Veronica Chambers,
welcome to The Daily Social Distancing Show.
(laughs): Thank you.
It's nice to be socially distancing from you.
I, uh, really appreciate...
appreciate having you on the show
because you've done something that I honestly think
is one of the most crucial things ever,
and that is writing a book
that teaches people about history.
And although you've written it
predominantly for middle schoolers,
I feel everyone should read this book,
because it's about the suffrages...
you know, the suffrage movement in America.
It's about women fighting for the right to vote.
What I find interesting is that it tells a part of history
that is oftentimes overlooked.
Why did you think this book was so crucial?
Well, about a year and a half ago,
maybe a little more, we were thinking...
We knew the anniversary of the 19th Amendment was coming up,
and we kind of gathered in a room at the New York Times,
and we said, "What do we know?"
And it turned out not a lot.
And so the idea of writing the middle grade...
the middle grade book
was really from that thing that journalists do,
which is, like, explain it to me like I was a ten-year-old.
And if you can explain it to someone
like you're a ten-year-old,
you really actually have to learn a lot to distill it,
and that's what we did.
And it-it kind of shaped everything,
including all the coverage we're doing now.
I won't lie. One thing that I really found interesting
in the way you wrote about their stories
is they seem pretty badass.
You know, like, normally, when you read
about the suffrage movement, it gets...
It sometimes can be portrayed as like,
"And they asked for the right to vote,
and they asked again, and they asked again."
But you portray them as really tactical geniuses in politics.
One of the first things we did is we had a roundtable
of historians, and one of them,
Kate Lemay from the Smithsonian,
she was like, "Suffrage needs a rewrite.
"This is not a boring history.
"These are badass political strategists
who worked for 90 years to get the job done."
(laughs): And that stuck in my head,
so I really tried to let that infuse the writing in it.
I-I really fell in love with these women,
I have to tell you.
They just became, like, my heroes,
and I couldn't believe
that I didn't grow up knowing about them.
This book is about the women who fought for their right to vote.
-Yeah. -It's also the story, which is really difficult,
of how women fought for the right to vote
but not all of those women were treated equally
when the vote was-was, uh, was given to women.
Tell me a little bit more about that.
Well, you know, the suffrage movement
really has its history in abolition,
the movement to end slavery.
And then the Civil War comes, and the 15th Amendment is up.
And they decide to push for black men
to get the vote before white women,
and, quite frankly, you know,
we have a sort of cultural moment of Karens.
-The Karens of the 19th century were not having it. -(laughs)
They were just basically like,
"How dare these men who are just off plantations
get the right to vote before us."
And it really sets up a pecking order
that we see today, which is, you know,
white men, white women, black men, black women.
And there's this clash,
and it really breaks apart the movement,
and it's-it's difficult,
and it sets the tone for a lot.
But I will say that I think that what Kimberlé Crenshaw said
about black women showing up and showing out,
you see it so much in the history.
-Mm-hmm. -As early as the 1810s, 1820s,
years before Seneca Falls,
black women are giving speeches about women's rights.
And the motto "lifting as we climb"
is really about opening the door as wide as you can get it
for as many people as you can get it.
You know, Susan B. Anthony is somebody
that so many people look up to, and they go like,
"Man, if it weren't for her,
women wouldn't have the right to vote."
And this is wonderful,
but she does have a complicated history.
As-as a journalist and as a writer,
how did you try and navigate that story
of somebody who has done something amazing
but also has extremely problematic views
and tried to hold other people back?
Well, that was definitely...
You hit the nail on the head
in terms of one of the challenges.
But one of the things that I fought really strongly for...
I remember sitting in a meeting, and someone said,
"We should do a chapter called 'Susan B. Anthony is Canceled.'"
And I was like, "We are not canceling people from history.
-I'm sorry." -(laughs)
I'm like, "We're just not."
Like, it's so flip and so whatever.
I mean, the fact is
is that she dedicated her whole life to it.
You know, the movement took so long,
only one woman who signed at Seneca Falls
lived to vote in 1920.
-Wow. -That's how long this movement took.
So, I think that, you know, we just have to say
some people had problems.
and I think we can hold a more complicated view now.
Appreciate them for what they did
and know that they had problems
and hopefully teach our kids to learn from that.
-You know? -I really think this would be great for kids
to see themselves, because yes, you have white women
who are fighting for the right to vote,
but they're joined by black women
who are also fighting for the right to vote,
who, as you said, inspired much of the movement.
You also have Asian women
who are fighting for the right to vote.
You have Latinx women
who are fighting for the right to vote.
And it really does paint a more, um...
not just diverse but-but really, like, superhero picture
of this-this band of people
who fought in different ways for this right.
Do you think it's important for us to-to reframe the story
and tell it with all of the color-- excuse the pun--
that it, that it truly deserves?
I know we think about diversity as ticking boxes,
but really when you get into the story of these women of color
in suffrage, they are really futurists.
They are thinking about not just themselves,
but other generations.
16-year-old Mabel Ping-Hua Lee
led one of the largest suffrage parades in history,
knowing that the Chinese Exclusion Act meant that
she, herself, would not be able to vote in 1920.
These suffragists who were futurists
were thinking not just about themselves,
not just about the Gram, and that's what I try to teach
my daughter and her friends is, you know,
you don't have to have, like, likes to be a badass.
You just have to do the right thing
be focused and, like, listen to your heart
and try to help people, you know?
When kids are reading your book,
what would you like them to take and apply to today?
What would hope that they try and inspire themselves
to think about for tomorrow?
Because many of them will go, like, "Well, everyone can vote,
so I guess the job is done."
What would you hope that they garner from this
that they may not necessarily immediately, um,
you know, jump to?
Yeah, well, I think it's funny, 'cause you saying that.
I remember being in school and thinking,
"Oh, the civil rights is d-- movement is done.
I'm never gonna have to fight that battle again."
Um, I think the one thing I would love, um, for kids to know
is that there's never just one thing going on at one time.
And that's why it's actually hard to make a movement,
because white suffragists were like,
"We have to focus on women."
And Ida B. Wells-Barnett comes in and says,
"We have to talk about lynching."
And then, you know, Rose Schneiderman
and Margaret Hinchey come in and they say,
"We have to talk about child labor laws
and safe factory conditions for poor women."
And the fact is that's the complicated thing
about making a difference is knowing
that nothing is happening in isolation.
And really the trick of working through coalition
and building a movement is being able to hear
the voices at... around you
and gathering together to do the work of many issues.
That is the challenge of leadership.
And I hope the book gives a little bit of a glimpse
of how these amazing women did that.
I hope someone gets books like these to the White House,
because I think they're not just fantastic for kids,
but they're fantastic for adults who may read at a child's level.
So, uh, thank you so much for joining us on the show.
And, uh, congratulations on creating a wonderful,
wonderful book that everybody should, uh, know about.
Thank you so much.
It's been an honor.