The Washington herald., 1914-01-17
WHO'S WHO AMONG
PROMINENT WOMEN
Alice Paul. Militant Su&rasist. Is
Young Quaker Woman of
Mildest Manners.
~ MARY d. MULLETT.
Copyright. lNl.)

Copyright. rn4)
Miss Alice Paul is one OF the very few
American women who have served 9
term in England's famous Holloway jail
and who knows from experience what II
means to hunger strike" and to b.
forcibly fed. Although she sympathize:
with English militancy-for Engiand-shs
is slender. delicate, soft of voice. Ir
fact she is about the miIdest hammered
militant you could possibly imagine.
II 1t was in that gentle voice, with
which she talked to me, that she cried
banquet in the great Guildhall OF Lon
don Chat being the heinous crime for
which she was sent TO Jail the first time).
it's q wonder anybody knew she had
made the remark at all.
II seems, however. that she was heard
and as a consequence she was sent to
prison for a month at hard labor. Most
Of the time she remained there the hard
labor fell to the share OF the prison doc
tors. For, as Miss Paul declined to eat
and as forcible feeding was then prac-
ticed in such cases. there was a session
Of 1t twice a day which was not at all
pleasant for anybody concerned. Miss
Paul, indeed. did not recover from her
part of it for several years.
Strangely enough, this militant young
person-she isn't out of her twenties yet
is Of good old Quaker stock. She was
degree OF A. b. at Swarthmore, that
highly respectable Quaker college. She
added an A. NJ, and even a PHI. d. at
the University Of Pennsylvania She is
a graduate of the School OF Philanthropy
Of the Russell Sage Foundation, and she
has taken special courses at the univer-
sities of Birmingham and London. So II
Is fairly safe to assert that. IL Miss Paul
ever gets the franchise. she cannot be
accused of swelling the ranks OF the
ignorant voters
In Warrington Past Year.
For the past year she has been in
Washington. ID. c., as the chairman of
the congressional committee OF the Ma
tional Suffrage Association, and in that
period she has somehow managed to make
a bigger dent in the armor of legislative
indifference than it had received in all
the preceding years of suffrage endeavor.
For almost fifty years the national as
sociation has had a Congressional COM
mittee which has more or less regularly
waited upon the Senators and Repre-
sentatives without, however. getting
much action out OF those gentlemen.
Since Miss Paul took hold OF the mat
ter, real things have happened.
In the first place. hundreds OF meet
ings-indoor. outdoor, parlor. hall and
every other kind-have been held in the
Capital City. suffrage parade took
place here last March. on the day pre-
ceding the Presidential Inauguration,
h;oh he -k IN Aio-
cussion. Early in April, 500 women from
all over the country marched to the
Capital, carrying letters from their Con-
gressional districts requesting a favor
able vote on woman suffrage. And fin
ally, as the elimination of these Incl
dents, the Woman Suffrage Committee
of the United States Senate voted on
May IA to report favorably a resolution
to amend the Constitution so that wom-
en- should have the right of suffrage.
Any one who expects to find a ranting.
masculine type OF woman in Alice Paul
will have a shock Of surprise; for she is
not only delicate in physique but is very
quiet and reserved In her bearing. She
has large brown eyes and soft fair hair.
In fact, the sole Indication that she has
gone through, her English experience
(she was arrested three times) Is the
pin which only those women who have
been imprisoned FOR the cause" may
wear. 1t is of silver in the form Of a
barred prison gate, and across 1t is the
broad arrowhead which Is the distinc-
tive decoration of convict garb in Eng
land.
Her Second Arrest.
Miss Pauls second arrest was when, In
company with Miss Burns, she was on
her way to a public meeting in London.
A block away from the building the po-
lice tried to stop them, and when they
resisted arrested them. The third time
was in Glasgow, where Miss Paul and
another American girl were arrested for
to go to a meeting to be ad-
dressed by Lord Crewe.
This" explains Miss Paul. was after
an order had been issued excluding
women from public meetings. We felt
that SO unjust an order should be pro-
tested against As for our interrupting
public meetings to ask candidates what
would be their attitude on the suffrage
question. that is a common thing In Eng
land. Men constantly do 1t for them
selves and are always courteously an
swered. The women of England should
have just as much right to ask a question
Of great importance to them and to the
but when they do they are
thrown into Jail They have been SEN
fenced to long terms Of imprisonment
merely for trying to present their resolu-
lions and petitions to cabinet ministers
and members of Parliament In this
there In no such state of affairs,
md therefore Americans do not under |