Valentine's Day special to League of Women Voters and every woman who has ever voted in the United States: Text forwarded by Fran Alexander; Joyce Hale did the intricate research

Dear Valentines-----

Below is an interesting and powerful speech made by Florence Cotnam, of Arkansas, to the First National Convention of the League of Women Voters in Chicago, Feb. 14, 1920.  I found out about her because a friend of mine, Joyce Hale, had done some research on Cotnam,  and this is what she discovered.  Joyce's emails to me explaining how she came to find and then transcribe this speech tell her own small detective story, one that still contains a mystery.  We do not, for example, know why Florence is celebrating "victory" in her speech,  when in Feb. 1920 the nation had not yet ratified the 19th Amendment giving women the right to vote. That certification came in August 1920.   Arkansas ratified in July 1919 so perhaps that and the expectation that the remaining 5 states would ratify soon may have been what her excitement was based on.  Considering that  today, 90 years later, we still do not have a nationally ratified Equal Rights Amendment,  perhaps her assurance that ratification would happen was ill placed. Certainly her hope was not.

Throughout my life I have thought frequently on the importance of one vote because of the lesson of women's suffrage "winning" our right to vote.......by one vote.   (And that's a great story on its own.)

I constantly hear Susan B. Anthony's words, "Failure is impossible," ringing in my ears, whenever I face off with issues I'd rather hide from,  and I always remember that after a lifetime spent on the task, she did not live to see the ratification, dying in 1906. Neither did Elizabeth Cady Stanton, dying in 1902, who wrote many of the platforms, did extensive organizing and was an extremely controversial player throughout the decades she fought for women's rights AND raised 7 children. There were hundreds of women who sacrificed so much, some to the extent that their lives were changed and often lost, so that we women today can vote---we need to remember them.

Not until Joyce unearthed this speech, which she orchestrated to be read at a local women's sorority house yesterday as a means of commemoration of the 90 year anniversary of the League of Women Voters, did I ever know there was yet another significance to Feb. 14 that I should make note of---now I do.

FYI-- Iron Jawed Angels  is a 2004 movie about the suffrage movement in the 1910's, and stars Hillary Swank and Anjelica Huston----will be shown at the Shiloh Museum in Springdale on Saturday, Feb. 27 at 11am and 2 pm. Admission is free.

Anyway, the speech and Joyce's undercover work make for good reading, I think, and certainly put a grand historical spin on this VALENTINE'S DAY,  90 years after the speech was given.  Please read it to the end for the Valentine punch.         

 Enjoy!     Fran

2/10/10

Hi Fran,

I have been trying to figure out the difference in dates.  I too have seen the August date, but what I had been going on was the text of Florence Cotnam's speech (I just happened to have spent a couple of hours studying the original manuscript with a magnifying glass today to decipher the penciled handwriting and now have it complete to my satisfaction).  It was delivered on February 14, 1920.  I don't know what would have led her to address the LWV in this way, but in checking to see what states came in and when, the final five had yet to vote by Feb. 14th.  It must have been her conviction that so little remained that she felt safe in making such a claim at this important occasion.  Here was what I found in one reference to her speech:

The following was taken from the Arkansas Encyclopedia of History and Culture and when considering the quote from her text, it is confusing.
"After women achieved right to vote, local women organized the League of Women Voters of Little Rock to promote political responsibility. Cotnam was elected president of this new organization and was asked to address the National League of Women Voters Convention in Chicago on February 14, 1920. She spoke on the struggle to achieve voting rights in her speech titled “All’s Well That Ends Well.” "
I find it hard to understand why she would have considered the victory won on February 14, 1920, but the text certainly states her surety.

Going over the manuscript with a fine tooth comb was quite invigorating.  I had quite a rush thinking what she would have thought to see someone sitting with a small portable computer typing in the words that were carefully revealed with magnification in an effort to glean every detail of her enthusiasm and eloquence.  After struggling at length to find meaning out of loosely penciled lines, the sudden revelation of a word would make me gasp and want to share my discovery with those in the room.  It was an inanimate object that came to life.  But the last two sentences were the greatest challenge.  The thin onion skin paper was most fragile in this area and her original typing gave way to strike-throughs as she must have come back later to her writing to make it more intimate for the audience she was to address.  The mood of the Valentine holiday and the more congenial relationships that women shared during that era, came to the surface in smudged but bolder script than occurred earlier between lines and in margins.  Here you could hear her voice rise to the crescendo and see her standing erect in full confidence of victory before the grandeur of some hotel ballroom:  we look into the future that begins tonight and with only joy and thankfulness in our hearts can say to the world what every Valentine says to him who opens its doors on Feb. 14^th,”all’s well that ends well.” “I love you.”
-------Joyce

and when I asked Joyce if I could forward her emails to others, she agreed, and answered my question as to how she came across this Cotnam speech-----

As to finding the speech, it was meant to be.  The Arkansas Encyclopedia of History and Culture was my source to learn about her, but Jay's [Joyce's husband]  grandfather's old books gave me the real interest.  He was a friend of the state's historian, Dallas T. Herndon, and several of Jay's family's biographies were recorded in the three volume history.  The books were published in 1920, so you can imagine the image of Florence Cotnam was very fresh in Herndon's mind.  After seeing Cotnam written up in his old books, I looked to see if there was any mention online of Jay's grandfather, who had been a prominent civil engineer.  This led me to the easy online access to the items in the Special Collections, where I found the materials of Florence Cotnam.  The speech was one of the first complete documents I came across in the multiple file folders they brought to me and seemed to eliminate the need to look further for anything better.  I am sure the other files are also rich in material that you and I would cherish.

