[Vision2020] Fwd: A short history lesson on the privilege of voting ..

[Tom Trail]

>Visionaries:   This reflection on the history that we should remember and

not forget about the importance of the privilege of voting.  Only 
about 20% of Idaho's
voters turned out for the primary this spring, and Ada County the turnout
was about 16%.  The price paid by many for the privilege that in this case-
women could vote--needs to be remembered.

Tom Trail

>
>>
>>
>>A short history lesson on the privilege of voting ...
>>
>>The women were innocent and defenseless. And by the end of the night,
>>they were barely alive. Forty prison guards wielding clubs and with
>>their warden's blessing went on a rampage against the 33 women wrongly
>>convicted of "obstructing sidewalk traffic."
>>
>>They beat Lucy Burn, chained her hands to the cell bars above her head
>>and left her hanging for the night, bleeding and gasping for air. They
>>hurled Dora Lewis into a dark cell, smashed her head against an iron
>>bed and knocked her out cold. Her cellmate, Alice Cosu, thought Lewis
>>was dead and suffered a heart attack. Additional affidavits describe
>>the guards grabbing, dragging, beating, choking, slamming, pinching,
>>twisting and kicking the  women.
>>
>>Thus unfolded the "Night of Terror" on November 15, 1917 (a mere 87
>>years ago), when the warden at  the Occoquan Workhouse in Virginia
>>ordered his guards to teach a  lesson to the  suffragists imprisoned
>>there because they dared to picket Woodrow Wilson's  White House for
>>the right to vote.
>>
>>For weeks, the women's only water came from an open pail. Their
>>food--all of it colorless slop--was infested with worms. When one of
>>the leaders, Alice Paul, embarked on a hunger strike, they tied her to
>>a chair, forced a tube down her throat and poured liquid into her until
>>she vomited. She was tortured like this for weeks until word was
>>smuggled out to the press.
>>
>>So, refresh my memory. Some women won't vote this year because--why,
>>exactly? We have carpool duties? We have to get to work? Our vote
>>doesn't matter? It's raining?
>>
>>Last week, I went to a sparsely attended screening of HBO's new movie
>>"Iron Jawed Angels." It is a graphic depiction of the battle these
>>women  waged so that I could pull the curtain at the polling booth and
>>have my say. I am ashamed to say I needed the reminder.
>>
>>All these years later, voter registration is still my passion. But the
>>actual act of voting had become less personal for me, more rote.
>>Frankly, voting often felt more like an obligation than a privilege.
>>Sometimes it was inconvenient.
>>
>>My friend Wendy, who is my age and studied women's history, saw the HBO
>>movie, too. When she stopped by my desk to talk about it, she looked
>>angry.  She was--with herself.
>>
>>"One thought kept coming back to me as I watched that movie," she said.
>>"What would those women think of the way I use--or don't use--my right
>>to vote? All of us take it for granted now, not just younger women, but
>>those of us who did seek to learn.  "The right to vote" she said, had
>>become valuable to her all over again.
>>
>>HBO will run the movie periodically before releasing it on video and
>>DVD.
>>
>>I wish all history, social studies and government teachers would
>>include the movie in their curriculum. we  are not voting in the
>>numbers that we should be, and I think a little shock  therapy is in
>>order.
>>
>>It is jarring to watch Woodrow Wilson and his cronies try to persuade a
>>psychiatrist to declare Alice Paul insane so that she could be
>>permanently institutionalized. And it is inspiring to watch the doctor
>>refuse. Alice Paul was strong, he said, and brave. That didn't make her
>>crazy. The doctor admonished the men: "Courage in women is often
>>mistaken for insanity."
>>
>>Please pass this on to all the women you know. We need to get out and
>>vote and use this right that was fought so hard for by these very
>>courageous
>>women.


       Courtesy of my cousin, Mary.


-- 
Dr. Tom Trail
International Trails
1375 Mt. View Rd.
Moscow, Id. 83843
Tel:  (208) 882-6077
Fax:  (208) 882-0896
e mail ttrail at moscow.com
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