NARRATOR: It had been four decades
since the woman suffrage measure
first had been brought to the New York legislature––
and the one and only popular referendum
ever held in the state,
in 1915,
had been bitterly defeated.
But Carrie Chapman Catt had been working twelve- to fourteen-hour days all year,
with her "Winning Plan" always in her sights.
KEYSSAR: Carrie Chapman Catt was looking at 36 states.
We need ratification by 36 states.
She was focused on lobbying members of Congress.
She was meeting with Woodrow Wilson
to try to win him over.
BEHN: Catt puts a lot of stock in Wilson's support
and she cultivates that relationship with him.
Over the course of 1917, Catt and Wilson exchange 30 letters.
Almost every other week
they're writing back and forth to one another.
She's counting on him to weigh in
with governors and legislators in key states.
NARRRATOR: Though the president remained staunch in his opposition to a federal amendment,
he'd obligingly thrown his weight behind Catt's state campaigns.
Thanks to his influence––
and the tireless efforts of thousands of unsung heroines on the ground––
five states recently had followed the Illinois example
and extended either presidential suffrage or primary suffrage to women,
dramatically enhancing their political clout.
A victory in New York,
the most populous state in the country,
would add as many as 45 pro-suffrage votes in Congress––
and the National Association had pulled out all the stops to secure them.
For months on end,
suffragists had tramped over the nearly 50,000 square miles of the state,
collecting signatures door-to-door.
An enormous campaign coalition had been built,
comprised not only of working-class and immigrant women,
but also, crucially, African-American women,
many of whom had been actively working for the ballot for years––
through black women's clubs, equal suffrage leagues, the NAACP–
and who were able to tap a population of male voters too sizable to ignore.
JONES: When we focus on the national story
we see the near impossibility of black and white women
working in tight and equal coalition with one another.
But in a place like New York City,
things are possible that are not possible on a national scale.
And when African-American women see an opening,
they are prepared to mobilize their clubs
into real political power.
NARRATOR: Most promising to Catt
was the continued return on her investment with President Wilson,
who publicly expressed his hope
"that the people of New York
will realize the great occasion that faces them on Election Day
and respond to it in a noble fashion."
Tammany Hall,
the powerful Democratic machine that dominated New York City politics,
was quick to follow Wilson's lead and,
on the eve of the election,
reversed its longtime opposition to woman suffrage.
KEYSSAR: If you’re a politician,
you don’t want to stake out a strong position on a losing side
where you’re in opposition to people
who might become enfranchised anyway,
especially a lot of people—
like half the population.
So that what happens at that point
when they’re looking at the end game, they say,
"let’s get on the bandwagon."
NARRATOR: On election night,
as newsboys roamed the streets below hawking late editions,
Carrie Chapman Catt stood in a window of the National Association's headquarters on Fifth Avenue
and watched as the building that housed the anti-suffrage Times
flashed its rooftop spotlight––
a signal that the women of New York
at last had won the right to vote.
At a victory celebration the next day,
before an auditorium packed to the rafters,
Catt opened her remarks with the words "fellow citizens."
What came next was drowned out by cheers.
But Catt had no time for jubilation.
She'd already turned her mind to what lay ahead:
"The victory is not New York's alone," she declared.
"It's the nation's.
The 65th Congress will now pass the federal amendment."
DUBOIS: Catt called the New York victory the Gettysburg of suffrage.
Meaning it was the battle that turned the tide.
But it wasn’t the battle that ended the war.