Page:History of Woman Suffrage Volume 5.djvu/593

 nation-wide urge for favorable action. The Legislatures themselves were circularized with excellent literature.

In February, 1918, a bulletin was sent to State presidents offering one or more traveling libraries of sixty-two volumes, the Leslie Commission to pay expenses to the State and its association to pay them within the State. A library could be held one year. Quantities of literature have been sent to the States for distribution while requests for special literature have received prompt attention.

The activity regarding the appointment of a woman or women on the Peace Commission originated in the national office and stirred the people of the entire country. On Dec. 8, 1918, the association held a meeting of war workers in the National Theatre in Washington, D. C., to protest against further delay in the Senate on the Federal Amendment. Twenty-seven delegates representing the association. attended the eight congresses held throughout the United States in the interest of the League of Nations.

Field Work. The resolution committing the National Association to an aggressive policy was passed at its convention of 1917. It read: "If the 65th Congress fails to submit the Federal Amendment before the next Congressional election the association shall select and enter into such a number of campaigns as will effect a change in both houses of Congress sufficient to insure its passage."

October came; the November elections were approaching; the 65th Congress had failed to pass the amendment. Probabilities had to be weighed which would produce the necessary two votes if possible and it was decided to enter the campaigns in New Hampshire, New Jersey, Massachusetts and Delaware. The first two were at no time specially hopeful, as they were likely to poll Republican majorities and the Republican Senatorial candidates of both were against woman suffrage. However, as a result of the work done in New Jersey, Senator Baird fell much behind his ticket, while in New Hampshire the women and the advertising made so strong a case for the pro-suffrage candidate that for a day or two the result was in doubt, but it was finally declared that Moses had won by 1,200 votesThe two most important and successful contests were in Massachusetts against the Republican Senator Weeks; in Delaware against the Democratic Senator Saulsbury

Under the sub-title "In the trenches" Mrs. Shuler told of the three great State campaigns of the year in Michigan, South Dakota and Oklahoma (described in the chapters for those States) and said:

The National Association gave to these States eighteen organizers, all of whom rendered valuable service. It gave plate matter at a cost of $4,600; 100,000 posters, 1,528,000 pieces of literature, eighteen street banners and 50,000 buttons. It gave to South Dakota a "suffrage school," June 3-20, sessions in the daytime in seven Cities and street meetings in ten of the nearby towns in the evenings.