Women's Suffragist-A Non-Violent Protest

Women's Suffrage- Non-Violent Protest

During the time when Woodrow Wilson was President there were many events that took place that change the world. Including, World War I and also the Woman Suffrage movement.

Alice Paul and Lucy Burns are some of the young Suffragist activists of who played a major role in changing history. Paul and Burns were very rebellious women who wanted a constitutional amendment for women to have the right to vote. Both of these women would go through great lengths until this amendment was passed. The NAWSA (National American Woman Suffrage Association) wanted Alice Paul to run their committee in Washington D.C. but they were advised to raise their own money. Their first event was a parade to promote woman suffrage. The parade led to a riot and the suffragists got exactly what they wanted; exposure. They were on the front page of the newspaper letting people know what they are about. After this event Alice Paul meets a political cartoonist named Ben Weissman. This, leads to Burns and Paul leaving NAWSA to form their own organization called the National Woman's Party (NWP). The NWP opposes any candidate against the proposed constitutional amendment.

The NWP decided to protest and picket the White House in 1917. During these pickets the women were arrested for their actions and were imprisoned on charges of obstructing traffic, they were sentenced to prison for up to six months. Paul and Burns did not like this idea so they started to go on a hunger strike. The women of NWP used this hunger strike to secure public sympathy and move the government to act on woman suffrage. Paul was placed in a psychopathic ward and was forced-fed. Paul did not want other members of NWP to go on a hunger strike but she only wanted to take sacrifice on herself.

On November 14, thirty-three NWP women suffered Raymond Whittaker's infamous "night of terror". The terror began immediately when two soldiers attacked picketers. Burns was singled out for especially rough treatment during her time at Occoquan Workhouse. When she resisted being taken away, she was beaten and then eventually had her wrists handcuffed high on her cell door. Nobody treated Burns for her injuries or anyone else's injuries; they were not even allowed to use the toilet. Feeding was done with tubing, forced down the mouth or nostrils, and the suffragists faced it but with dread. Rose Winslow experienced forcible feeding during her imprisonment, she smuggled out notes saying:

"I had a nervous time of it, gasping a long time after ward, and my stomach rejecting during the process...the poor soul who fed me got liberally besprinkled during the process. I heard myself making the most hideous sounds...one feels so forsaken when one lies prone and people shove a pipe down one's stomach...yesterday was a bad day for me in feeding. I was vomiting continually during the process. The tube had developed an irritation somewhere that is painful...the same doctor feds both Alice