WEBVTT

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♪ ♪

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(gulls squawking,
waves crashing)

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NARRATOR:
By the fall of 1915,

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there could scarcely have been
an adult in the United States

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unaware of the controversy
over votes for women.

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It had been circulating
on the periphery

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of the national conversation

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for six decades,

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and during the previous
five years,

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had moved decisively
to the center--

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a crusade of the few
blooming into a mass movement,

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their demand for the ballot
growing ever more insistent.

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Hotly debated in town halls,
on street corners,

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and around dinner tables
the country over,

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woman suffrage had divided
husbands and wives,

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siblings,
women, one from another,

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and had aroused
vociferous opposition

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from every quarter
of American society:

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industrial interests,
politicians,

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and not least, the states
of the former Confederacy,

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where the franchise was
a jealously guarded instrument

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of white supremacy.

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With defeats far more numerous
than victories,

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new voices had risen to champion
new, more aggressive tactics,

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and the suffrage movement
had splintered over strategy,

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highlighting the fundamental
question of what it would take

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for American women
to finally win the ballot.

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What no one anticipated in 1915

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was the lengths to which they
would actually have to go.

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MARTHA JONES:
This is a real struggle.

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It is a struggle over ideas.

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Who are women,
what can they be?

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What can they do,
who should they be?

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It is a struggle over power.

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Who gets to say
what this nation is

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and how it does what it does?

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ALEXANDER KEYSSAR:
The fact that there is
resistance

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to the expansion
of democratic rights

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is not uniquely American.

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When people have some rights
that other people don't have,

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you have to convince them
to share.

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Not everybody's
going to want to.

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♪ ♪

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(car engine puttering,
horn honking)

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(crowd cheering)

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(children chattering)

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♪ ♪

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NARRATOR:
On September 16, 1915,

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at the Panama-Pacific
International Exposition

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in San Francisco,

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four women--
virtual strangers--

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climbed into a waiting car,

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drove through the fairground
gates,

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and headed east

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to launch a new phase
in the very long struggle

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for woman suffrage,

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now in its 67th year
and counting.

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It was close to midnight
when they set out.

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Their final destination:
Washington, DC.

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(fireworks exploding)

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MARY WALTON:
The car takes off,
very, very dramatic.

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Lights and fireworks,
and it's on its way.

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NARRATOR:
With few personal possessions,

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the travelers' cargo consisted
primarily of an enormous scroll

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which had been gathering
signatures

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at the Expo for months:

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a petition
demanding an amendment

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to the U.S. Constitution

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that would enfranchise all of
the nation's women at once.

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Bearing it across the continent
was Frances Jolliffe,

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42 and a drama critic
from Washington state;

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poet Sara Bard Field,
33 and a native of Oregon;

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and two Swedes
who had volunteered

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their brand-new
Willys-Overland

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for the trip.

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(engine running)

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The "envoys,"
as they were called,

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would be taking
a circuitous route,

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stopping for pre-arranged
rallies, receptions,

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and press interviews

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in 48 different cities.

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Not counting unplanned detours,

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the itinerary
was nearly 5,000 miles.

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On a good road,
with the top up,

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they'd be lucky to log
20 miles per hour.

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WALTON:
You have to imagine roads
at that time.

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Roads are like tracks across
the prairies left by wagons.

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They had to cross the desert.

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There are no maps.

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TINA CASSIDY:
There was no interstate
highway system.

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There weren't streetlights.

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There weren't pay phones.

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There was really
no infrastructure

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to support a crazy trip
like this.

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NARRATOR:
Already by Sacramento,
Frances Jolliffe had had enough,

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leaving Sara Bard Field alone
with the Swedes,

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one of whom talked incessantly.

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"Like Odysseus, I have many
experiences to relate,"

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Field telegrammed a friend
from the road:

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12 miles through alkali salt pan
in Nevada's Great Basin,

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an experience Field described
as "plowing through dust";

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snow drifts so high in Wyoming

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that everyone had to get out
and push;

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a mud hole in Kansas
that swallowed the Overland

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as if it were a shoe.

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CASSIDY:
Newspaper outlets would call in
with scenes from the road.

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The whole adventure of it

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was really captivating
for the nation.

