Idaho, which ratified on February 11; Arizona on February 12; New Mexico on February 19; Oklahoma on February 27 did so only after a struggle, but their cases were special only in detail.
In the meantime, there had been two January defeats, Mississippi and South Carolina; two February defeats, Virginia for the second time, and Maryland.
West Virginia, which came into the fold on March 10, presents to ratification another dramatic story. I quote an article by Mary Dubrow, in the April Suffragist.
They are all true—the old adages about pride and falls, boasters who forget to rap on wood, chickens and hatchings—West Virginia proved it.
Last August the card catalogue files carefully compiled by Maud Younger, Legislative Chairman of the Woman’s Party, showed an overwhelming majority for ratification in the West Virginia legislature. To check up on this poll, a member of the Legislature took another and discovered the same overwhelming majority. Our National Headquarters kept in touch with the situation until the special session was called.
The West Virginia delegation in Congress, the Democratic governor of the State, and the Republican National Committee-man, all alike expressed certainty of ratification.
As I left for West Virginia I confided to every one I met how happy I was to go to a State which would probably ratify unanimously, and every leading citizen I interviewed for the first four days confirmed my expectation.
Then the legislators began to assemble at the Kanawha Hotel, the political center of Charleston. I had their written pledges and I approached them more to exchange pleasant anticipations of victory than for any other purpose, and my fall began—a gradual inch-by-inch fall. The first man I met said: “Well, I haven’t been here very long and I don’t know just how I will vote. You see our great State voted Suffrage down by a majority of——” And the second man said the same thing, and the third repeated the remark.
Then the splendid men who were leading our fight and who were standing staunch came to me with appalling reports of the wavering of this one and that one. It was an opposition stampede—nothing less.
I hurriedly told the Washington Headquarters the situation and the National Republican Senatorial Committee was prevailed upon to send a representative, Mr. Frank Barrow, to West Virginia to urge the Republicans in the Legislature to remember their Party and vote for ratification.