Women’s Suffrage & Temperance

Seneca Falls Convention 1848

• Leaders:

– Elizabeth Cady Stanton

– Susan B. Anthony

– Lucretia Mott

• Seneca Falls Declaration

– Modeled on Declaration of Independence

– Demanded equal rights for women, including suffrage (voting rights)

Opposition to Women Voting

Why were people opposed to women’s suffrage?

Protest!

• New leaders of the Suffragist movement

◊ Carrie Chapman Catt organized state by state fight for suffrage

◊Alice Paul & Rose Winslow lead constant protests of Wilson’s Whitehouse

• Many protesters arrested

• Protesters & organizers were successfulProtesters & organizers were successful

The 19th Amendment

New Opportunities for Women

• The 19th Amendment was ratified in 1920, giving women the right to vote 130 years after the Constitution was ratified

• This gave women many more social and political opportunities

New Opportunities

• 1) Higher Education: More and more women began attending universities and graduate schools

• 2) Women’s clubs were formed to help improve local communities; raising $ for parks, libraries, schools, etc.

• 3) Women became vocal reformers (Florence Kelly – sweatshops & child labor)

The 18th Amendment: Prohibition

Reasons for Prohibition

• Damage to family

• Economic cost (unemployment)

• Religious reasons

• Machine politics (deals were made in saloons)

• WWI: use grain to feed troops

• Anti-German sentiment

• Women– WCTU

(Frances Willard)

– Carrie Nation

Supporters

• Rural People– Southern &

Westerners concerned with “out of control” Northern cities

Women’s Christian Temperance Union

• Goal: Outlaw alcohol

• Methods: Community organizing, protests

Carry Nation• Husband died

from heavy drinking

• Religious Fanatic

• Went into bars/saloons broke kegs & bottles with hatchet

18th Amendment passed in 1917

18th Amendment a total failure

• People continued drinking in “speakeasies” (illegal bars & saloons)

• Organized crime supplied liquor

• People attempted to make their own liquor (bathtub gin) and were blinded or poisoned

• Many people who were supposed to enforce the law became hypocrites

Organized Crime

• Mobsters such as Al Capone in Chicago made lots of money supplying alcohol.– This money gave them more power to hire

goons and corrupt politicians– Mobsters would gun competing mobsters

down in the street, blow up buildings and speakeasies, kidnap and murder innocent people, all to gain power.

Valentine’s Day Massacre

Prohibition Repealed in 1932

Lessons of Prohibition

• Good idea?

– Why or why not?

• Is there still prohibition?

• Is it a good idea?

– Why or why not?