HISTORY 211 STORYBOARD TEMPLATE
On Election Day, November 2,
1920, the Boston Daily Globe
observed that “wherever one
went, it was impossible not to
notice the predominance of
women voters” in the morning.
This election was the first
since the ratification of
Nineteenth Amendment to the
Constitution the previous
August, which enfranchised all
women who were United
States citizens over the age of
21.
Various groups of women had
fought for their right to vote
throughout the nineteenth and early
twentieth centuries.
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http://www.handcountedpaperbal
lots.org/documents/voting_rights.
html
Text: (“Women by Thousands
Pour Into Polling Places in the
Bay State.” Boston Daily Globe. 3
November, 1920, 20.)
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http://www.youngwomenmisbe
havin.com/category/feminism/
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http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/pro
jects/ftrials/anthony/votesposter.jpg.
Text:
Text:
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The women’s suffrage
movement began prior to the
Civil War and grew after the
Fifteenth Amendment to the
Constitution was ratified in 1870.
In addition to enfranchising
African American men, it
established a clear gender
barrier for voting rights.
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http://www.bet.com/news/decisio
n08/newsflipbookblacksrighttovot
e.htm?i=7.
Text:
In the late nineteenth and early
twentieth centuries, a handful
of states began to enfranchise
women. By 1919, 29 states
including New York permitted
women to vote.
This combined with the increasing
efforts of women suffrage activists
and the loyalty of women to the war
effort during World War One
prompted the ratification of the
nineteenth amendment.
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m/_c5KlMWdcl1Q/TGvoAi7_H
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p=18&ved=1t:429,r:6,s:0&tx=1
28&ty=28
Text: Amar, Akhil Reed. “How
Women Won the Vote.” The
Wilson Quarterly 29, no. 3
(2005); 30-34.
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http://www.woodrowwilsonhouse.or
g/imageview.asp?id=35.
Text: Amar, Akhil Reed. “How
Women Won the Vote.” The Wilson
Quarterly 29, no. 3 (2005); 30-34.
-2-
HISTORY 211 STORYBOARD TEMPLATE
In 1920, the Republicans
nominated Ohio Senator
Warren G. Harding and
Massachusetts Governor Calvin
Coolidge for President and Vice
President.
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alvin-coolidge/photo4.
Text: (Provide brief citation or
citations)
The Democrats, in turn,
nominated Ohio Governor James
Cox and former Assistant
Secretary of the Navy Franklin
Roosevelt.
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phemera/political/PoliticalCampaign-Cox-Roosevelt-PinJugate-1920--D9729663.htm
Text: I
The election was, in many ways, a
referendum on the policies of
outgoing Democratic President
Woodrow Wilson, namely his
staunch support for America’s
entry into the League of Nations.
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http://www.history.com/photos/wo
odrow-wilson/photo9
Text: (Binning, William, and
Larry Esterly and Paul Sracic.
Encyclopedia of American
Parties, Campaigns and
Elections. Westport, CT:
Greenwood Press, 1999, 66)
-3-
In addition, the campaign was
largely focused on the
prohibition of alcohol, which
was enacted the previous year.
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http://moretimespace.wordpress
.com/2008/10/28/no-carsbooze-or-bangsticks/
Text: (Kyvig, David. Repealing
National Prohibition. Chicago:
University of Chicago Press,
1979, 29)
Unlike Cox, Harding strongly
supported the enforcement of
prohibition. This stance likely
resonated with a significant
portion of the new female
electorate, as many women were
supporters of the temperance
movement.
Image: Public domain,
http://persiflagethis.blogspot.com/
2009/07/our-feminized-americanculture-part-1.html.
Text: (Murdock, Catherine
Gilbert. Domesticating Drink:
Women, Men, and Alcohol in
America, 1870-1940. Baltimore:
The Johns Hopkins University
Press, 1998, 169.)
On Election Day, Boston area
women flocked to the polls to cast
their first ever ballots.
Image: Public domain,
http://www.loc.gov/pictures/resour
ce/cph.3b23344/.
Text: (“Women by Thousands
Pour Into Polling Places in the
Bay State.” Boston Daily Globe. 3
November, 1920, 20.)
-4-
HISTORY 211 STORYBOARD TEMPLATE
The Boston Daily Globe reported
that when the polls opened in the
morning, “women old and young
married and single, most of them
under no compulsion to vote at
that daylight hour, had come
foreword with pride and
eagerness to be among the first”
to vote.
In Westfield, MA, the first
person to vote was Mrs. Lura
P. Hunt, a Harding supporter
who arrived at the polls fortyfive minutes before they
opened at 6 a.m.
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http://www.mnhs.org/school/ted_
suffrage.htm
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http://americanhistory.si.edu/v
ote/votingmachine.html.
