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Social conditions during the decades (Click on dates
to choose a decade) 1900-1920
During the first two decades of the 20th century, women had few rights. They could not own property nor vote and their husbands could beat them whenever they wanted. Not that many women were upset about this. Only a few, mostly radicals, tried to get any more rights for women. The common belief, among both men and women, was that women were the “weaker” sex--that politics was too complicated for their “pretty little heads,” and that men were better suited to the world outside of the home. Inside the home was the woman’s domain. The saying was that any education should prepare women for their rightful duties: marriage, motherhood and service to Christianity. Anything beyond the home belonged to the man. When Fannie Brice sang My Man in 1922, she sings that he beats her, but what can she do? There was no 911, no domestic violence legislation. Men beat their wives and that was that. You just put up with it. And anyway, she probably provoked him somehow.
During this period there was a small, but growing, group of women working towards suffrage. In fact, this had been going on for some time. However, the idea was so far-fetched that at the 1848 women’s rights conference, it was the only resolution that did not pass unanimously, as they all believed it would be a cause of ridicule for their fledgling movement. Voting for women, after all, was a challenge to religion, law and custom. It was “against the natural order.” People saw the suffragist as “uppity women” who were trying to take over and upset society’s balance.
But after WWI, the movement increased, with even a few women using violence to get their point across. The story of Alice Paul, Carrie Chapman Catt and others has been told very effectively in the 2004 film Iron Jawed Angels starring Hilary Swank and Angelica Huston. Ratifying the 19th Amendment , giving women the right to vote, was not an easy task and almost went the way of the Equal Rights Amendment, which never got enough states to ratify it. With the 19th Amendment, it was not until June 14, 1919 that both the House and Senate passed the 19th Amendment (after it had failed numerous times in previous years), sending it off to the States for ratification. Wisconsin, Illinois and Michigan were the first three states (in that order) to ratify, followed by Ohio, New York and Kansas. Within six months, 22 states had ratified. Thirty-six were needed. In March 1920, 34 states were on board, but two more were needed. After intense debate, West Virginia ratified by a vote of 15-14. There was only one more state that had any chance of passing the legislation, because most of the Southern states had either voted it down or were unwilling to even raise the issue. Vermont had passed it in 1919, but was overturned by a dubious gubernatorial veto. Tennessee seemed to be the only state left to win the battle to get the “perfect 36.” Suffragists and anti-suffragists descended on Nashville, Tennessee that hot August of 1920. There was a lot of lobbying, a lot of debate. With a straw vote taken, the suffragists saw they would lose, as the vote was one short, then tied at 48-48, with no hope of breaking the deadlock. But when the final vote was taken, the youngest member of the legislature—Henry Burn—opened a telegram from his mother in East Tennessee. She wrote: Do the right thing. Vote for the women. When time came for his vote, he changed it in favor of the 19th Amendment, which left the vote 47-49 and the Amendment passed. The legislators and others were so angry that an angry mob chased Henry Burn and he had to climb out the 3rd-floor window of the Capitol and hide in its attic.
After women won the right to vote there was a fear that those “Brassy, man-hating feminists” were going to take over. Society needed reassurance that women were not going to revolt and it got help from musical theater, such as the 1926 song Someone to Watch Over Me. During the twenties, the Flappers got a lot of attention. We look back at them as independent, but back then people saw them as “floozies” with loose morals. They dressed provocatively, smoked and did not confine their sexual activities to marriage. Social conditions during the decades (Click to choose
a decade) Background | Social Conditions During the Decades | Discussion Questions | Worksheets and Activities | References | Appendices
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Carrie
Chapman Catt
Alice
Paul 