1913 April 4

Racially Integrated Suffrage Conference Held in St. Louis

 

The Mississippi Valley Suffrage Conference became a racially integrated event on this day with the attendance of Mrs. Victoria Haley, an African-American. Her appearance caused a “commotion,” and the hotel management protested, but the meeting went forward as planned.

St. Louis at that time was a segregated Southern city, and across the country racist attitudes were rising. The leaders of the suffrage conference who had invited Mrs. Haley congratulated her on her courage.

The suffrage movement was deeply divided over the issue of race. Most of the top leadership did not want press the issue of suffrage for African-American women out of fear of alienation southern supporters of women’s suffrage. A relatively small number of principled, egalitarian-minded suffragists, on the other hand, wanted to push the issue.

The woman’s suffrage movement picked up momentum in 1913, marked by a huge parade in Washington, DC, on March 3rd, organized by the militant suffragist Alice Paul.

Learn more: Paula Giddings, When and Where I Enter: The Impact of Black Women on Race and Sex in America (1984)

Learn more about the history of women’s suffrage, from the 19th Century to the present: Ellen Carol DuBois, Suffrage: Women’s Long Battle for the Vote (2020)

Learn more about the complex history of race and the suffrage movement: http://uschs.wordpress.com/tag/race-and-suffrage-movement/

Read about African-American women and the fight for suffrage here

Learn about African-American women leaders in the fight for suffrage here

Read about the history of African-American women and suffrage: Ann F. Gordon, 1997). African American Women and the Vote 1837-1965  (1997)

 

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