Alice Paul, Inez Milholland, Mrs. Belmont, Dudley Field Malone, and all the prisoners. Imperative resolutions calling upon President Wilson and his Administration to act, were unanimously passed amid an uproar.

Chapter 15

Political Results

Immediately following the release of the prisoners and the magnificent demonstration of public support of them, culminating at the mass meeting recorded in the preceding chapter, political events happened thick and fast. Committees in Congress acted on the amendment. President Wilson surrendered and a date for the vote was set.

The Judiciary Committee of the House voted 18 to 2 to report the amendment to that body. The measure, it will be remembered, was reported to the Senate in the closing days of the previous session, and was therefore already before the Senate awaiting action.[1]

To be sure, the Judiciary Committee voted to report the amendment without recommendation. But soon after, the members of the - Suffrage Committee, provision for which had also been made during the war session, were appointed. All but four members of this committee were in favor of national suffrage, and immediately after its formation it met to organize and decided to take the suffrage measure out of the hands of the Judiciary Committee and to press for a vote.

A test of strength came on December 18th.

On a trivial motion to refer all suffrage bills to the new suffrage committee, the vote stood 204 to 10'7. This vote, although unimportant in itself, clearly promised victory for the amendment in the House. In a few days, Representative Mon-

[1]See Chapter 8. dell of Wyoming, Republican, declared that the Republican side of the House would give more than a two-thirds majority of its members to the amendment.

"It is up to our friends on the Democratic side to see that the amendment is not defeated through hostility or indifference on their side," said Mr. Mondell.

Our daily poll of the House showed constant gains. Pledges from both Democratic and Republican members came thick and fast; cabinet members for the first time publicly declared their belief in the amendment. A final poll, however, showed that we lacked a few votes of the necessary two-thirds majority to pass the measure in the House.

No stone was left unturned in a final effort to get the President to secure additional Democratic votes to insure the passage of the amendment. Finally, on the eve of the vote President Wilson made his first declaration of support of the amendment through a committee of Democratic Congressmen. During the vote the following day Representative Cantrill of Kentucky, Democrat, reported the event to the House. He said in part: