LEARNING GUIDE TO:
IRON JAWED ANGELS
SUBJECTS — U.S. History; Politics;
SOCIAL-EMOTIONAL LEARNING — Human Rights; Courage; Leadership;
MORAL-ETHICAL EMPHASIS — Respect; Fairness; Citizenship.
Age: 13+; MPAA Rating PG-13 rating for some intense scenes of women being assaulted by crowds and tortured in
prison); 2004; 123 minutes; Color.
Description:
Frustrated by the failure of the United States to adopt a constitutional amendment giving women the
vote, militant suffragists led by Alice Paul mount an aggressive campaign demanding suffrage. They used parades and
demonstrations with striking visual messages, campaigned against the Democratic party, which would not endorse the
Amendment, and engaged in sustained picketing of the White House. The demonstrations were entirely peaceful and
the banners often used the words of Woodrow Wilson, who was president at the time, to argue the justice of their
cause. After the U.S. entered the First World War in 1917, many people expected all citizens to join together to support
the war effort. The militant suffragists refused, noting that they had not been permitted to participate in making the
decision on whether or not to go to war. They also pointed to the hypocrisy of a nation that was fighting a war to
"make the world safe for democracy" but which refused to allow the vast majority of its female citizens to vote.
The response was violent. Angry crowds assaulted the protesters and the police did little or nothing to protect them.
Instead, the suffragists were arrested on false charges of blocking the sidewalk, convicted without due process of law,
and sent to jail. In jail, they were confined in poor conditions and given rancid, wormy food. Their claim to be treated
as political prisoners was rejected. Other inmates were incited by the guards to attack them. When some of the women
protested their mistreatment, they were placed in solitary confinement. When the women went on hunger strikes in
response, they were brutally force-fed. The government tried to have their leader, Alice Paul, declared insane so that
she could be committed indefinitely, but its chief psychiatrist, after interviews with Miss Paul, decided that she was of
sound mind. Word of the women's mistreatment got out and was publicized by the militants and their supporters. The
public outcry was immense.
The suffragists were applying all of the principles of nonviolent mass action: meeting violence with peacefulness;
generating massive publicity; applying political or economic pressure; and making arguments that worked on the
conscience of the general public and of their adversaries. The militants' campaign kept the suffrage issue in the
forefront of the national consciousness and was a factor in leading President Wilson to change his position and work
actively for passage of the 19th Amendment.
Benefits of the Movie:
This movie can be used to vividly impress upon students the following important historical
lessons not taught in textbooks:
(1) when the militant wing of the suffrage movement, led by Alice Paul, used nonviolent protests to demand
the vote, they were assaulted by crowds of men and denied police protection;
(2) the government tried to suppress the militants' nonviolent protests with false arrests, unfair trials,
imprisonment in harsh conditions, and what can best be described as torture;
(3) the militant suffragists withstood the violence, imprisonment and torture, continuing their protests and
refusing to back down, while strictly adhering to nonviolence;
(4) the arguments of the militant suffragists and the public's outrage at the way they were treated, as well as
respect for the strength of the suffragists' commitment, were factors in the passage of the 19th Amendment,
although the efforts of the National American Women's Suffrage Association (NAWSA) and its leader, Mrs.
Carrie Chapman Catt, were probably more important factors in passing the amendment; and
(5) Alice Paul and the NWP independently developed tactics of nonviolent protest which were strikingly similar
to the methods of promoting political and social change being developed at about the same time by Mahatma
Gandhi.
The film will inspire students to study the movement for women's equality, one of the five great advances in human
rights in the U.S. since the beginning of the 20th century. The others were the grant of equal treatment for black
Americans and other minorities, the procedural protections given to persons accused of crimes (achieved primarily
through court decisions), granting access and other rights to the disabled (achieved through legislation) and the grant
of equal rights to homosexuals, including the right to raise children and to marry. While all these advances are works in
process, the last has been only partially realized and is still controversial today.
Helpful Background:
HISTORICAL ACCURACY
Summary: The events portrayed in the film relating to the protests and the efforts of the U.S. government to
suppress those protests are extremely accurate. The portrayal of Mrs. Carrie Chapman Catt and the impression that
Alice Paul and the National Women's Party alone were the driving force behind the suffragist victory are inaccurate.
The romantic interlude is imagined.
Notes on Historical Inaccuracies and Poetic License
Some historians agree that the militants and their White House pickets played an important role in leading President
Wilson to endorse a constitutional amendment giving women the vote. This was also the appraisal of some
contemporary observers. For historians, see Adams and Keane and Lunardini. For observations of contemporaries, see
Stevens, and in particular the passage citing a telegram from Walter Clark, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of North
Carolina, p. 18. For the opinions of two women who were active in the suffrage movement but not in Miss Paul's
National Women's Party, see Gluck, Interview of Jessie Haver Butler, p. 105 and Laura Ellsworth Seiler. p. 228.
However, it is generally agreed that the militant suffragists were just one of several factors leading to the President's
change of position and to the passage of the amendment. Mrs. Carrie Chapman Catt's "Winning Plan," NAWSA's
network of state suffrage organizations, NAWSA's state by state strategy which increased the numbers of pro-suffrage
representatives in Congress, NAWSA's cooperation with President Wilson in supporting the war effort and criticizing the
militant suffragists, and the political debt that President Wilson came to owe NAWSA, were probably more important
than the efforts of Alice Paul and the NWP.
Discussion Questions:
Questions Relating to Suffrage
1. Why did American society resist women's suffrage so strongly for so many decades?
2. Were the militant suffragists led by Alice Paul traitors to their country by continuing their protests after the nation
went to war? Should they have rallied to the country's defense and put their efforts at suffrage on hold during the war
emergency?
3. Alice Paul is given a lot of credit for organizing a nonviolent campaign to change American politics and society.
However, it could be argued that she had no choice. Miss Paul would have lost the support of American women if she
had asked them to turn violent in support of suffrage. Does this argument take anything away from the importance of
Miss Paul's commitment to nonviolence? Explain your reasons.
4.
What was the importance of nonviolence in the NWP's campaign for a federal suffrage amendment?
5.
Where did Alice Paul find the philosophical inspiration for her nonviolent philosophy?
6. Where does the phrase, "Take the beam out of your own eye" that was used in the "Kaiser Wilson" poster come
from? What did the poster mean by telling President Wilson to "Take the beam out of your own eye"?
7. People call politicians names all the time and politicians and their supporters just take it in stride. Why did equating
President Wilson to the German Kaiser in the "Kaiser Wilson" poster enrage the President and the crowds that
assaulted the suffragists?
8. Are there any existing social injustices that some people believe merit protests, such as picketing, demonstrating
and boycotting merchants?
9. A political prisoner is someone who is incarcerated not for criminal activity, but because of his or her political
beliefs or activities. The concept was developed in Europe in the 1800s to protect opponents of despotic regimes in
Europe. Political prisoners, being different from common criminals, were supposed to be housed in better conditions
than existed in most jails. The Wilson administration carefully considered giving the suffragists political prisoner status
but ultimately decided that to do so would cause a revolution in American law. Why can't American law tolerate the
concept of political prisoners?
10. Assume that you and people of your sex, nationality, or economic status were not permitted to vote. Would you
be willing to go to jail and suffer harsh conditions like those encountered by the suffragists in order to gain the right to
vote?
11. The mistreatment of Alice Paul and her suffragists is not the only time that violence has marred the history of the
U.S. The dual tragedies of lynchings and race riots attests to this. Further evidence is the violence perpetrated on
people trying to change society, such as activists in the Civil Rights Movement, see e.g., "Ghosts of Mississippi", and
workers trying to organize labor unions, see e.g., "Matewan." Farmers displaced by the dust bowl of the 1930s who
moved by the thousands to California looking for work were assaulted and beaten in communities that felt threatened
by their presence. "The Grapes of Wrath" tells this story. Race riots and police brutality still occur. Do you think
current-day America is as violent a country as it once was?
SPECIAL THEORETICAL QUESTIONS FOR HONORS AND AP CLASSES
12.
Six Questions on Natural Rights and Tyranny in America
(A) Was the United States, before passage of the 19th Amendment, a tyranny with respect to women?
Describe the reasons for your answer
(B) Under the theory of natural rights, could a legislature elected by men and women, in which women
received fair representation, pass a law prohibiting women from voting in the future despite the fact that some
women wanted to retain the power to vote?
(C) Assume that the Silent Sentinels had been protesting against something that was very important but
which did not involve the deprivation of a natural right; let's assume they objected to the construction of a
factory that would spew toxic fumes on the surrounding neighborhood and that a high school was located
across the street from where the factory was going to be built. Assume that the protesters were treated by the
government in the same way that the Silent Sentinels of 1917 were treated: they were arrested, convicted on
false charges, sent to prison, and mistreated in prison. Were the actions of the government in this instance
tyrannical and, if so, why?
(D) Assume that the Silent Sentinels had resorted to violence and had set fire to a building to publicize their
position. The protesters were arrested and prosecuted for arson as part of a government effort to suppress the
women's suffrage campaign. Assume further that suffragists' due process rights were respected in the
investigation. Were the actions of the government in this instance tyrannical and, if so, why?
(E) Describe three situations in American history in which local, state, or federal governments acted in a
tyrannical manner. These examples can be from colonial times to the present day. Then describe why the
actions involved "oppressive power asserted by government."
Social-Emotional Learning Discussion Questions:
1.
Describe some acts of courage that are shown in this film.
2.
What is the basic reason that women deserve the right to vote?
3.
Why were the white suffragists hesitant to march with the black suffragists? Was this fair?
Assignments, Projects and Activities: Choose one
1. Create your own issue of The Suffragist in honor of the upcoming 100 year anniversary of the 19th Amendment
(which will be in 2020); illustrate the cover with a political cartoon; write letters to the editor; and create articles about
women's history since 1920. [This is an excellent assignment for small groups of students.]
2.
Write a letter from Alice Paul to the future citizens of America.