Text: (“Women by Thousands
Pour Into Polling Places in the
Bay State.” Boston Daily Globe. 3
November, 1920, 20.)
Text: (“Women by Thousands
Pour Into Polling Places in the
Bay State.” Boston Daily
Globe. 3 November, 1920, 20.)
That morning, 102 year old Annie
Stone, born over half a century
before the ratification of the
Fifteenth Amendment, cast her vote
for Harding in Roxbury, MA wearing
a bonnet she made herself.
Republican State Committee Chair
Frank B. Smith accompanied her
and mailed a photograph of her
voting to Harding.
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onstitution/docs/constitutional_ame
nd.html.
Text: (“Casts First Vote at 102.”
The New York Times. 3 November,
1920, 22.)
-5-
Since they were voting for the
first time, many women had
difficulty comprehending the
process of casting a ballot.
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http://www.womeninworldhistory.
com/TWR-13.html.
A number of women voters
failed to understand the
concept of the secret ballot
and asked if they needed to
sign their ballots in order for
them to count.
Image: Public domain,
http://csudigitalhumanities.org/
exhibits/items/show/4044.
Text: (“Women by Thousands
Pour Into Polling Places in the
Bay State.” Boston Daily Globe. 3
November, 1920, 20.)
Text: (“Women by Thousands
Pour Into Polling Places in the
Bay State.” Boston Daily
Globe. 3 November, 1920, 20.)
Many women at Boston area
polling places refused to
discuss who they were voting
for, prompting one male
observer to remark that “they
are as mum as clams.”
The level of enthusiasm
among women voters
witnessed in Boston was also
seen in New York City,
despite the fact that New York
granted women the right to
vote three years earlier.
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http://www.amrook.com/.
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http://webs.rps205.com/depart
ments/TAH/lessonplans.html.
One woman asked the warden
“Which one is a good candidate to
vote for?” To which he replied “I
can’t answer that, madam.”
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http://tpsnva.sonjara.com/teaching_
materials/learning_experience/all.ph
p?experiences_key=6724.
Text: (“Women by Thousands Pour
Into Polling Places in the Bay State.”
Boston Daily Globe. 3 November,
1920, 20.)
Many women in the city were
seen voting on their way to
and from the grocery store in
the morning.
Copyright,
http://library.thinkquest.org/C007
481/1920.htm.
-6-
(“Women by Thousands Pour
Into Polling Places in the Bay
State.” Boston Daily Globe. 3
November, 1920, 20.)
(“Thousands Carry Lunches to
the Polls.” New York Times. 3
November, 1920, 11.)
The high turnout among new
women voters significantly
contributed to Harding’s
landslide victory, in which he
enjoyed the largest margin of
victory since Theodore
Roosevelt in 1904.
The Republican ticket won
the popular vote 60% to
34% and carried every state
outside of the south. In
addition, the Republicans
won control of both houses
of Congress, which were
previously held by the
Democrats.
Public domain,
Copyright,
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?
VISuperSize&item=270625988996.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:
ElectoralCollege1920.svg.
(“Cox and League Buried Under
Huge Majority.” Chicago Daily
Tribune. 3 November, 1920, 1.)
(Geer, John G. Polling and Public
Opinion Around the World. Santa
Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, Inc.,
2004, 100).
(“Thousands Carry Lunches to
the Polls.” New York Times. 3
November, 1920, 11.)
The conclusion that newly
enfranchised women voters
were partially responsible for
the Republican landslide is
supported by research
conducted by statisticians
Malcolm Willey and Stuart
Rice. They found that in
Illinois, where men and
women’s votes were counted
separately, Republicans had a
larger edge among women.
Public domain,
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_7wokH
OQuGmc/TG815dbhOHI/AAAAA
AAAAG4/k4ZOCVxf78o/s1600/
Women+in+the+1920s++Flat+Rock+Org.jpg.
(“Rice, Stuart, and Willey,
Malcolm. “A Sex Cleavage in the
Presidential Election of 1920.”
Journal of the American
Statistical Association 19, no.
148, (1924): 519-520.)
-7-
Rice and Willey concluded
that women voters, especially
in the north, tended to be
morally conservative and
supported Harding because of
his firm stance on prohibition.
Public domain,
http://www.academicamerican.com/t
wentiesdepww2/t
Twenties/twenties2010.html.
In the first election since they
gained the right to vote in
many states, enthusiastic
women voters made a clear
mark on the Election of 1920.
Public domain,
http://www.amrook.com/.
(“Rice, Stuart, and Willey,
Malcolm. “A Sex Cleavage in the
Presidential Election of 1920.”
Journal of the American
Statistical Association 19, no.
148, (1924): 519-520.)
-8-