In celebration of the 85th anniversary of women's right to vote, the
Library of Congress has released "Women
of Protest: Photographs from the Records of the National Woman's Party."
This presentation is a selection of 448 of the approximately 2,650
photographs in the Records of the National Woman's Party, housed in
the Manuscript Division of the Library of Congress.
Representing the militant wing of the suffrage movement, the National
Woman's Party effectively commanded the attention of politicians and
the public through its aggressive campaign of relentless lobbying, creative
publicity stunts and disarming examples of civil disobedience. It used
parades, demonstrations and picketing, as well as its members'
arrests, imprisonment and hunger strikes, to spur public discussion
and win publicity for the suffrage cause. In addition to photographic
documentation of these events, the presentation includes a gallery of
"Suffrage
Prisoners" who were arrested and held for their activities.
"Women of Protest" presents images of the party's broad range
of tactics as well as individual portraits of organization leaders and
members. The photographs range from circa 1875 to 1938, but largely
date from 1913 to 1922. They document the party's push for passage and
ratification of the 19th Amendment as well as its later campaign for
passage of the Equal Rights Amendment, which was never ratified.
