Our History…
The League of Women Voters Through the Decades!
Founding and Early History:
From the spirit of the suffrage movement and the shock of the First World War came a great idea – that a nonpartisan civic organization could provide the education and experience the public needed to assure the success of democracy. The League of Women Voters was founded on that idea.
The 1920s:
In 1920, on a motion made earlier, the long-established National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA, formed in 1890 for women’s suffrage) and the National Council of Women Voters (NCWV, founded in 1911 by Emma Smith DeVoe and were intended to educate women voters and support suffrage) merged to create the League of Women Voters. This new organization aimed to bring together the strengths of both its predecessors, focusing on educating women voters and advocating for their rights.
The formal organization of the National League of Women Voters was born at the 1920 convention held in Chicago. It was founded on the ideas of suffrage as a nonpartisan civic organization to provide the education and experience the public needed to ensure the success of democracy. This National LWV aimed to educate women on election processes and lobby for favorable legislation on women’s issues.
The path to women’s suffrage was complicated and sometimes ugly. History books tend mostly to credit the courage and tenacity of white women. But it is time to amend the history books and tell the real story of the suffrage movement. Some fantastic women fought for the 19th Amendment. Still, we need to note that significant black suffragists like Sojourner Truth, Ida B. Wells, and Mary Church Terrell fought alongside Carrie Chapman Catt and Emma Smith Devoe to bring this movement to the success we now enjoy. These women and the sisters they recruited won the passage of the 19th Amendment; it was never given to them. Suffrage marches didn’t always capture the many African American women who fought to win the vote; it was a fight decades in the making. Through demonstrations and arrests, lobbying, and advocacy, the Amendment was ratified in 1920, but not all women were granted the vote then. Women of color, especially those in the South, did not have full voting rights. There were poll taxes and literacy tests set to deliberately keep women of color from participating until the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Denial of citizenship, property requirements, and sanctioned violence against voters barred Native Americans from the polls, and literacy tests were used to disenfranchise racial minorities as late as 1970.
By 1924, the National League was organized in 346 or 433 congressional districts, 23 state Leagues, and 15 city Leagues maintaining regular business headquarters, most with paid staff. State Leagues were the key to the League’s structure and were responsible for organizing local Leagues. A convention, held annually at first and then later biennially, of state League representatives selected a program that was national, state, and local all in one for many years. Local Leagues had no representation at the conventions, and the state League delegates chose the national officers and directors.
During the first two decades, the League concentrated on studying and passing needed legislation. The National Board furnished study materials for all national and some state items, leading to national board and staff expertise and legislative successes that overshadowed the goal of political education of the public at large.
The League also set up classes to train volunteer teachers for citizenship schools and organized institutes to study defects in our system of government. In 1928, the League sponsored the first national radio broadcast of a candidate forum. Voter service efforts remain a hallmark of the League’s services to the electorate today and laid the foundation for the League’s education program.
The 1930s:
The depression of the 1930s and the onset of World War II brought far-reaching change to the League. Membership fell from 100,000 in 1924 to 44,000 in 1934, and the League’s budget halved. Due to war-driven gas rationing, League members started meeting in small neighborhood groups to discuss issues. These issues included the threat to democracy itself and the importance of the informed individual to the success of democracy. League members worked successfully to enact the Social Security and Food & Drug Acts and the TVA. The League also launched a nationwide campaign in support of the merit system for selecting government personnel.
The 1940s:
The 1944 convention made significant changes in the basic structure of the League, proclaiming it an association of members rather than a federation of state Leagues. The 1946 convention changed the name to the League of Women Voters of the United States and considerably shortened the national program. Members joined the League of Women Voters of the United States by enrolling in local community Leagues, and the local League became the basis of organization and representation in the League. Members influence League decisions either personally or through representatives at state and national levels by electing leaders, determining how to spend money through adopting budgets, choosing programs, participating in the member agreement process, and deciding the bylaws.
During the post-World War II period, the League helped lead the effort to establish the United Nations and to ensure US participation. The League was one of the first organizations in the country officially recognized by the United Nations as a non-governmental organization (NGO0; it still maintains official observer status today and has special consultative status to the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC). The League also supported the creation of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, as well as NATO, economic aid to less developed countries, and the Marshall Plan.
The 1950s:
Delegates to the 1954 convention voted to group the League programs into Current Agenda (“Cas”) government issues chosen for sustained attention and concerted action, and Continuing Responsibilities (“CRs”) positions on governmental issues to which the League had given sustained attention and on which it could continue to act. In 1951, “The National Voter” magazine was first published. The witch hunt of the early 1950s inspired the League to undertake a two-year community education program focusing on the individual liberties guaranteed by the Constitution. In 1955, League President Percy Maxim Lee testified before Congress against Senator Joseph McCarthy’s abuse of congressional investigative powers. Dating back to a 1920s study of the Tennessee Valley Authority, the League rekindled its concern about the depletion and conservation of natural resources in the mid-1950s with a study of water resources.
The 1960s:
The 1966 convention redefined program as “those governmental issues chosen for concerted study and action.” Membership reached a high point in 1969, with almost 157,000 members. In response to the growing civil rights crisis of the 1960s, the League directed its energies toward equality of opportunity and built a solid foundation of support for equal access to education, employment, and housing. The League also added support for presidential suffrage for the residents of Washington, DC.
The 1970s:
In the early 1970s, the League addressed the issue of income assistance and began its efforts to achieve a national Equal Rights Amendment, which ultimately failed. The League also adopted a position on direct popular election of the President, on Congress, on the UN, and Campaign Finance. In 1976, the League sponsored the first televised presidential debates since 1960, resulting in receiving an Emmy award. The League’s deep interest in the environment was dramatically evident in the 1970s, and it has since built a sequence of broad national positions on water, air, waste management, land use, and energy.
The 1980s:
The League was at the forefront of the struggle to pass the Voting Rights Act Amendments of 1982 and contributed significantly to the enactment of the historic Tax Reform Act of 1986. In the arms control field, LWV pressure helped the Senate ratify the groundbreaking Intermediate Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF) in 1988.
The 1990s:
The 1998 convention amended the bylaws to provide communication vehicles other than “snail” mail. Members adopted a position on gun control in 1990 and Congress passed reauthorization of the Clean Air Act, capping a ten-year legislative campaign. The League also launched “Take Back the System,” a voter campaign to reclaim government and elections, and sponsored a Presidential primary debate in 1992. In 1993, the League adopted a position on healthcare and won passage of the National Voter Registration Act, better known as Motor Voter.
In the last years of the 1990s, the issue for emphasis was Making Democracy Work, which included increasing voter turnout, campaign finance reports, civic education, diversity of representatives, civic participation, and voting representation of the District of Columbia.
The 2000s:
At the 2000 convention, the League adopted a concurrence to add support for restoring the federal payment to the District of Columbia. The League offered the first “candidate debates” online, which were replaced by the even more effective voter education website Vote411 in 2006.
The League was instrumental in the enactment of the Help America Vote Act of 2002 and the Bipartisan Campaign Finance Reform Act of 2002. The League worked to renew the Voting Rights Act and filed several amicus briefs relating to campaign finance reform issues, racial bias in jury selection, and Title IX. Beginning in 2004, the League focused its legislative work under a “Democracy Agenda” umbrella, including redistricting civil liberties, campaign finance reform, voting rights for District of Columbia residents, election administration reform, and ethics and lobbying reform.
The 2010s:
Fast forward to 2013, when the Supreme Court rolled back voter protections in the Voting Rights Act in the Shelby County v. Holder decision, and since that time, we have seen countless attacks on the right to vote – too often targeting racial minorities, as has been the case throughout our country’s history. In the aftermath of that decision, we have seen rollbacks to early voting, unjust voter purges, and strict voter photo IS laws that make it harder for young people, women, people of color, and individuals with low incomes to register and exercise their right to vote.
While we celebrate our history and its achievements, we do so with the recognition that women’s suffrage was not perfect. Progress toward a more perfect democracy is often messy, but we cannot allow the ends to justify the means, especially if it perpetuates oppression. While the League’s programs, priorities, and procedures have changed over the years to meet changing times, a League pamphlet written in 1919 describes with remarkable accuracy its basic aims today: The organization has three purposes: to foster education in citizenship, to promote forums and public discussion of civic reforms, and to support needed legislation.
Re-written from:
- Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/League_of_Women_Voters
- The Hill: This Women’s Equality Day, Stop Romanticizing the 19th Amendment: https://www.lwv.org/newsroom/news-clips/hill-womens-equality-day-stop-romanticizing-19th-amendment
- The League of Women Voters Through the Decades https://www.lwv.org/league-women-voters-through-decades
The League of Women Voters Education Fund (LWVEF) and the Overseas Education Fund (OEF)
In the late 1940s and 1950s, the League established two 501(c)(3) educational organizations that, like the LWVUS, are nonprofit, tax-exempt organizations, but, unlike the LWVUS, also can accept contributions that are deductible for income tax purposes. In 1957, the LWVUS Board established the League of Women Voters Education Fund (LWVEF) . The LWVEF undertakes a broad array of citizen education and research efforts, which complement the membership and political action activities of the League of Women Voters of the United States.
