Difference between revisions of "328 2010--Week 5 Questions/Comments"

==Maud Wood Park, "Front Door Lobbying" for Suffrage, 1917==

==Maud Wood Park, "Front Door Lobbying" for Suffrage, 1917==

I found this section to be extremely interesting because it illustrates how organized suffrage lobbyists were. Maud Wood Park's directions for lobbyists were structured, extensive, and specific. Among the instructions for interviewing, Park states it is most important to "take every possible means to prevent a member from committing himself definitely against the federal Amendment" (MAW, 109). She also made a list of "don'ts" that included, "don't threaten...don't nag...[and] don't do anything to close the door to the next advocate of suffrage" (MAW, 109). What I found most interesting in the article was the examples of actual reports taken by the lobbyists. In one report where a Texas man declared that men represent woman and there was no need for women to vote, the lobbyist wrote in her report "When I suggested my being a widow and not having representation, he gallantly offered to represent me" (MAW, 110). This report made me laugh because it seems like this man from Texas was pretty conceited. It also represented the viewpoint of a large majority of men who felt it was their responsibility to vote and not woman's. - David Fitch

I found this section to be extremely interesting because it illustrates how organized suffrage lobbyists were. Maud Wood Park's directions for lobbyists were structured, extensive, and specific. Among the instructions for interviewing, Park states it is most important to "take every possible means to prevent a member from committing himself definitely against the federal Amendment" (MAW, 109). She also made a list of "don'ts" that included, "don't threaten...don't nag...[and] don't do anything to close the door to the next advocate of suffrage" (MAW, 109). What I found most interesting in the article was the examples of actual reports taken by the lobbyists. In one report where a Texas man declared that men represent woman and there was no need for women to vote, the lobbyist wrote in her report "When I suggested my being a widow and not having representation, he gallantly offered to represent me" (MAW, 110). This report made me laugh because it seems like this man from Texas was pretty conceited. It also represented the viewpoint of a large majority of men who felt it was their responsibility to vote and not woman's. - David Fitch