every ethnicity exists in america. it is not defined by religion. every religion exists in america. defined by an idea. the only country in history of the world created and defined by an idea.therefore, in order to keep the republic as franklin enjoined us to do is we must know the ideas understand them, and to the ideas and live them out. good biographies on william -- and his latest you can keep it brief for now live three hour conversation the calls, emails, tweets and email questions live sunday on in-depth on c-span2. [inaudible conversations]

[inaudible conversations] >> good evening i am bradley graham co-owner of politics and growth. thank you so much for coming out on this rather damp summer evening. hopefully the will of the time we are ready to go home. we are coming up in a few years on our 100th anniversary of the ratification of the 19th amendment. the course gave the men nationally right to vote. anticipation centennial, angela dodson has put together a table sort of almanac titles remember the ladies. a documents the long struggles for suffrage for women in this country. how long with from the very title of the book calls what

abigail adams said to her husband. a drawing on a range of sources including letters, speeches, newspaper accounts, photos, drawings. angela highlights the milestones in historic push for women's voting rights. her book provides portraits of a number of the leaders of the women's suffrage movement. in places the movement in the context of other major social and political developments that were unfolding. today, more women than men attend turn out to. but as anyone can defend is overcommitted of massive turnout of the mall last january. the reaffirming of women's rights and effectively protesting donald's election. as lots of experience herself. reporting and telling newsworthy stories.she is a

veteran journalist and the washington star land at "the new york times". there she rose from copy editor to become the first african-american woman promoted to a senior editor position at times. she left the paper about two decades ago. in the intervening years has written for publications including a black issues book review.she also has edited or ghostwritten a number of books. angela will be in conversation here this evening with other accomplished analysts. carol bridges who is on the advair of bessie today and the a lecturer at george washington university's media and public affairs. dorothy -- who of course it is been a long-time columnist for the "washington post" and herself writing a memoir at the

moment that is put out a little more than a year from now. so we hope to see her back for that. ladies and gentlemen, please join me in welcoming, angela dodson and dorothy. >> good afternoon everyone good evening. [inaudible] >> good evening everyone. my name is dorothy knows who just heard it is a pleasure to be here at politics and prose. and it is very good to welcome all of you. we are excited about angelo's new book, "remember the ladies". before i turn this over and asked angela questions i want

to take a moment to introduce someone else that was very important in the production of the book. angela, editor of her book group. we wave for just a moment? is not. thank you. angela, i think like many people i thought i knew something about the suffrage movement until i read your very riveting book. can you give five or six of the key moments in the suffrage movement? >> yes, i too thought and knew something about the movement until i tried to write about it. a moment, these are that, one of the leaders in the movement always considered the first women's convention of the antislavery movement to be the beginning of the movement.

and that was in 1938. the other moment would have been when women again to start speaking in public, 1838. assessments shaking their thing. the other seminal moment would have been when women started addressing public audience. because women were not supposed to and women were not even allowed to speak in their churches except for the quaker woman. but a free woman of color, began speaking out in the antislavery movement is on the education of crows and other public is from 1831. and she was followed by two white women who had been born into slaveholding families. they became quakers and moved to philadelphia and became very active in the antislavery

movement. and they had to fight for the right to speak in public. they were criticized. a group of ministers wrote and cyclical kind of things condemning them for doing so. the key moment the 1848 senator falls convention of women which was called by mostly quaker woman but also elizabeth cady stanton who was not quaker. and was then about a week and and a half time, they conceived meeting, called the meeting, publicized the meeting and checked the 300 people there. the next moment probably was a. really, was from about 1850 to 1860 when they met annually in conventions. they had not settled on the boat as the key issue so they were not really calling themselves but they kept meeting to talk about things

like property rights custody and divorce and a lot of these men were also simultaneously involved in a temperance movement which became a women's issue. so that was a big deal for the next moment was when they split up after the civil war because some of the women want to support the 14th and 15th amendments giving black men the right boat and some of them did not want to work for that unless the women's vote was going to be included and at that point, they were told that it was not on the table. and that was the negroes hour. some people, particularly other than katie and susan b anthony did not take well to that and they formed an organization just to fight for women and suffrage. another faction state with the 14th and the amendment issue as well as the women's vote. so the next moment billy for me has been the two groups they fit together 20 years later

finally have some energy to move forward. then there is a period where the states begin, more states begin to give women the vote and beginning in 1917, new york state voted for women's suffrage for voting in new york. and there are states that follow after that so that is a key period. the final push is really ratification which occurs with the final vote in tennessee. and i check just to women in tennessee. >> i think the thing that struck me most about this book was the vast expanse of time that remember the 80s there was written in 1776. it was almost hundred and 50 years later. 150 years later that woman got to vote. 150 years. that is a long time!

and from the 150 years it has been almost 100 years since hillary clinton ran for president and won the popular vote. and i will tell you, another time this program that we were talking about, the number of times that they got hold of that they would get there their hopes were dashed, one time after another, you know there is -- then there are all of these other things disturbed them. they did not win. the fact is, did not win in 2016. even though we won the popular vote. which means there is more work to do.and i just want to point out another thing angelo's book.

the majority of white american women's voters voted for donald trump. "c", this is not, it was not easy. it is not easy and is not going to be easy. >> just to build on that, they were about 96 percent of african-american women who voted for hillary clinton. it is possible that women are ever being to get together and vote as a tribe so that they can really elect a woman for president? >> i think will but is going to take maybe this administration, the blessing in disguise. [laughter] fact 53 percent of white women voted for donald trump. and for and the 96 percent of

women could still vote hillary, black women. that voted to vote for hillary without concern for her race particularly. people keep saying that some people thought that hillary was a flawed candidate and therefore they could not for her in my answer to that is always, and we have elected 45 flawed men. one of them blessedly was an african-american but he was not perfect either. so we have to decide as women, when is it going to be important enough for us to one for the girls? i have to put aside everything else and say, it is more important and in many ways is more, our nation has never been if they woman an effective and never elected an african-american male. so for going to happen, women often hold together one of the

lessons of this book also was that women could not do it alone. many men appear in this book as having helped the movement at various times. many men attended every conference. frederick douglass publicized the conference, went to the conference at seneca falls. stood up with right for women to vote when no one else did. no one else stood with elizabeth cady stanton widget with the resolution into -- and he wrote about efforts to also have all kinds of other abolitionist men. men introduced the first legislation, the first versions of the women's rights amendment to the constitution. men had to ratify. there were no women who accepted, wyoming for example by the time the suffrage of both camera new york would have been able to vote a few more states. but women were totally dependent on male helpers as well throughout most of the

movement. in the early days it did not even want to run there on the run is there no one had ever thought they did not know how. never adjust the meeting.one woman at and all health conditions that i can never speak in front of an audience. i've never spoken at a meeting. she went on to speak very eloquently for an hour. but what we have learned is that there be some sort of coalition. something women will have to stand up and decide that we are a tribe because we are all women. >> was also interested in the way that women relate president woodrow wilson. they really work him and they worked him in an upward manner. can you talk about that please? >> woodrow wilson was on record as being opposed to women's suffrage. and was on record as having said very horrible things about

students and what a waste of time it was to educate women in that kind of thing.so if you women organized the march before wilson's inaugural, the day before in 1913. and their whole campaign was to work on him specifically to get him to turn around and support women's suffrage. after a while, they began picketing him and being at the white house every single day. and that in turn led to their arrest after world war one starting. they were arrested is more rearrested price, they were force-fed. they will let go, rest again. that went on for a couple of years. but the whole thing was to work woodrow wilson.

getting to turn around. meanwhile the other part of the movement was playing the good girl kind of routine. and carriage in her faction were meeting with him and try to bring him around and let efforts during world war i to do women's work. whatever women do during war. and that seems to be what turned him around toward the end or at least that is the excuse he used when he finally came out before congress in support of women. >> was a stinker. woodrow wilson was not good for african-americans and he was not good for women and he finally came around after this terrible publicity of women being force-fed in jail. the treatment was just appalling. i think he came around because he had to come around. it finally come around. >> i can understand what he would not be a fan. but i thought i think the way

that the woman handled it you know, just cost which from boarding the white house with the picketing and because of course, it was during wartime they got some of the schism from so many americans that white americans saying you know, you are interested in the war. and they were so persistent and i think that is a great lesson. they learned that from the pitch women. british women had been much more militant in their movement and alice paul head split that austin but went to fill with them and marched them and that sort of thing. and carrie chapman had gone they applied some suppose from that class one of the things that they did with marge's common interest beatings.

they decided to organize serious parades of women and there were pictures of these women in white marching and that was eight points. don't you think? >> it was a turning point will women start occupying outdoor spaces. nobody was mr. women being outdoors, making noise, marching down the street. they had seen male parades in different societies and what have you in uniform. military parades. but just in spite of the women and that women would not be sound anymore would not be unseen i guess. it was a big deal. let's i think one of the things that struck me about the book, it is the first book that i have seen on suffrage and i am not a expert on this. but that has really talked about intersection audi between african-americans history and american history.

he fitted in a way they talk about many of the women were abolitionists before they became suffrage's. and i think that's a very important departure. can you comment on that? >> i think it is also. i tell people i did not set out to write a black book about suffrage. and i did not set out to write a book about white woman suffrage. i set out to write a book about the suffrage movement in whatever i found. and early on i found that there were black actors in here that none of us really all that aware of. or i was not that aware of. but that they interacted in ways that we do not think about. in the abolition movement is the most important. nearly all of the women that started the women's movement were abolitionists. and they were on a first name basis with people at frederick douglass.and they met with

them and they retained them in their homes and all that sort of stuff. lucretia mott, everyone heard about box brown and shipped in a box to escape slavery. one of the places they bring him is to her house so that she can think because they knew she would get a kick out of lori. and not only were most of these early women abolitionists, they were among the most radical abolitionists in the country. they started a second movement where they would not even use a product that was known to have been made with enslaved labor. think about it. this takes a lot of trouble. they had spores we have whole foods we can just go by free goods in the clothes the free produce movement fiercely did not wear cotton. they did not trade in cotton. if not sugar during this

period. they may not have molasses or rice or anything else you can think of that came from the hands of somebody enslaved in the south. in a couple of, and one of the was an organizer from her family ran one of the stores. so that was interesting to me and at the same time almost all of them, the first room that organized it you know their homes were also known stations on the underground railroad. and all through the literature about the woman suffrage meant for every now and then up top a letter from soma describing whoever they were hiding last week, susan b anthony talks about outfitting families to take over. it was one of organizer, mansa sister doctor someone in her kitchen overnight. and then talking to them the next morning. and then stance infects about meeting someone at her uncles added.

and all of the young girls in the family to me this young black woman they were hiding to ready to take to canada the next morning. so it is a big thing in their lives. and they are not ordinary women they do not service they lived it. and the fact that they started the women's movement is probably no accident. more that they were reformists to begin with." the woman i've forgot to mention this before they were able to speak in churches? we were used to be treating wicky. -- >> also, if they thought they had to they would people under the bus and keep moving on with the suffrage movement. >> i have been to the end of the movement i found that one of the things people do remember and you know if they knew anything about black women's participation was that

for instance, during 1913 march, they asked black women to march at the end of the crate. the woman in d.c., a severity which had just been formed two or three weeks before marched at the back. i've b wells pretended she was going to go along with this and she had in the cloud and when her legation passed by she marched right on out and got among the white friends infects walking. so no there was that and then they asked black women, they disparaged black women from going to the convention in atlanta. and this was a time that they were really courting white participant, rights of participation. white women in the south had not formed their own organizations and not been particularly active. and this is about 1900 fiercely were trying to get fighting women into the fold they were afraid the presence of black women would offend the white woman and they asked frederick douglass who had always a place

of honor to not come because -- with delicate white women this would not go over well in the south. but ida b wells called out susan b anthony and her willingness to be able to cast black women aside because of the second book.and some other woman did also. >> and clear that it says in the book that one of the reasons people who were abolitionist became suffrage this because it it was because they realize that women could not vote could not get pass legislation free the slaves. >> yes, i was interested in how industry banded together against the suffrage movement and we still see that in politics today. can you comment on that? let's particularly the liquor industry against women. among the major -- because they

feared that it woman that thought they would vote like a tribe and would vote for prohibition and things that were not good for industry like child labor laws. like their sellers for women. even companies that their wealth is obvious. whoever had big business lobbies at the time fought tooth and now it's particularly liquor. at that point prohibition had not been passed and when it did it wasn't the woman is the anti-saloon movement got it done. >> we're quickly going to the audience questions.just a couple of minutes, please get your questions ready. also, i'm going to ask you to come to the microphone on my left and so that c-span is shooting this so they can see your faces and can capture your riveting words. and i guess my last question

was, looking at where we are today, and i think that the questions have really understood a lot of that, you said that you do not think that we could elect a woman for president now but things might change. what would have to change within the female population in europe you for that to happen? >> of investment, we have to start thinking as woman and set aside some of the concerns if they are not that important. and we have to have the right candidate i guess at the right time. but we also have to raise a heck of a lot of money and people have to get behind whoever that is. >> i think candidate is the big one. the big issue.

hillary was, had the experience, the publicity, the spiritual sense of carafano. it made her good candidate. right now is not the democrats of anybody in mind our female that some of the really good candidates to run against, something you cannot beat someone with no one. need a couple of great women to come forward and we have some great women in congress and some good governors but i'm not seeing anybody come in fourth. have you? >> no. but since we are journalists, is very interesting there was an article in yesterday's "washington post". they referenced a new study by harvard in which the media is really taking to task for a way that they covered the election. and that was a very good article because in many ways,

they suggested that donald trump had been given a free ride. and that the media was equivocating and basically saying that the flaws in hillary equal flaws in donald trump. and the article went on actually was a columnist. the article went on to say that there are those two things, particularly out of line. and asking that journalist to start really looking again at how they covered the election. but we are getting past that suffrage movement, aren't we? just one thing. with margaret sullivan's column, she is awfully good. her point was that for years, journalists and sink have to be fair in every spring. and if you say something bad

about someone you say something bad about the other somebody. it turns out the one for the benefit hillary with emails. and then there was something bad about donald trump and every time he heard about donald trump, had to throw in the emails also making this sound like this enormous thing and making donald trump things that changed daily seem -- is a big journalistic problem. >> i agree. i think we need to look at that is journalists. anyone in the audience wishes to come forward, please do so. and angela will be happy to answer your questions. >> i am from the caribbean. i was lucky to grow up around very strong dominant woman. extraordinary, strong and dominant woman. but we obviously have a lot of the problems that exist but the

first question is, i am from the caribbean from the french dutch caribbean. if you're going to put -- if they're going to put a list together, and, woman, man, woman. let me throw this together you figure out. no, it is going to be -- in europe obviously one of the big problems you all have breakfast is 100 years after, woman in america still are very lowly represented and even businesses especially. so would you believe that it will be a good idea for something like in france we

have -- in history, if you do not do it then the 15 percent will get voted in. >> women would have to be 50 percent of the congress or something like that? >> yes. 50 percent of the voters women. the second question would be, related to abigail adams. remember the ladies. we know that. [inaudible] i remember that from way back but he felt about that and maybe this influenced abigail and for their other woman doing these type of ideas at the time that had influence on you know because this was before --

>> i do not know if you read -- abigail adams was very well read for her time. she was glad to read her family's library and she did. angie was informally tutored at home. so for her time she was pretty well educated as a woman. she made this remark as he was going to the second continental congress. and as it the second continental congress cannot deal with women's rights at all. it's not specifically drug laws as she thought they would at that time. so it was kind of a loose confederation at that point. she probably also did not really have women's suffrage in mind. it was not because she had so much as to remember that women had no rights at all. and they could not divorce, connect on their own properties, they could not have control over the cut for their

own children. women did not exist as an entity aside from their husbands if they were married. she was more to those kind of things that she hoped they would write into whatever they were at that point. and they did not write those into the constitution later either. other than new jersey to give women the right to vote initially in 1776 and took it back around 1907. familiar with legislative principle. about its more. >> and i would sue. i had never thought about that concept but it seems something to explore. i do not know if it would ever pass. >> i think with the 19th amendment to passage of the states had to adopt individually. and today it was the day that didn't pass. so i'm wondering what kind of advocacy they had to do to

encourage them to ask the 19th amendment? >> there were actually two paths to getting friends is suffrage for most of the 1800s and well into the 1900s. states could pass a referendum to have women vote in their state. and a lot of the energy from the early suffrage was spent trying to get these battles won. somewhere after the 15th amendment was passed, there was an argument that it also covered women health. because there were citizens and they were asked they were not denied. >> they were not denied the right to vote. so some women went around testing and trying to get vote that way. that not work. but the efforts for state referendums continued. if it up to when this was

passed. to pass the 19th amendment, a certain number of states had to ratify and hennessey was the last one that they needed to qualify. >> on vacation in new hampshire, i heard just recently about some of the local efforts to get some of the very powerful woman in new hampshire into office the last couple of years. and i worry a little about the presidential basket. there's so much work to be done. not just for women but men also. the politics that some of us might subscribe to. but to get women in at the local and state level. the very local jurisdictional to state levels. i mean we have may have been some is this i miss the beginning but the imprint of in the health vote this summer.

i just wanted to know where you stay in this direction and. >> i think women have to start getting into the pipeline and local offices are the way to go. unless they are in the pipeline of becoming legislators and governors in their own states and senators in their own state. they have to come forward themselves but could talk to raise money to go out and vote for them. we all have to go out and vote for them. >> and friends in the audience had been fun to local meetings their local district and the democratic party. and for people who are in charge are stunned because suddenly they mean the easter to people has 100 women in it. so if this keeps up, pipeline will fill up. you cannot just try it once and get discouraged. >> effective held it up in kuwait it is very strategic.

really appreciate your discussion of strategy in all of this in that prompt me to raise the question. >> this book is really good indicator of the strategies that we need. have to review where we have been and what they did to get those passed. >> thank you so much angela. i remember your editing from the book review. thank you because out -- my name is rowen. i am a professor. two points you earlier, you mentioned how forward position women were in terms of abolition. when the civil war was happening he mentioned the book and for and her daughter sylvia is one of the few women to actually respond the first wife of marcus garvey. amy ashwood garvey.

in the last year of her life she was waiting for different people to publish her story and sylvia - was one of the few. i appreciate angela what you meant francis harp. because that very important debate is so relevant. it is but relevant to -- decision to with the era. there's a big analogy between that and francis harper very public disagreement with elizabeth cady stanton in the 1886 convention. i think angela describes it best in her book. that is what i was going to ask. >> he is talking about francis harper who had been a free woman. she was a poet and an abolitionist lecturer. and african-american. after the civil war there is

the meeting where -- during the civil war all of these separate scripts have stopped meeting pearson has a meeting afterwards with women and the men get together and made the car a couple of meetings really. and she's one of them and said basically that as much as she wanted to vote for herself that black men should have the boat and basically that white woman needed to get over it at that point. [laughter] >> good evening i am a novelist as well. i actually happen to think that women are the superior race. i do. i think they are smarter, more courageous, less willing to fight, more willing to negotiate and find a common cause. i would advocate strongly that the senate was met with 50 percent of women and 50 percent

men so each state would have to send one of each. that is how i stand on that. this is the question i asked to the panel. it seems like the last election was marked referendum on people being fed and disenfranchised of national government and so a guy from the business community was elected. would be interesting for women because we have a tremendous amount of really great women who are heads of these and corporations. would be interesting to explore having a great ceo run for the dissidents equally. -- run for the presidency? >> i think it would be interesting maybe would capture people's imagination. but i'm not sure the woman president will come out of business. >> i think the first woman president may come out of the u.s. senate.

we have one from massachusetts who is, elizabeth warren. there are some good women there. i would really hope that one of the lessons we have now is that you need somebody who does understand government to be running to be in charge. a person that does not know anything for it is not interested in the details of legislation which is what we have now, is not going to get those things done. so i would vote for someone to come up through local politics and it might be a republican, it might be a democrat or her nose. they might shatter the way things are going and might end up with some new format. but you have got to pay your dues first. >> is interesting that with women that stood up on the healthcare bill -- maybe we are almost there. >> hello. he said again he thought they knew the history of slippage

before we started digging into the research i'm actually very curious what most surprised you in your research? what did you find that you did not expect to find? >> i think i was surprised at the role that men play. and surprised by the path that they're all abolitionists. that is news 3. i don't think anyone had ever really said that. i, like a bonus. i would of writing about women running around and white fences and -- i was into right out of the woman and i found that that was not the story. >> my name is drew sheppard and i just lived this subject of --