Although a separate legal entity, the LWVEF is closely related to the LWVUS; in fact, the LWVUS Board members also constitute the LWVEF Board of Trustees. While the LWVEF provides citizen education information to a larger-than-League community, the LWVUS benefits from its research, and the budgets of each organization reflect this relationship. Thus, (1) the LWVEF conducts and funds research on national issues and undertakes educational projects in cooperation with state and local Leagues aimed at providing information and educational services to the public; (2) the LWVUS conducts and funds all action, membership and organization-related activities; and (3) administrative services used by both organizations are shared.
The unique network of local and state Leagues has a multiplier effect in bringing the Education Fund’s services to the wider public. Through workshops, conferences and the distribution of publications, Leagues disseminate LWVEF’s materials. The LWVEF also sponsored the 1976, 1980 and 1984 Presidential Debates and the 1988 and 1992 Presidential Primary Debates.
Many local and state Leagues and Inter-League Organizations (ILOs) use the services of the LWVEF to finance state and local educational projects by raising tax-deductible money. In addition, many state and some local Leagues have established their own education funds, which can accept tax-deductible contributions.
The Carrie Chapman Catt Memorial Fund (CCCMF) was set up in 1947 as a vehicle to expand the League’s work and to service requests from women in former totalitarian countries for guidance on the role of citizens under a democratic system of government and for help with civic action programs. In 1961, its name was changed to the Overseas Education Fund (OEF) and in 1986, it became OEF International.
Although established by the LWVUS, the CCCMF and its successor organizations were always independent, setting their own policies, raising their own funds and carrying out their own programs. The board, too, was always separate from the LWVUS Board, although in the early years many of the CCCMF (and later OEF) board members also served on the LWVUS Board. Until the late 1970s all LWVUS Board members were among the 40 OEF trustees that elected the OEF Board.
In its early years, the Carrie Chapman Catt Memorial Fund provided citizen education publications for use both in the United States and abroad. Of particular significance to the League was the Fund’s work with the LWVUS in developing a series of pamphlets and discussion guides for the Freedom Agenda project. These became the resource materials for League members and community groups on the League’s study of the relationship of national security to individual liberty, adopted by the 1954 convention. In the 1950s, OEF began to work with women in Latin America and later in Asia. In the 1980s, OEF International worked primarily in Asia, Africa and Latin America, although its Women, Law and Development program was global.
OEF’s efforts enabled women in more than 20 countries to work together to manage profitable enterprises, increase local food production, overcome legal inequities and organize for community development. Among development agencies OEF was a pioneer in promoting participatory organizational skills, part of its rich inheritance from the League of Women Voters. The OEF ceased operations in 1991 after spinning off several independent organizations to promote various aspects of its mission around the world.
Conclusion:
While the League’s programs, priorities and procedures have changed over the years to meet changing times, a League pamphlet written in 1919 describes with remarkable accuracy its basic aims today: The organization has three purposes to foster education in citizenship, to promote forums and public discussion of civic reforms and to support needed legislation.
“Over the years, the League has also been a training ground for women who want to serve in public office. In fact, the League’s ability to prepare women for public life may be its finest legacy to the nation.”
(Nancy Neuman, President, LWVUS, 1986-90).
There is probably no other national volunteer organization in America that inspires such a great degree of commitment from its members. As a direct result of that commitment, the League of Women Voters has evolved from what it was in 1920, a might political experiment designed to help 20 million enfranchised women carry out their new responsibilities, to what it is today: a unique, nonpartisan organization that is a recognized force in molding political leaders, shaping public policy and promoting informed citizen participation at all levels of government.
League History Reference Materials:
- “Twenty-Five Years of a Great Idea“, LWVUS, 1950.
- “Forty Years of a Great Idea“, LWVUS.
- “For the Public Record, A Documentary History of the League of Women Voters“, Barbara Stuhler, 2003.
- “In the Public Interest: The League of Women Voters 1920-1970“, Louise M. Young, 1989.
- “Papers of the League of Women Voters, 1918-1974“, Library of Congress Research Collections in Women’s Studies.
- “Impact on Issues: 2004-06: A Guide to Public Policy Positions“, LWVUS, 2005.
- “Recollections“, Percy Maxim Lee, 1984.
Compiled by Kay J. Maxwell
League of Women Voters
North Pinellas County
PO Box 7867
Clearwater, FL 33758
PO Box 7867
Clearwater, FL 33758