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From: "june kennedy" <>
Subject: Re: [MO-OREGON-HISTORY] Women's Vote/a reminder of our history
Date: Thu, 19 Aug 2004 16:46:45 -0400
References: <5B7E1B36-F184-11D8-A977-000393CCBB70@southwind.net>


This is just wonderful information. I vote everytime there is even a
proposal. What a privilege we have.

June
----- Original Message -----
From: "Lanita Sconce Miller" <>
To: <>
Sent: Wednesday, August 18, 2004 10:06 PM
Subject: [MO-OREGON-HISTORY] Women's Vote/a reminder of our history


> I received this from our own Bonnie Johnson. Thanks, Bonnie, for
> sharing..
>
> This regards the original fight to obtain Women's right to vote, and is
> a good reminder to all of us - VOTE ON NOV 12.
> Bonnie
> = = = = = = =
>
> Remember how women gained the right to vote? The women were innocent
> and defenseless. And by the end of the night, they were barely alive.
>
> Forty prison guards, wielding clubs and their warden's blessing, went
> on a rampage against the 33 helpless women wrongly convicted of
> 'obstructing sidewalk traffic.' They beat Lucy Burn, chained her hands
> to the cell bars above her head and left her hanging for the night,
> bleeding and gasping for air. They hurled Dora Lewis into a dark cell,
> smashed her head against an iron bed and knocked her out cold. Her cell
> mate, Alice Cosu, thought Lewis was dead and suffered a heart attack.
> Additional affidavits describe the guards grabbing, dragging, beating,
> choking, slamming, pinching, twisting and kicking the women.
>
> Thus unfolded the 'Night of Terror' on Nov. 15, 1917, when the warden
> at the Occoquan Workhouse in Virginia ordered his guards to teach a
> lesson to the suffragists imprisoned there because they dared to picket
> Woodrow Wilson's White House for the right to vote. For weeks, the
> women's only water came from an open pail. Their food-- all of it
> colorless slop--was infested with worms. When one of the leaders, Alice
> Paul, embarked on a hunger strike, they tied her to a chair, forced a
> tube down her throat and poured liquid into her until she vomited. She
> was tortured like this for weeks until word was smuggled out to the
> press.
>
> So, refresh my memory. Some women won't vote this year because--why,
> exactly? We have carpool duties? We have to get to work? Our vote
> doesn't matter? It's raining? In 2000, over 40 million women didn't
> vote.
>
> HBO has a new movie 'Iron Jawed Angels.' It is a graphic depiction of
> the battle these women waged so that we could pull the curtain at the
> polling booth and have our say. HBO will run the movie periodically
> before releasing it on video and DVD. It is jarring to watch Woodrow
> Wilson and his cronies try to persuade a psychiatrist to declare Alice
> Paul insane so that she could be permanently institutionalized. And it
> is inspiring to watch the doctor refuse. Alice Paul was strong, he
> said, and brave That didn't make her crazy. The doctor admonished the
> men:
>
> Courage in women is often mistaken for insanity. Please make it a point
> to see this movie, and share it with your girlfriends. It reminds us
> why we shouldn't take our right to vote for granted.
>
>
> And make sure to VOTE on November 2! - Men and Women
>
>
> Love,
> Lanita
> www.lanitasloft.com
> A new cousin a day keeps the boredom away.
>
>
> ==== MO-OREGON-HISTORY Mailing List ====
> http://www.oregoncountyhistory.net/
>


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