Alice Paul

Alice Stokes Paul
Alice Paul, circa 1901
Born	(1885-01-11)January 11, 1885 Mount Laurel Township, New Jersey
Died	July 9, 1977(1977-07-09) (aged 92) Moorestown Township, New Jersey
Occupation	Suffragist
Parent(s)	William Mickle Paul I (1850-1902) Tacie Parry
Relatives	Siblings: Helen, Parry and Willam

Alice Stokes Paul (January 11, 1885 – July 9, 1977) was an American suffragist and activist. Along with Lucy Burns and others, she led a successful campaign for women's suffrage that resulted in the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution in 1920.

Activism

Alice Paul and Helen Gardener, ca. 1908-1915

Alice Paul

Alice Paul received her undergraduate education from Swarthmore College, and then earned her M.A. and Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania. Paul received her LL.B from the Washington College of Law at American University in 1922. In 1927, she earned an LL.M, and in 1928, a Doctorate in Civil Laws from American University.

Women's Suffrage and the Nineteenth Amendment

After her graduation from the University of Pennsylvania, Paul joined the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) and was appointed Chairwoman of their Congressional Committee in Washington, DC. Her initial work was to organize a parade in Washington the day before President Wilson's inauguration, which was a success. After months of fundraising and raising awareness for the cause, membership numbers went up in 1913. Their focus was lobbying for a constitutional amendment to secure the right to vote for women. Such an amendment had originally been sought by suffragists Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton who tried securing the vote on a state-by-state basis.

Paul's methods began to create tension between her and the leader of NAWSA, who felt that a constitutional amendment was not practical for the times. When her lobbying efforts proved fruitless, Paul and her colleagues formed the National Woman's Party (NWP) in 1916 and began introducing some of the methods used by the suffrage movement in Britain. The National Woman's Party was funded by Alva Belmont who was a multi-millionaire socialite at the time. The NWP was accompanied by press coverage and the publication of the weekly Suffragist.

In the US presidential election of 1916, Paul and the NWP campaigned against the continuing refusal of President Woodrow Wilson and other incumbent Democrats to support the Suffrage Amendment actively. In January 1917, the NWP staged the first political protest to picket the White House. The picketers, known as "Silent Sentinels," held banners demanding the right to vote. This was an example of a non-violent civil disobedience campaign. In July 1917, picketers were arrested on charges of "obstructing traffic." Many, including Paul, were convicted and incarcerated at the Occoquan Workhouse in Virginia (later the Lorton Correctional Complex) and the District of Columbia Jail.

In a protest of the conditions in Occoquan, Paul commenced a hunger strike, which led to her being moved to the prison’s psychiatric ward and force-fed raw eggs through a feeding tube. This, combined with the continuing demonstrations and attendant press coverage, kept pressure on the Wilson administration. In January, 1918, Wilson announced that women's suffrage was urgently needed as a "war measure", and strongly urged Congress to pass the legislation. In 1919, after coming down to one vote in the state of Tennessee, the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution secured the vote for women.

Equal Rights Amendment

Paul was the original author of a proposed Equal Rights Amendment to the Constitution in 1923. The ERA would not find its way to the Senate until 1972 when it was approved by the Senate and submitted to the state legislatures for ratification. Approval by 38 states was required to ensure adoption of the amendment. Not enough states — only 35 — voted in favor in time for the deadline. However, efforts to pass the ERA passed by Congress in the 1970s are still afoot, as well as efforts to pass a new equality amendment, and almost half of the U.S. states have adopted the ERA into their state constitutions.

Death

Paul died at the age of 92 on July 9, 1977 at the Quaker Greenleaf Extension Home in Moorestown Township, New Jersey, near her family home of Paulsdale. Before that she had a stroke in 1974, which disabled her.

Legacy

Paul created a long legacy of woman’s rights. Her alma mater Swarthmore College named the Women's Center and a dormitory in her honor. Montclair State University in New Jersey has also named a building in her honor. Hilary Swank, in the HBO 2004 movie Iron Jawed Angels, portrayed Paul during her struggle for passage of the 19th Amendment. Two countries have honored her by issuing a postage stamp: Great Britain in 1981 and the United States in 1995, issuing a 78¢ Great Americans series stamp.

Paul is also scheduled to appear on a United States half-ounce $10 gold coin in 2012, as part of the so-called "First Spouse" program. A provision in the Presidential $1 Coin Program (see Pub. L.Tooltip Public Law (United States) 109–145 (text) (PDF), 119 Stat. 2664, enacted December 22, 2005) directs that Presidential spouses be honored. As President Chester A. Arthur was a widower, Paul is representing Arthur's era.

In 1989, the Alice Paul Centennial Foundation was working to raise the funds needed to purchase the brick farmhouse in Mount Laurel Township where Paul was born.

See also

• Iron Jawed Angels, 2004 film about Paul, Lucy Burns and their fight resulting in passage of the 19th Amendment.
• List of civil rights leaders
• List of suffragists and suffragettes
• Paulsdale, birthplace and childhood home of Alice Paul in Mount Laurel Township, New Jersey.

References

• Adams, Katherine H. and Michael L. Keene. Alice Paul and the American Suffrage Campaign. University of Illinois Press, 2007. ISBN 978-0-252-07471-4
• Walton, Mary. A Woman's Crusade: Alice Paul and the Battle for the Ballot. Palgrave Macmillan, 2010. ISBN 978-0-230-61175-7

External links

• R.Digati (Mar 23, 2002). "Alice Paul". Social Reformer, Suffragette. Find a Grave. Retrieved Aug 17, 2011. (Westfield Friends Burial Ground, Cinnaminson, New Jersey)
• The Alice Paul Institute
• Alice Paul at Lakewood Public Library: Women In History
• The Sewall-Belmont House & Museum—Home of the historic National Woman's Party
• Biographical sketch at the University of Pennsylvania