>> under the headquarters? >> is where alice paul went in 1929 and where she wrote the equal rights amendment in 1932. after suffrage. but the were there to take advantage of being next door to the capital. i think your panel is great and having a great turnout is wonderful. i wanted to make do with quick comments. one is that there is a project at the wilson center. women in public service project that is trying by 2050 have 50 percent men, 50 percent women in government worldwide. so i recommend that to you. and the comment i would make and i would like your comments on it is that, and i was the

clinton administration and so forth. my observation about hillary clinton i think the world of, was that by definition the first woman nominee for president and the democratic party of a major party of either party. would need to have so much credibility, have so much background and be a first lady and all because it took so much credibility that by definition she was really banged up and bruised and all of that. and i wonder if think that also. >> well i think it is like everything else would be stronger, wiser, faster, smarter, whatever. in order to be considered as equal. >> what else is new. we will have to be like superwoman.

>>

>> said then coming to the of women's suffrage to somehow proclaim that is different. >> so let me gsa that it each state the female elected people say this number has grown over the years it is like pulling teeth to get the first the man all elected to the segment with a respectable amount of women in congress. >> but this does not happen

overnight. >> but those who was very clearly. >> but those who voted for donald trump. obviously so also talking about consciousness photos that perhaps though it the way their husbands vote i'm not trying to do analysis

because there are other reasons people did vote for job and they thought with those evangelicals were a big part of that so how do we raise of consciousness of people? those are the basic aim was. >> but what us suffragist assumed that the men assume they would vote as a block is a banner to clean up politics for women and children and all kinds of horrible things and society would be perfect.

and then began to realize so yes we have a long ways to go so we have to think about that. so is the core of things that we need to do?. >> some of this is not a call just to vote for women. >> this is a great way to spend august 18 so i come from a long line.

>> i'm leaving an organization from our lifetime however we define that one of my particular interest of suffrage of these movements of the last century like americans the disability act with those changing rules and systems we simply encourage women to vote to be more likable there is a systematic is day barrier similarly that somebody mentioned earlier the fact that different countries that they rank behind 100 countries here we

are the leading exporter of democracy. and those are the same. they don't have training programs with gen the quota is over 100 countries with different legislative norms i think that is the inspiration. that isn't happening that the best of the brightest. >> and with identity politics. in this is identity politics.

because we all have identities. because yoda people in the opportunity and with that obligation to allow us to have representation i feel that it is poignant to think about how we relegate those certain identities that are problem identities where the norm is not the of people of color. so i feel we have to embrace the fact we need to do everything we can to not disparage them to have power in society. >> you have to live your identity whether a black

woman or what ever with the primary association and then to figurative those collective identities can do something to get there. -- -- together. even though we still have the same religion we have the same values. identity is not our problem. >> but i think it is. so to never really except the identity of african-americans. we'll lit into the fabric of american life and that is what needs to be attacked.

and then i have to keep to the bottom of those issues. >> that is not my only concern. >> i want to address it with those that come forward for the first of all, of president. and then it has to be looked at it as wonderful examples where 33 year 44% of affirmative action and as it just had a chance to work the process so unfortunately

i the thing'' doesn't what mr. sessions is doing so i encourage thinking out of the box and did america is the supreme court opposing people voting for the up propositioned to bathe and sen -- same-sex marriage totally reverse that. and on the civil-rights issue so any idea they had way back in the '70s? or

anything that should be the gateway?. >>. >> we have to be open and willing to do a lot of things but it is it's sustainable that women stay on the bottom if we have to then we will. >> their lives and organization that are in engaged on trading women to win the local office but my question is can you talk

about your research of henry ward beecher and the irony of the first president of the women's suffrage association and?. >> there is a photograph in the book that has been active in the movement with the american women's suffrage association and also decided to support the 14th and 15th amendment. it was a little bit of a scandal but he is also connected to other people. >> i just want to take a minute to a knowledge.

[applause] a long time philadelphia inquirer. >> journalists are always correct the. >> band with that legacy. >> on behalf of a angelina and carol the key for your participation and your presence we hope you will enjoy reading the book. >> you just want to get yourself. it is about getting these accomplishments.

>> cousins and friends and former colleagues and my former landlord. [laughter] we want this to ba conversation starter so we want to think these people in washington's. [applause] >> this is a very informative discussion by the book and angelo will be happier signing. full up the chairs to put them against something solid [inaudible conversations]