think it is right now.
Speaker 0 01:02:45 Well, but I mean, conservative in that it really does not change much at all appointments because of the lifetime appointments and you know, so yeah. It's um, yeah, this has been great. I, I, I think we need to have a followup episode, not immediately, but at some point I think we need to have a follow-up episode where we talk about the equal rights amendment and we follow its history,
Speaker 1 01:03:11 A lot of work to pass it. Alice Paul carried that torch for her, you know, after, um, the, the suffrage amendment pass and it has not passed. Um, I also think that there's something to be said about your knowledge of fashion that we maybe need to explore, because you're able to name all these women wearing white. And I think that's great. And because there's so much symbolism right there, there is a lot of symbolism in fashion historically. So maybe sometime we could do one of those for fun.
Speaker 0 01:03:44 Fantastic. Well, we are back on a regular schedule we'll we will be back and, um, w w I'll be back, um, we'll be back, uh, thanks for joining us today. I'm Jeff and I'm Hillary
Speaker 2 01:04:00 <inaudible>.
