Women's suffrage in Arizona
After women's suffrage was narrowly voted down at the 1891 Arizona Constitutional Convention, prominent suffragettes such as Josephine Brawley Hughes and Laura M. Johns formed the Arizona Suffrage Association and began touring the state campaigning for women's right to vote.
Momentum built throughout the decade, and after a strenuous campaign in 1903, a woman's suffrage bill passed both houses of the legislature but was ultimately vetoed by Governor Alexander Oswald Brodie.
She and others succeeded in obtaining the requisite number of signatures, and after a strong campaign, the initiative passed in a landslide vote on November 5, 1912.
In 1883, Murate Masterson from Prescott introduced a bill to allow women to vote in school board elections.
[2] Josephine Brawley Hughes and Frances Willard toured Arizona to recruit members to the new chapter.
[4][3] In 1891, Henry B. Blackwell and Lucy Stone asked Laura M. Johns, a suffragist from Kansas, to attend the Constitutional Convention for the Territory of Arizona.
[4][5] Johns allied with William Herring, a delegate at the convention and the chair of the committee that would hear women's suffrage arguments.
[4] She went as a delegate for Arizona to the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) Convention in January 1896.
[8][10] In Winter of 1899, Carrie Chapman Catt and Mary Garrett Hay came to Phoenix during the legislative session.
[16] Robinson and Munds both had connections with the labor movement and were able to help further organize suffrage groups around the state.
[18] Munds, O'Neill, and Robinson worked with Senator Kean St. Charles to bring the bill to the Territorial Council after it passed the House.
[19] The suffrage bill passed both houses of the legislature, but was vetoed by Governor Alexander Oswald Brodie.
[14] Efforts to revive organizations with NAWSA field worker, Mary C. C. Bradford, in 1905 were not met with enthusiasm.
[20] Anna Howard Shaw sent NAWSA field worker, Laura Clay, to Arizona in January 1909 to persuade Munds to revive the women's suffrage organizations.
[20][16] Clay and Munds lobbied the territorial legislature in the spring of 1909 on women's suffrage, but bills failed in both houses.
[24] Munds and O'Neill decided to refocus their efforts on getting a women's suffrage amendment in the Arizona Constitution.
[26] Munds was determined that only men who supported women's suffrage would be included as delegates to the constitutional convention that was on the horizon.
[28] George W. P. Hunt, the president of the convention, feared that if women's suffrage was included, the United States would reject Arizona's bid for statehood.
[34] Anna Howard Shaw visited, making seven different speeches around Arizona that drew "large and enthusiastic crowds.
[41] Munds also coordinated with local newspapers to get favorable press and opinion pieces on women's suffrage published.
[35] In 1913, the Arizona State Legislature passed an emergency law to open voter registration books to women.
[44] Also in 1914, Alice Paul sent Congressional Union (CU) organizers, Josephine Casey and Jane Pincus, to Arizona.
[47][48][49] When the Nineteenth Amendment went to the states for ratification, Arizona Governor Thomas E. Campbell called for a special legislative session on February 12, 1920.
[24] Munds and other suffragists did reach out to "prominent members of the educated Mexican American business and political community.
[54] In 1924, the Indian Citizenship Act meant that Native Americans could be considered citizens without ending their ties to their tribal customs and lands.
[54] When the act passed, Attorney General John W. Murphy felt that Native Americans now possessed the requirements to vote.
[55] Issues with Native Americans living on reservations called into question the eligibility for voting for some county attorneys.
