Equal Suffrage League of Virginia

Adele Goodman Clark served as the secretary for one year and headed the group's lobbying efforts in the Virginia General Assembly.

The majority of its members were socially prominent caucasian women who used their political connections and wealth to facilitate the spread of their ideas.

[6] On January 21, 1910, the league hosted their first major public event, a guest lecture by Dr. Anna Howard Shaw, president of the National American Woman Suffrage Association.

Anti-suffragists argued that extending the vote to women would threaten white hegemony by giving more African Americans the right to vote while supporters of woman suffrage countered, not by condemning white supremacy, but by arguing that woman suffrage would not have a significant racial impact at the polls.

Where the NAWSA had moved on to lobbying and direct political activism, the Virginia movement had to focus on education and awareness.

In Richmond, a group of businessmen were encouraged to join the effort and founded the Men’s Equal Suffrage League of Virginia.