Constitutional amendments were submitted to the voters of three states in 1916, namely, Iowa, where the vote was taken June 5th on Primary Day; South Dakota and West Virginia, where the vote was taken at the general election in November. More than one influential newspaper editorially discussed the returns with the comment that "the people" of three states had refused to extend the suffrage to women. An investigation unveils some ugly facts and raises significant questions.
In 1882 a prohibition constitutional amendment was adopted by a large majority in Iowa and was promptly set aside by the supreme court upon a technicality. The wet and dry question has been a vexed political issue ever since. The state now has prohibition by statutory enactment. A constitutional amendment is pending, having passed the Legislature of 1914, and is due to pass the Legislature of 1916. The "wets" believing that women would generally support the proposed prohibition amendment were extremely active in opposing the suffrage amendment. Although the suffragists kept their question distinctly separate from prohibition, the wet and dry issue, it was generally admitted, would prove a determining factor.
Every judge of the Supreme Court, the United States Senators, the Governor, most of the men prominent in Republican and Democratic politics, most of the clergymen, most of the press and every woman's state organization espoused the suffrage amendment.
Men familiar with Iowa politics advised the suffrage campaigners early and late and all the time between that it was unnecessary to conduct an intensive campaign as "everybody believed in it."
Yet despite this omnipresent optimism thousands of women gave every possibility of their lives for months before to arouse public sentiment, instruct and acquaint the men and women of the state concerning the question.
The amendment was lost by about 10,000 votes. Were four of the ninety-nine counties (Dubuque, Clinton, Scott and Des Moines counties) lying along the Mississippi River, not included in the returns, the state would have been carried for woman suffrage. It is instructive to inquire what kind of population occupied the four counties which defeated it. The following table gives the answer:
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| | | | | Total |
| | | | Total | German, |
| | Total | Total | Foreign |Austrian,|
|Iowa Counties| | Native | and | Russian |
| |Population|Parentage| Foreign | and of |
| | | |Parentage| such |
| | | | |Parentage|
+——————-+—————+————-+————-+————-+
|Dubuque | 57,450 | 24,024 | 33,426 | 14,566 |
|Clinton | 45,394 | 19,116 | 26,278 | 11,494 |
|Scott | 60,000 | 24,104 | 35,896 | 20,119 |
|Des Moines | 36,145 | 17,769 | 18,376 | 7,828 |
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The vote on woman suffrage was 162,679 yes and 173,020 no. The "yes vote" of the above four counties was 8,061; the "no vote" 18,941. Subtract these totals from the totals of the state vote and 154,618 "yes" and 154,079 "no" remains, giving a majority of 539 for woman suffrage.
Once more in the history of suffrage referenda a foreign and colonized population decided the issue. Was the election an honest one? That is a question of interest to Iowa just now. The returns revealed some suspicious facts. Nearly 30,000 more votes were cast on the suffrage proposition than in the primary. Where did they come from? The president of the W.C.T.U., Mrs. Ida B. Wise Smith, employed a detective after the election. His investigation covered forty-four counties and was not confined to those wherein woman suffrage was lost. The findings have not been given to the public in their entirety, but they were conclusive enough to cause an injunction suit to be filed against the Board of Elections and the Legislature to restrain them from accepting the official returns.
Registration was necessary for the amendment, not for the primary, yet thousands of unregistered votes apparently were cast upon the amendment. All good election laws provide that a definite number of ballots shall be officially issued to each precinct; that the number of those deposited in the ballot box, the number spoiled and those unused shall not only tally with the number received, but the unused ones must be counted, sealed, labelled and returned with the certificate recording the count. This is the law of Iowa; but the report of the investigation, as given to the press, shows that in thirty-five counties out of the forty-four investigated no tally list was used and there was nothing by which to check in order to determine the correctness of the number on the certificate. In many cases no unused ballots were returned. The poll lists did not tally with the number of votes and even a recount could not reveal whether fraud or carelessness had led to irregularity.