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Women were quite literally
crossing

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a new divide in America,

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and being much more vocal
and aggressive--

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demanding the vote,
not asking politely.

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NARRATOR:
The stunt was the handiwork
of Alice Paul,

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a 30-year-old Quaker
with a PhD

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from the
University of Pennsylvania

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and a playbook inspired
by her apprenticeship

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with Britain's notoriously
militant suffragettes.

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Having been recently ousted

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from the movement's
pre-eminent organization,

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the more moderate

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National American
Woman Suffrage Association,

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Paul now led the upstart
Congressional Union,

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a small cadre
of committed activists

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who shared her impatience
for the ballot

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and her willingness to employ
unladylike tactics to win it.

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CASSIDY:
Women had been at this
for decades,

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and the movement
was going nowhere.

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And Alice Paul really believed
that the answer

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was in needing a new approach.

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♪ ♪

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NARRATOR:
While her one-time allies
from the National Association

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continued to wage the battle
state-by-state,

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re-enacting the by-now
tired ritual

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of pleading with male voters
on street corners,

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Paul had set her sights
on the federal amendment,

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and had appealed instead
to female voters

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from the 11 so-called
free states of the West,

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where women already were
fully enfranchised.

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As the popular humor magazine
"Puck" acknowledged

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with a two-page spread in its
special 1915 Suffrage Issue,

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the four million women
of the free states

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were poised to liberate
their sisters elsewhere.

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All they had to do was vote
in solidarity with the cause.

07:59.045 --> 08:02.949 align:left position:17.5% line:83% size:72.5%
Alice Paul's envoys would
deliver that message

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to Capitol Hill

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and make it known
to the Democrats--

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who held the presidency

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and controlled
both houses of Congress--

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that thousands of Western women
were prepared

08:13.659 --> 08:14.694 align:left position:20% line:89% size:70%
to hold them responsible

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for the federal
suffrage amendment.

08:18.631 --> 08:22.134 align:left position:32.5% line:77% size:57.5%
J.D. ZAHNISER:
The idea was to get
the attention of the party

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and convince them
that women's votes

08:24.403 --> 08:26.672 align:left position:10% line:5% size:80%
can alter the balance of power,

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and persuade them
to push through

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the constitutional amendment.

08:33.346 --> 08:37.183 align:left position:45% line:89% size:45%
♪ ♪

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NARRATOR:
By the time the envoys' Overland
reached Washington, DC,

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on the morning of December 6,

08:42.054 --> 08:44.390 align:left position:20% line:89% size:70%
four states in the East

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had voted to keep women
from the ballot box.

08:49.262 --> 08:52.398 align:left position:12.5% line:83% size:77.5%
And even those suffragists who
dismissed Paul as a "militant"

08:52.431 --> 08:53.733 align:left position:15% line:89% size:75%
had begun to see the wisdom

08:53.766 --> 08:56.936 align:left position:32.5% line:83% size:57.5%
in her demand
for the federal amendment.

08:56.969 --> 09:02.341 align:left position:17.5% line:83% size:72.5%
President Wilson received
the envoys graciously.

09:02.375 --> 09:04.343 align:left position:22.5% line:83% size:67.5%
"Nothing could be more
impressive," he said,

09:04.377 --> 09:06.212 align:left position:20% line:89% size:70%
surveying the petition.

09:06.245 --> 09:08.848 align:left position:25% line:83% size:65%
"This visit of yours
undoubtedly will make it

09:08.881 --> 09:11.884 align:left position:20% line:83% size:70%
"necessary for all of us
to consider very carefully

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what it is right for us to do."

09:13.986 --> 09:17.223 align:left position:12.5% line:89% size:77.5%
What the president did not say

09:17.256 --> 09:21.227 align:left position:10% line:83% size:80%
was that he had already decided
what was right to do.

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As he'd put it to a friend
just the night before,

09:24.330 --> 09:25.364 align:left position:17.5% line:89% size:72.5%
"Woman suffrage will make

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"absolutely no change
in politics.

09:28.301 --> 09:31.504 align:left position:15% line:83% size:75%
"It is the home that will be
disastrously affected.

09:31.537 --> 09:35.537 align:left position:12.5% line:83% size:77.5%
Who is going to make the home,
if the women don't?"