The National American Woman Suffrage Association 1890 (NAWSA) MUNUC 33 1 The National American Woman Suffrage Association 1890 (NAWSA)| MUNUC 33 TABLE OF CONTENTS ______________________________________________________ A NOTE ON INTERSECTIONALITY FROM THE DAIS………...……….………3 CHAIR LETTERS………………………….….…………………..…….…….....…5 COMMITTEE STRUCTURE.……………..………………………………………..9 TOPIC A: ORGANIZING THE WOMEN’S SUFFRAGE MOVEMENT……….14 Statement of the Problem……………….……………..………….…14 History of the Problem………………………………………………….26 Roster……………………………………………………………………..30 Bibliography……………………………………………………………..66 2 The National American Woman Suffrage Association 1890 (NAWSA)| MUNUC 33 A NOTE ON INTERSECTIONALITY FROM THE DAIS ____________________________________________________ Dear Delegates, Welcome to the National American Woman’s Suffrage Association - where you will spend your weekend writing and voting on policy that will advance gender equality and grant women the rights that they deserve. We hope this committee will provoke conversations, creativity, and a hard (and even critical) look at the movement that led to the enfranchisement of the largest group of voters at a single time. Our goal with running this committee is to teach you about how to organize and run a political movement. However, we also want you to understand and critique how political movements have worked in the past. In order to do this, we must confront both the parts of our history that are commendable and inspiring, as well as the parts of our history in which people were discriminatory or acted in a manner that we would not support today. The history we will be discussing is not faultless, and deals with racist, antisemitic, and homophobic actors both outside and within the suffrage movement. Some of you have been assigned characters who hold problematic, prejudiced beliefs. While we have attempted to acknowledge this in the background guide and believe that it is important to understand this history, we will not stand for the parroting or promoting of any of these biases, regardless of historical accuracy. The women’s suffrage movement was riddled with discussions about race as well as sex, and much of it was shaped by racism. We would be doing a disservice to you all as delegates if we did not acknowledge this fact. However, despite this history we believe that it is still important for all of you to learn about the movement. This being said, with this committee we do not want any of you to aim for historical accuracy with regard to bigotry. Instead, we hope that you will join us in reimagining a better, more inclusive version of the women’s suffrage movement, while still acknowledging that the real history is much more complicated and discriminatory than what we will be presenting. To help you understand the current feminist politics, the dais strongly recommends you focus your energies on intersectional feminism. This idea suggests that different people experience overlapping 3 The National American Woman Suffrage Association 1890 (NAWSA)| MUNUC 33 identities, some of which can be oppressed simultaneously. It seeks to lift the voices of those who have these identities and might be excluded from an equality initiative due to another identity. As you will read in the bios, we have tried to include women from a number of backgrounds and positions who were actually involved in the movement, though it is not at all representative of all women or identities. We strongly recommend that you include as many women as possible in the work you present to committee and continue challenging yourself over the weekend to be not only inclusive, but to think about the impact of your work on others who might not share your identity. Feminism is a complex, nuanced, umbrella term which roughly describes the belief that all genders deserve equal rights and opportunity. If you find yourself grappling with any of the ideas or terms presented in this background guide or during committee, please feel free to reach out to us. Please also know that everyone is still learning about this issue, and we should all commit to giving them the space to learn. While we will continually remind you all to be as inclusive as possible, we hope to foster an environment where people explain to others why a statement was not inclusive, instead of belittling a speaker for not doing so in the first place. For those with more privilege than others, please acknowledge and use your power to explain why something may be non inclusive, even if you yourself was not affected by the proposal or statement. Finally, if anything in this topic makes you feel uncomfortable, or if you feel excluded or upset during any point in the conference, please let the dais know and we will do what we can to address the situation. These topics are incredibly important, but the discussion of them can also spark a large number of emotions. If you need some time to process your feelings, either with a member of the dais or alone, we understand and are happy to help you in any way that we can. The dais has high expectations of you, but we also know you can meet them. Welcome to the challenge of learning from history to reimagine a more inclusive women’s suffrage movement. Emily Young and Elisa Bayoumi 4 The National American Woman Suffrage Association 1890 (NAWSA)| MUNUC 33 CHAIR LETTERS ____________________________________________________ Hello fellow suffragists! My name is Emily Young, and I will be your chair for the NAWSA 1890. I am beyond excited to welcome you to MUNUC and to this committee which Elisa and I have been wanting to run for a long time. As your chair I will be in charge of the front room, where I get to listen to your exciting plans for the NAWSA and watch you respond to the many crisis breaks and tasks we have planned for you. This committee will be a hybrid committee (personally my favorite type of committee at MUNUC) and therefore will incorporate both crisis and traditional General Assembly elements. For those of you who have done Model UN before, think of this as an exciting new challenge! For those who have never done MUN before, don’t worry! I had no idea what Model UN was before college and I am more than happy to help you navigate this new and exciting world. MUNUC is first and foremost about learning - so no matter what level of experience you have with Model UN be prepared to build your public speaking, collaboration, and debate skills. When I’m not planning with Elisa to make this committee the best one at MUNUC, I am a fourth-year student at the University of Chicago studying public policy and political science with a specialization in education policy. I fell in love with MUNUC my first year and MUNUC 33 will be my fourth time participating in it. Previously, I have helped run two committees as both an Assistant Chair and Chair, and last year I was MUNUC’s Under-Secretary General for Hybrid Committees. Apart from MUNUC, I also work as a teacher’s assistant teaching math to second graders at a local elementary school and conduct education policy research for UChicago’s student think tank - the Paul Douglas Institute. I also love to cook, drink inordinate amounts of tea, and talk about musicals with anyone who will listen. This committee topic in particular is incredibly close to my heart, as I am a very proud feminist who spent the summer working for an advocacy organization that builds support for feminist causes. I wanted to run the NAWSA this year because both Elisa and I believe that this period in history is incredibly important to not just learn about, but to learn from. Knowing how to stand up for what you believe in and take action to make the change you wish to see occur, is as important now as 5 The National American Woman Suffrage Association 1890 (NAWSA)| MUNUC 33 ever. While all of us can say that we believe in something - it can be very hard to take that passion and turn it into action. The members of the NAWSA had to overcome a number of barriers to achieve their goal of women’s suffrage. We hope that from this committee you learn about how to effectively build a movement to fight for what you believe in, and that you are able to put the work in to make sure your movement succeeds no matter the problems you face. Above all, I hope that you become inspired to start or continue organizing and working for a cause you believe in once committee ends. If any of you have questions about committee or life in general, please feel free to reach out to me both before or during committee. I am happy to give advice about delivering speeches, building support for your ideas in the frontroom, or any other Model UN related skill that you want to build. I can’t wait to see you all (either virtually or in person) for what I am sure will be the best MUNUC yet! All the best, Emily Young [email protected] 6 The National American Woman Suffrage Association 1890 (NAWSA)| MUNUC 33 Dear Delegates, Welcome to the best committee at MUNUC! My name is Elisa Bayoumi, and I am the crisis director for NAWSA 1890, meaning I will be the one wreaking havoc on your plans. I’m so excited to bring this chaotic historical moment to life while exploring different organizing and lobbying efforts. If you have extensive crisis experience, no crisis experience, or no Model UN experience, I know this committee will have something to offer you - particularly because this will be a new MUN experience for us all! Crisis is the art of dealing with the unexpected ruining your plans.