These banners were taken up by the newspapers of the Senators’ States and focussed unfavorable attention upon them.
By this time, the Capitol police had found that their system of arresting and detaining what threatened to prove an inexhaustible army of Suffragists was futile. So now they reverted to their policy of 1917. They stood aside and let the crowd worry the Suffragists. Mainly, however, these were small boys, who seized the banners and dragged them through the streets.
On October 23 appeared:
GERMANY HAS ESTABLISHED “EQUAL, UNIVERSAL, SECRET,
DIRECT FRANCHISE.” THE SENATE HAS DENIED EQUAL UNIVERSAL
SUFFRAGE TO AMERICA. WHICH IS MORE OF A DEMOCRACY,
GERMANY OR AMERICA?
The small boys, generally office boys, were allowed to tear up this banner too.
On October 24, Julia Emory and Virginia Arnold succeeded in getting to the top of the Capitol steps, unseen by the police who were grouped on the sidewalk. Their banner said: