The Inevitable: an Analysis of Carrie Chapman Catt's Address to the U.S. Congress (1917)
The Inevitable: An Analysis of Carrie Chapman Catt’s Address to the United States Congress (1917)
In November 1917, Carrie Chapman Catt, leader of National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA), gave an address to the United States Congress expressing her belief that woman’s suffrage was inevitable, and requesting that Congress see it as such and vote to pass the amendment. Catt’s speech was based on facts and figures (ethos) from our own country’s history, logic, reasoning, and common sense (logos); it was hard for any man to argue with, which was her goal. Catt had given hundreds of speeches in her life, and in this case, she planned her approach to be factual and unemotional to get through to those that thought of women as being not intelligent enough and too emotional, and accomplished just that. This proved to be a pivotal and noteworthy moment in history because after that point, there became more of a majority in favor of a woman’s right to vote, which just a few short years later resulted in the passing of the 19th Amendment.
Women’s suffrage had been going on for a long time, and Carrie Chapman Catt had been involved and then leading the fight along the way. “In 1887, Carrie returned to Iowa and began her work for suffrage. She joined the Iowa branch of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union, becoming head of its suffrage section. As that local group began breaking apart, she began organizing women and creating suffrage clubs. In 1889, she was elected secretary of the Iowa Woman Suffrage Association and, the next year, was a delegate and minor speaker at the convention of the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) in Washington, D.C. (From 1869 until 1890, the women’s suffrage movement had been divided between two organizations – one headed by Lucy Stone and Henry B. Blackwell, and the other by Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton – which had differing methods of achieving their goal; they reconciled differences into
In November 1917, Carrie Chapman Catt, leader of National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA), gave an address to the United States Congress expressing her belief that woman’s suffrage was inevitable, and requesting that Congress see it as such and vote to pass the amendment. Catt’s speech was based on facts and figures (ethos) from our own country’s history, logic, reasoning, and common sense (logos); it was hard for any man to argue with, which was her goal. Catt had given hundreds of speeches in her life, and in this case, she planned her approach to be factual and unemotional to get through to those that thought of women as being not intelligent enough and too emotional, and accomplished just that. This proved to be a pivotal and noteworthy moment in history because after that point, there became more of a majority in favor of a woman’s right to vote, which just a few short years later resulted in the passing of the 19th Amendment.
Women’s suffrage had been going on for a long time, and Carrie Chapman Catt had been involved and then leading the fight along the way. “In 1887, Carrie returned to Iowa and began her work for suffrage. She joined the Iowa branch of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union, becoming head of its suffrage section. As that local group began breaking apart, she began organizing women and creating suffrage clubs. In 1889, she was elected secretary of the Iowa Woman Suffrage Association and, the next year, was a delegate and minor speaker at the convention of the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) in Washington, D.C. (From 1869 until 1890, the women’s suffrage movement had been divided between two organizations – one headed by Lucy Stone and Henry B. Blackwell, and the other by Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton – which had differing methods of achieving their goal; they reconciled differences into
References: Bassett, J. S. (1928). Makers of a New Nation: The Pageant of America: Volume 9 (Independence ed.). Yale University Press. Catt, C. C. (1917, November). Address to the United States Congress. Washington D.C.