The Suffragette Movement: Picketing the White House

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The Suffragette Movement: Picketing the White House

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A central tactic for the National Woman's Party (NWP) was picketing the White House. Designed to be high-profile and attention grabbing, women came to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue with the express purpose of publicizing the cause through action. Various associations of women suffragists affiliated with the activist stance of the NWP came and protested. The signs seen in the collection photographs frequently allude to the phrases Wilson used in describing America's role as the protector of democracy during the First World War. After passage of the Espionage Act in 1917, NWP picketers were often considered subversive and arrested for impeding the war effort. Wilson even went so far as to task the newly formed Secret Service with keeping an eye on the NWP's activities.

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Collection Items

College Day in the picket line
Members of the breakaway National Woman's Party(NWP) picket the White House during the Wilson administration. They are wearing banners designating their Alma Maters. The NWP strove to show that their organization was made up of dedicated young…

Penn[sylvania] on the picket line
Fourteen Suffragists stand on the picket line outside the Wilson White House. The sign reads, "Mr. President How Long Must Women Wait For Liberty." Wilson would lead the United States to war by calling it a democratic crusade. American women used…

Maryland Day [picketing the White House for suffrage]
The National Woman's Party had numerous branches throughout the country. State organizations, like the women of Maryland shown here, agitated locally for suffrage rights on a state by state basis. When the 19th amendment went to the states these…

Suffragettes picketing at the East Wing of the White House in 1917.
The suffragists who picketed the White House were the first to do so according to the White House Museum. Verbally and physically abused by crowds, the police did little as President Wilson sought to ignore the men and women marching outside.

PROTEST FOR PICKETS SENT TO PRESIDENT:Mrs. Belmont Tells Him Their Treatment in Washington Jail Is Inhuman.
The article describes the poor conditions that Alice Paul and other picketers are enduring in prison calling them political prisoners it asks why they are held in a jail for murders. The article also goes on to describe the next picket of the White…

SUFFRAGISTS PLAN TO CONTINUE TROUBLE:Hope Their Banners Will Keep On Waving at White House Gates--Two More Arrested.
This article describes the NWP as an organization determined to continue its efforts. The incarcerated picketers are described as uncomfortable in prison but determined to succeed. Alice Paul is shown as an indefatigable organizer, using the news…

Policewoman arrests Florence Youmans of Minnesota and Annie Arniel (center) of Delaware for refusing to give up their banners.
In this image we see three women in the foreground. Two are NWP picketers and the third is a police woman who is in the process of arresting the picketers. It has been estimated that close to 300 NWP members were arrested and near 100 picketers…
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