Mrs. Hooker then urged upon the President, very movingly, the humiliation, from the standpoint of a Southerner and a woman, of going before the entire population of men now enfranchised, and begging them each personally to approve of woman’s right to full citizenship. Tears came into her eyes as she spoke, and the President seemed rather touched. He said consolingly that she must not mind the criticism she encountered in a good work. “Every one in the public eye,” the President said, “is deluged with criticism. You simply must do what you believe to be right.”
Mrs. Hooker went on to explain the political difficulties of the State by State road to National Woman Suffrage.
President Wilson seemed very little impressed by these facts. “Every good thing,” he said, “takes a great deal of hard work.”
Mrs. Hooker made a very strong point of the indefensible behavior of the House Judiciary Committee in blocking the Suffrage Amendment and refusing to allow the representatives of the people an opportunity to vote upon it. “Whatever one may think of Woman Suffrage,” she said, “tying the Amendment up this way before an election is wrong; and the blame will fall squarely on the Democratic Party.”
“You must see the members of the Judiciary Committee about that,” said the President, with a considerable tactical skill. “I do not think I should interfere with the action of a Committee of Congress.”
“Have you never done it before, Mr. President?” asked Mrs. Hooker. The President explained that he had done it only under pressure of a national emergency.
The interview lasted about half an hour. The President’s manner was kindly and friendly, but he made it very plain that he interpreted the Democratic platform plank to mean the limitation of the Suffrage movement to State activities, and that he was still opposed to the Federal Suffrage Amendment.
Later, Mrs. Field replied to the President’s letter:
I am sorry to have to tell you that not only is the platform declaration not acceptable to me, and to hundreds of thousands of voting women of the West, but that we also greatly deprecate the interpretation which you gave of this plank to Mrs. D. E. Hooker of Richmond.
It is my sincere hope as a Democratic woman that you will not allow any menace to the Democratic Party in the fall election through your unwillingness to face the desire of the West for speedy action upon the Susan B. Anthony Amendment.