Woman Suffrage Law, The.
Narrow 12mo, 15.5 X 7.5 cm. 24 pp., including printed wrappers. In fine condition.
A landmark in the women's suffrage movement, granting women in Illinois the right to vote for presidential electors and for local officials not specifically named in the Illinois Constitution. Though they could not vote for state representatives, congressmen, or governors, and were required to use separate ballots and ballot boxes, Illinois by virtue of this law became the first state east of the Mississippi to grant women the right to vote for president.
The author and longtime sponsor of the law was Catharine Gouger Waugh McCulloch (1862-1945), lawyer and suffragette. In 1885 McCulloch graduated Union College of Law in Chicago (later Northwestern University Law School). In 1890 she joined her husband's law firm and became involved with the Illinois Equal Suffrage Association, at which time she drafted the bill that became law in 1913. McCulloch also served as legal advisor to the National American Woman Suffrage Association. In 1901 and again in 1905 she authored successful bills to protect the legal rights of married women. As master of chancery in the Cook County Superior Court she promoted equality under law for women. She also served as president of the Woman's Bar Association of Illinois, and was a founding member of the League of Women Voters.
This is not merely a printing of the statute, but rather the author's commentary, full of pointed remarks and aggressive interpretation, on the law that she crafted:
"The particular suffrage law passed in 1913 may seem ... a peculiar conglomeration ... There was ... one rule that guided the author ... and that was to put in everything she could find which was not named in the constitution, whether the officers were important or not. The bill was loaded down with all it could carry, and it is a great mercy that none of the load spilled over in transit, nor was dumped overboard, like Jonah, to save the rest." (p.5).
Much of the pamphlet is devoted to familiarizing women with functions performed by presidential electors and various local officials; with the importance of propositions: ”The greatest of all powers granted by the suffrage bill is the vote granted women on all propositions;" the short ballot, which should not be approved by a suffragist until she is fully enfranchised; registration; primaries, &c., &c.
OCLC lists no physical copy, only microform. cf. Notable American Women.
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