After decades of struggle, Washington women won the right to vote in 1910. This victory would prove to be a breakthrough on the path towards ratification of the 19th Amendment securing voting rights for women across the United States. And Grays Harbor women helped pave the way.
Women’s Suffrage in Grays Harbor: Winning the Vote and Loosing it
The Women’s Suffrage Movement began in 1848, when activists gathered in Seneca Falls, New York. Perhaps surprisingly, the movement’s strongest support was in the American west.
Washington Territory suffragists – supporters of women’s voting rights – even proposed a bill in 1854!
The legislature finally approved women’s suffrage in 1883. Four years later, the Territorial Supreme Court struck down the law. While voters rejected women’s suffrage in 1889, women won the right to vote in school elections the next year.
But suffragists did not give up. In 1895 Montesano women circulated a petition, urging the state legislature to submit a woman’s suffrage amendment to popular (male) vote. They collected over 300 signatures.
Gaining Support in Washington for Women’s Right to Vote
After decades of lobbying, the legislature finally put women’s suffrage on the ballot in 1910. Would the amendment pass?
Washington’s suffragists, led by the Washington Equal Suffrage Association (WESA), were determined it would. They had a powerful collation of support going into the election. Their oldest ally was the Woman’s Christian Temperence Union (WCTU), which believed that women voters would help pass prohibition. The Chehalis County unit even had a suffrage department. New support came from the Grange (a farmers advocacy association), unions and socialists. But still, success was far from sure.
In contrast to militant suffragists abroad, Washington suffragists waged a campaign of publicity and education, demonstrating through their “ladylike” behavior that women’s suffrage would improve society rather than destroy the family and home like anti-suffragists warned.
Campaigning for Suffrage in Grays Harbor
Suffragists distributed literature and held public meetings. Advocacy in Grays Harbor was organized by WESA. Equal Suffrage Clubs formed in Aberdeen, Hoquiam, and Oakville. Members met in each other’s homes. The Aberdeen Club sometimes met at the public library.
Emma Smith DeVoe, president of WESA, visited Grays Harbor often, speaking at meetings and local churches. Gatherings were open to the public.
Avoiding demonstrations and protests, suffrage clubs tried many tactics to get people to support votes for women. For Equal Suffrage Day on March 15, Aberdeen suffragists joined together for a “mammoth church and society sale” at J.S. Waugh’s store. They raised $21. That May the club canvassed the city to poll people about their support on women’s suffrage. The Hoquiam Club also got creative, co-sponsoring the play “The Women’s Legislature” with the Hoquiam WCTU in October.
Who Said Suffragists Can’t Cook?
Grays Harbor women contributed to the WESA’s “Washington Women’s Cook Book.” To combat the popular idea that suffragists were all men-hating spinsters who could not cook, suffragists from across the state sent in recipes for a book that combined cooking with pro-suffragist arguments.
Clara Sauers from Aberdeen and Anna Combes, Mrs. A.L. Callow and Mrs. L.A. Blair of Elma contributed their best recipes. From graham muffins and prune whip to creamed clams and oyster omelets, Grays Harbor suffragists reassured reluctant (and hungry) male voters that voting would help, not destroy women’s traditional roles. These women, like most of the club members, were married with families.
Suffragists kept working until election day, Tuesday, November 8. Just days before the election, Ida Allen, secretary of the Aberdeen Equal Suffrage Club, published a lengthy defense for women’s suffrage in the Aberdeen Herald. “Are they not strong enough, intelligent enough, trustworthy enough, to be allowed a voice in their own government? Men of Washington,” she concluded “we want the ballot. You alone can give it to us. Will you not do it?”
Election Day in Grays Harbor
While suffragists did not rally at the polls in 1910, Mrs. W.J. Patterson, president of the Aberdeen Club organized last minute appeals to get out the vote. The only roadblock that day was an anonymous “dodger” leaflet circulated in Aberdeen. Believed to have been published by saloon interests (who feared that if women could vote, prohibition would soon follow), it read: “Warning! Vote for the amendment to Article 6 of the constitution means voting for ‘woman’s suffrage.’ Do you want it?”
Suffrage supporters later credited the dodger with increasing the vote in favor of women’s suffrage.
When the votes were finally tallied, Washington men supported women’s suffrage 52,299 to 29,676. Grays Harbor carried the measure as well. Early counts were 897 for and 384 against.
Suffragists and their allies celebrated the victory. On November 23, 1910, the day before Thanksgiving, suffragists from around the county gathered at Aberdeen’s Grand Theater. The Franklin School orchestra provided music. Speakers like Ida Allen and State Senator Alexander Polson of Hoquiam celebrated the victory and urged women to become educated and active voters, working for the welfare of their communities.
Suffrage From Washington to the United States
Women flocked to register to vote. The next election, that March proved the largest turnout in Aberdeen’s history. About half of the voters were women.
Washington’s suffrage victory would prove the breakthrough that suffragists needed. As women won the right to vote in more states, support for a national suffrage amendment grew. The 19th amendment passed in 1920. Though discriminatory laws kept many minority women from the polls, women’s suffrage was here to stay.
All of this was made possible by the determined suffragists of Washington and their allies. Their struggle is a reminder that voting rights are something that should never be taken for granted.
