At the annual convention held in Peoria in 1915 Mrs. Trout positively refused to stand again for president and Mrs. Adella Maxwell Brown of Peoria was elected. Four State conferences were held during the year and Mrs. Brown represented the association at the National Suffrage Association at Washington in December; the Mississippi Valley Conference at Minneapolis the next May; the National Council of Women Voters at Cheyenne in July and the National Suffrage Association at Atlantic City in September. In June, 1916, the State association, assisted by those of Chicago, took charge of what became known as the "famous rainy day suffrage parade," held in that city while the National Republican convention was in session. Mrs. Brown was chairman of the committee, Mrs. Morrisson vice-chairman and Mrs. Kellogg Fairbanks grand marshal of the parade.
There was much speculation among the political parties as to how the women would vote at their first presidential election in November, 1916. As their ballots were put into separate boxes they could be distinguished and they were as follows: Republican, 459,215; Democratic, 383,292; Socialist, 17,175; Prohibition, 16,212; Socialist Labor, 806.
Much important legislative work was to be done in the next session of the Legislature and at the State convention held in Springfield in October, 1916, Mrs. Trout was persuaded to accept again the presidency. Delegates were present from every section and the policy for the ensuing year was thoroughly discussed by Mrs. McCulloch, Senator Magill, Lewis G. Stevenson, Secretary of State; Mrs. George Bass, and others. The consensus of opinion was that owing to the great difficulty of amending the State constitution the only practical way to secure full suffrage for women was through a new constitution. This convention, therefore, voted in an overwhelming majority to work in the Legislature of 1917 for the calling of a constitutional convention. The Citizens' Association, composed of leading men of Chicago and the State, had been trying over thirty years to obtain a new State constitution and as soon as they learned of this action they sent Shelby M. Singleton, its secretary, to request of Mrs. Trout and Mrs. McGraw that the work be directed by the leaders of the State Equal Suffrage Association, to which they agreed. They went to Springfield at the beginning of the session in 1917 and a struggle followed that lasted over ten weeks.
[Mrs. McGraw prepared a very full account of the work in the Legislature to have it submit to the voters the question of calling a convention to prepare a new constitution. Representatives of all the leading organizations of women assisted at Springfield from time to time. The resolution had the powerful support of Governor Frank C. Lowden, Congressman Medill McCormick, Roger C. Sullivan and other prominent men, but the Citizens' Association in an official bulletin gave the larger part of the credit to "the tireless and tactful work of the women's lobby." After Senate and House by more than a two-thirds majority had voted to submit the question to the voters the State association organized an Emergency League to establish centers in each of the 101 counties and an immense educational campaign was carried on. Over a thousand meetings were held in the summer and fall preceding the election Nov. 5, 1918, when the proposal for a convention received a majority of 74,239. The next year delegates to the convention were elected and it met in Springfield Jan. 6, 1920. One of its first acts was to adopt an article giving the complete suffrage to women. Before the constitution was ready to submit to the voters the women were fully enfranchised by the Federal Amendment.]
After the victory was gained in the Legislature and just as all plans were laid for the campaign in the spring of 1917 the United States entered the war against Germany. Mrs. Trout was appointed a member of the executive committee of the Woman's Council of National Defense and all the members of the board immediately engaged in Liberty Loan, Red Cross and other war work. During this period of strenuous activity another attack was made on the constitutionality of the suffrage law by the liquor interests and the case was again brought before the Supreme Court. The State Board engaged James G. Skinner, an able lawyer, formerly Assistant Corporation Counsel, and in December the law was again pronounced constitutional.
The State convention was held in the autumn of 1917 in Danville and Mrs. Trout was re-elected. The association now had affiliated societies in every senatorial and congressional district with a membership of over 200,000 women. Mrs. Trout was soon called to Washington by Mrs. Catt to work for the Federal Suffrage Amendment and spent many months there while Mrs. McGraw directed the organization work of the State association. She secured the co-operation of Mrs. R. M. Reed, legislative chairman of the Illinois Federation of Women's Clubs; they appointed two workers in each congressional district and nearly every woman's society in the State had constitutional convention programs. In the spring of 1918 Governor Lowden appointed Judge Orrin N. Carter, of the Supreme Court, chairman of a state-wide committee that worked in co-operation with the state-wide committee of women. The annual suffrage convention was held in the latter part of October, 1918, in Chicago, and Mrs. Trout was re-elected.
Ratification. When Congress submitted the Federal Suffrage Amendment June 4, 1919, Mrs. Trout and Mrs. McGraw immediately went to Springfield where the Legislature was in session. They had already made preliminary arrangements and without urging it ratified the amendment on June 10. The vote in the Senate was unanimous, in the House it was 135 ayes, 85 Republicans, 50 Democrats; three nays, all Democrats, Lee O'Neil Browne, John Griffin and Peter F. Smith. A minor mistake was made in the first certified copy of the resolution sent from the Secretary of State's office at Washington to the Governor of Illinois. To prevent the possibility of any legal quibbling Governor Lowden telegraphed that office to send at once a corrected, certified copy. This was done and the ratification was reaffirmed by the Legislature on June 17, the vote in the Senate again being unanimous and one Democrat, Charles F. Franz, added to the former three negative votes in the House.
Owing to a misunderstanding of the facts for a short time there was some controversy as to whether Illinois was entitled to first place, as the Wisconsin Legislature ratified an hour later. Attorney General Brundage prepared a brief showing that the mistake in the first certified copy did not affect the legality of the ratification on June 10, as the mistake was made in copying the introductory resolution and not in the amendment itself. This opinion was accepted in the Secretary of State's office at Washington. So Illinois, the first State east of the Mississippi River to grant suffrage to its women, was the first to ratify the Federal Suffrage Amendment. In celebration a jubilee banquet was held on June 24 at the Hotel LaSalle, Mrs. Trout presiding, with Governor and Mrs. Lowden the guests of honor. Among the speakers were the Governor, prominent members of the State Legislature and the leading women suffragists.
In October the State convention was held in Chicago, with delegates present from every section, and Mrs. Trout was re-elected president. It was voted to continue to work for the speedy ratification of the Federal Suffrage Amendment in other States and if this was not obtained in 1920 to work for the full suffrage article in the new constitution when it was submitted to the voters. At the convention of the National American Association in St. Louis the preceding March the Illinois association had extended an invitation to hold the next one in Chicago, which was accepted. The State board called together representatives from the principal organizations of women, which were appointed to take charge of different days of the convention and various phases of the work. Mrs. Trout and Mrs. McGraw were made chairman and vice-chairman of the committee; Mrs. Samuel Slade, recording secretary, was appointed chairman of the Finance Committee, which raised the funds to defray all the expenses of this large convention in February, 1920. [Full account in [Chapter XIX, Volume V].]
A meeting of the State Board was called and a committee formed to get as many women as possible to vote in November at the election for President. Mrs. Trout was elected State chairman, Mrs. McGraw vice-chairman, and Mrs. Albert Schweitzer, a member of the board, was appointed Chicago chairman. The Woman's City Club, of which Mrs. Joseph T. Bowen was president, took an active part in the campaign and was the headquarters for the Chicago committee. In August in the midst of the campaign came the joyful news that the 36th State had ratified the Federal Amendment. A call was issued for the State convention to be held in Chicago October 7-9, when the Illinois Equal Suffrage Association, its work finished, disbanded, and its members formed a State League of Women Voters, with Mrs. H. W. Cheney of Chicago as chairman.