Page:History of Woman Suffrage Volume 6.djvu/442

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HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE.

HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE make its special work for the year the collecting of a monster petition of women, to be so worded that it could be used in Con- gressional work for the Federal Amendment and with the Legislature for ratification. In the summer of 1918 U. S. Senator William Hughes, who was pledged to vote for the Federal Amendment, died and the candidate for the office was David Baird, a strong anti-suffragist. As only one more vote in the Senate was needed to pass the amendment the National Association asked the New Jersey asso- ciation to do its best to defeat him. An active campaign was carried on for two months but he was too powerful a party leader, though he ran 9,000 votes behind the rest of the ticket. He voted against the amendment every time it came before the Senate. Because of the Baird campaign and the general unsettled feel- ing around the time of the signing of the armistice the annual convention was postponed to May, 1919, when it was held in Atlantic City. The ratification petitions collected the preceding year had over 80,000 names of women not previously enrolled as suffragists. Mrs. H. N. Simmons, vice-president, and Mrs. F. T. Kellers, auditor, were the only new officers elected. It was voted that the other State organizations of women should be asked to join in the campaign for ratification of the Federal Amendment by the Legislature. The committee was organized in July, 1918, with the following organizations represented : Woman Suffrage Association, Federation of Women's Clubs, Federation of Col- ored Women's Clubs, Woman's Christian Temperance Union, Public Health Nursing, Teachers' Association ; chairman, Mrs. Feickert; secretary, Mrs. James Simister; treasurer, Mrs. Olm- sted. A Finance Committee was appointed Mrs. Seymour L. Cromwell, Mrs. Colby and Mrs. Hunter which raised over $10,000. The principal contributors were Mrs. Cromwell, Mrs. Colby, Judge and Mrs. John J. White, Mrs. Wittpenn, Mrs. Hartshorne, Mrs. Lewis S. Thompson and Mrs. Robert Stevens. A very active primary and general election campaign was made in 1919 for the election of men pledged to vote for ratifi- cation, in which 110,000 personal letters were sent out, all kinds of organizations were circularized and about 1,000,000 pieces of literature were distributed. A State ratification mass meeting