The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume VI

by Unknown

1907. Municipal suffrage bill was defeated by the Senate.

1911. A similar measure was reported favorably out of committees but lost in the Lower House by 41 ayes, 48 noes, and no action was taken by the Senate.

1913. A resolution to submit a woman suffrage amendment was held up in committees. The Senate passed a School suffrage bill by 27 ayes, 10 noes, but there was no action in the House.

1915. A Presidential suffrage bill passed in the Senate by 37 ayes, 3 noes, was held up in the House.

1917. This year will long be remembered by suffrage workers as one of triumphs and defeats. The legislative session was a continued triumph and showed that public opinion was in favor of granting political rights to women. A great help was the agitation for a new constitution. The present constitution was adopted in 1851. An early court decision that an amendment in order to carry must have a majority of all the votes cast at the election made amending it a practical impossibility and for a long time there had been a widespread demand for a new one for the sake of many needed reforms. The suffragists joined the agitation for it, as this seemed the only way to get the vote by State action.

The General Assembly of 1917 was carefully selected to pass the Prohibition Amendment and was known to be favorable to the calling of a constitutional convention. While the suffragists placed their hope in a new constitution yet in order to leave no means untried the Legislative Council of Women was formed at the suggestion of Mrs. Grace Julian Clarke, composed of representatives of eight or ten State organizations, of which the Women's Franchise League was one. Mrs. Felix T. McWhirter was made president and it was decided to present a Presidential and Municipal suffrage bill similar to the one passed by the Illinois Legislature in 1913 and sustained by the courts.

The Council had quarters in the State House granted by the Governor; the Women's Franchise League immediately established a bureau there by his consent with Mrs. John F. Barnhill and Miss Alma Sickler in charge and all the women labored diligently for the success of the measure. The work over the State was necessarily done largely by the Franchise League, as it had the local societies necessary. The Council secured the aid of Mrs. Catharine Waugh McCulloch, a lawyer of Chicago, who had been closely identified with the Illinois law. For the first time in the history of Indiana's struggle for equal suffrage there was active opposition by women. Nineteen, all of Indianapolis, appealed to the Senate Committee on Rights and Privileges, which had the bill in charge, for a hearing in order to protest.[48] This was granted but it resulted in an enthusiastic suffrage meeting. The "nineteen," who asserted that they spoke for 90 per cent. of unorganized women in Indiana, were represented by Mrs. Lucius B. Swift, Miss Minnie Bronson, secretary of the National Anti-Suffrage Association, and Charles McLean of Iowa, who was in its employ. Mrs. McCulloch, Meredith Nicholson, Mrs. Edward Franklin White, now president of the Council, former Mayor Charles A. Bookwalter and a number of others spoke for the bill.

The calendar of suffrage events in the Legislature of 1917 was as follows: On January 23 the bill for a constitutional convention passed the House by 87 ayes, 10 noes; on the 31st it passed the Senate by 34 ayes, 14 noes, and on February 1 was signed by Governor James P. Goodrich. On February 8 the Presidential-Municipal suffrage bill passed the Senate by 32 ayes, 16 noes. It also provided that women could vote for delegates to the constitutional convention, were eligible to election as delegates and could vote on the adoption of the proposed new constitution. On the 22nd it passed the House by 67 ayes, 24 noes, and was signed by the Governor. The Legislature also voted to submit a full suffrage amendment to the electors.

Although it was early apparent that these laws would be carried into the courts preparations were at once made by the women for registering. The Franchise League opened booths in the shopping districts in the cities and urged the women in the country to go to the court house and register when in town. They sent out women notaries with blanks to register the women.[49] In Vigo county, of which Terre Haute is the county seat, 12,000 registered, more than the average number of men who usually voted at elections. In all parts of the State the registration of women was very large and the women were studying political questions and showing much interest in their new duties.

Meanwhile the action of the Legislature was taken into the courts. On June 25 Judge W. W. Thornton of the Marion County (Indianapolis) Superior Court gave a decision that the Legislature had no authority to call for an election of delegates to a constitutional convention and no right to grant to women the privilege of voting for such delegates or any constitution which might be submitted to the voters. The case was at once appealed to the State Supreme Court, which on July 13 sustained the decision. Chief Justice Erwin wrote the opinion and Justices Spencer, Harvey and Myers concurred. Justice M. B. Lairy filed a dissenting opinion. There was a wide difference of opinion among the lawyers of the State.