Florence Cotnam, front row center with her head cocked, on the LR Capitol steps.  She really was a remarkable woman who traveled 22 states to bring legislatures into support for ratification.

Florence Cotnam Speech – February 14, 1920 – First National Convention of the League of Women Voters in Chicago

All’s Well that Ends Well

We rejoice that the bonds are loosed from the minds and abilities of one-half of the American people.  We rejoice that men and women meeting on an equal plane will soon gather together in the great political conventions and uniting a diversity of perception in a common purpose will be able to make intelligent plans for the upbuilding and re-establishment of a better and truer America.

American ideals, that so lately, like a living, burning thing set aflame the hearts of all the people of the world, enkindled the thought and fired the determination which won the victory we celebrate tonight.  Then here in this hour of triumph and rejoicing, we recognize and accept the responsibilities that have come to us with our enlarged opportunities, and pledge our best efforts to give our country what she needs above all things, an interested and intelligent electorate.

It was in 1869 that the National Woman Suffrage Association organized for the avowed purpose of winning a Federal Amendment for Woman Suffrage, and it was fifty years later, in 1919, that the purpose was accomplished.  The stream of years which flowed from 1869 to 1919 knew every aspect save placidness and stagnation, and mirrored every feeling save unbelief in a successful outcome.  Those gallant spirits who embarked for the great adventure did so without illusions.  Some of these had been dispelled when the word “male” went into the 14^th Amendment and the remnant had been shattered when sometime friends and ardent supporters refused to join with them in an effort to get the word “sex” written into the 15^th Amendment, rudely saying, “Stand back, this is another’s hour.”  Facing the undertaking with a realization of its difficulties, Miss Anthony said, “I see I must row up stream”; and seeing, she and a steadfast few bent their backs to the oars and pushed out into the current.

Those who looked on with seeing eyes prophesied the end, but there were few of these in 1869, and some who watched became discouraged when difficulties multiplied and progress was hardly perceptible.

What audacity of spirit, what cheerful endurance of hardships, what inflexibility of purpose and what supreme faith in the final triumph of right was theirs, make an astonishing and inspiring chapter in the history of Democracy.

There were powerful enemies, false friends, unhappy circumstances and sometimes the current of public opinion flowed with such strength and swiftness that their hopes were well nigh wrecked. But there were also good friends and true growing in number lonely at first…For it took courage to espouse a cause unpopular with the majority, conditions for propaganda became more favorable and by increasing persistence they reversed the current of public opinion which in these last years has borne them rapidly forward.  Wyoming stands alone as an equal suffrage territory and state for twenty-four years.

After the winning of Colorado in 1893 there was here and there a state victory, sometimes two and even three in one year for twenty-four years and then the success of New York campaign of 1917 started an avalanche which aroused and threatened to overwhelm a sleeping Congress.  The Senate voted on the amendment four times in the 41 years from its introduction in 1878 by Senator Sergeant of California to its final passage on June 4, 1919.  It took 37 years to get the first vote in the House of Representatives, which occurred January 12, 1915.  Before 1915 and up to 1917 when a woman Suffrage Committee was created in the House, the amendment was locked for some time in the great safety deposit vault of the House known as the Judiciary Committee and some one had lost the key. 

But neither locks nor bolts could hold against the pressure brought to bear in 1914 and 1915 and it was let out grudgingly unaccompanied by even a recommendation.  It was voted on January 12^th after ten hours of debate.  There were earnest men who from conviction and experience spoke of the worthiness of the women of America and the justice of the measure.  There were those who jested and laughed with no understanding of its importance or imminence, and there were those who still put women and angels in the same class and held that their attributes could never find a place in politics.  The amendment lost, but 174 voted aye.  By 1918 the avalanche was coming so fast not even the House of Representatives could mistake its import and on January 10^th, exactly 40 years from the day it was first introduced in the Senate, it passed by one vote.  One man had arisen from a sick bed and risked his life to be present, others had rushed across the continent at top speed, and one left the supreme sorrow in his home to do an act of justice to the human race.  It is an old story but fresh in your minds how the Senate of the 65^th Congress refused to pass the amendment, how it was the first measure to be considered in the House of the 66^th, how it passed that body in May 1919 by a handsome 42 more than 2/3, and how June 4, 1919, was made Independence Day for the women of America by its final passage through the Senate and then ratification as it has been told you tonight…  While millions of women have finally enlisted in this struggle, there is no doubt that we have won at this time by reason of our remarkable leadership.  Where in all the world could three such women be found as those who have led this movement for the message and interpretation of a Federal Suffrage Amendment.  Susan B. Anthony, determined, untiring, clear visioned, selfless – “Better lose me than a State:, she said when she when into the first campaign in South Dakota while her health demanded that she should rest.  Anna Howard Shaw, the great orator, moving men to justice and women to fresh endeavor; the big human heat beating in unison with the world, touching the depths of adversity unembittered and rising to the height of fame unspoiled.  Carrie Chapman Catt, the great constructive mind, the states woman and general, who has rallied to her standard the women of all the world, and has inspired a devotion among her followers that is unexampled. 

Surely the divine power raised up these women to carry out a mighty purpose;  for it is because they lived and strived and wrought – determined, yet generous and tolerant, - that we look into the future that begins tonight and with only joy and thankfulness in our hearts can say to the world what every Valentine says to him who opens its doors on Feb. 14^th,”all’s well that ends well.” “I love you.”