Communication in the Suffrage Movement

In the early twentieth century, the woman’s suffrage movement’s primary advocacy group was the National American Woman Suffrage Association. As a national organization, their main goal was to advocate for the right to vote on a state-by-state case. Local and state chapters worked to change opinion within their state. After organizing the women’s march on March 3, 1913, Alice Paul encouraged NAWSA to use more militant methods to achieve suffrage on the national level, which she had learned from English suffragettes. Militant American suffragists broke from NAWSA to create what would eventually become the National Women’s Party and would advocate for woman suffrage on a national level. More information on the militant suffrage efforts are linked in the resources section. Despite having the same goal, these groups communicated in dramatically different manners to persuade American politicians and the American public.

The methods of communication for NAWSA can be examined in Jane Addams’ local and nationally published speeches, articles, and interviews and her communications with national leaders of NAWSA, such as Carrie Chapman Catt, Anna Howard Shaw, and Alice Stone Blackwell. Regardless of any of these women’s involvement in other social movements or of their personal beliefs, NAWSA maintained the idea of conventional femininity in its propaganda and activities. While its members may have supported gender equality for more than just the purpose of helping women in the private sphere, NAWSA wanted public support and wanted to be protected from criticism. American society was not prepared for an upheaval of gender roles and many cartoons that critiqued suffragettes depicted women in a negative manner and in a masculine manner. Additionally, when Addams went to testify on the issue of suffrage, the Congressional Committee on Rules replied that while women are citizens, that the right to vote could only be given on a state level and Congress could only extend voting rights to women in territories.

In looking at Jane Addams’ writings on suffrage, she eloquently explains how suffrage supports women’s role in the domestic home. In other speeches, she explains how suffrage helps working women and immigrant women. Her speeches were not only meant for a national audience; speeches were made at the municipal and state level, to private and public audiences. Women were trying to gain the right to vote in the smallest and largest ways possible - if the national government was going to ignore them and say they didn’t have the power to extend the right to vote, women were going to gain the right from the bottom up. Addams’ work within the suffrage movement grew praise and criticism from people around the country, who sent her strong criticisms, new ideas, and words of encouragement. 

Recommended Primary Sources:

• Jane Addams Declares Ballot for Woman Made Necessary By Changed Conditions, April 1, 1906
• The Working Woman and the Ballot, April 1908
• Miss Jane Addams Tells More about Women Foreigners, February 21, 1909
• Woman's Suffrage and the Preservation of the Home, May 1909
• Why Women Should Vote, January 1910
• The Ballot for Health and Beauty, February 1911
• Why Women Should Vote, March 27, 1911
• What Women Might Accomplish with the Franchise (excerpt), October 21, 1911
• Testimony before the US House Committee on the Judiciary, March 13, 1912
• Anonymous ("a Progressive") to Jane Addams, August 10, 1912
• National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA)

Additional Resources:

• National Women’s Party and Militant Methods
• Tactics and Techniques of the National Womans Party Suffrage Campaign | Articles and Essays | Women of Protest: Photographs from the Records of the National Woman's Party | Digital Collections
• Winning the Vote: A Divided Movement Brought About the Nineteenth Amendment
• https://www.aarp.org/politics-society/history/info-2020/black-women-voting-rights.html#quest1
• Leaving all to younger hands: Why the history of the women's suffragist movement matters
• Votes for Women - Smithsonian Institute
• How suffragists—and their foes—used media

Suggested Search Subjects:

• Addams, Jane, and Woman Suffrage
• Woman Suffrage Movement, Activities Of
• Woman Suffrage, Argument For
• Woman Suffrage, Criticism Of
• Woman Suffrage, Impact Of

People, Organizations, and Events:

• People Associated with Woman Suffrage
• Organizations Associated with Woman Suffrage
• Events Associated with Woman Suffrage

Photo credit

Chicago Daily News, Jane Addams sitting with other women in an automobile in front of the Coliseum, Chicago History Museum.