Submitted by Patricia Nugent
Reprinted with permission from The Daily Gazette, as featured on May 7, 2025
I recently pitched League of Women Voters membership to a millennial lamenting how powerless he felt in this political climate. He forcefully replied, “It’s impossible to be nonpartisan these days! That’s totally unrealistic!” It’s true that our hyper-partisan culture has gotten progressively worse over the last decade, and nonpartisanship may be viewed with suspicion by both sides. I’m frequently challenged by people questioning how I, an outspoken feminist, can pursue women’s rights within the confines of the League’s nonpartisan mandate when one party’s record is verifiably less favorable to women’s equality than the other. After the last federal election, a friend indignantly texted, “How can the League remain nonpartisan when states are toying with executing women who have abortions? We can’t stand on the sidelines!”
I agree – we can’t. And we don’t. What is not well understood is that the League is a highly political organization, advocating for policies and legislation that advance an inclusive democracy – no matter which party supports or opposes them. We chase the cause and not the actors, not supporting or opposing political parties or candidates. Instead, we support or resist political actions. Admittedly, this can get confusing when party lines are drawn around issues, creating the potential to offend either political party at any given juncture.
A biography of Alice Paul, titled “Claiming Power” by J.D. Zahniser and Amelia R. Fry, has deepened my understanding of the League’s nonpartisan roots: Alice was one of the leaders who took women’s suffrage over the finish line to become the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The book traces Alice’s feminist training in London under Emmeline Pankhurst to the streets of Washington D.C. Originally a leader in the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA), she then formed a competing organization to engage in more militant strategies to secure women’s voting rights. She eventually founded the National Woman’s Party (NWP), with the goals of holding the party in power responsible for the roadblocks to suffrage and withholding support from any party that didn’t support suffrage. Since a Democratic president and Congress stood in the way of women’s voting rights, Alice’s organization launched full-scale opposition to all Democratic candidates in 1916 whether or not they individually supported women’s suffrage. In other words, she held the whole party responsible, no matter how individual politicians voted. She insisted it was not a partisan act – she would have gone after any party standing in the way. Women of both parties joined her picket lines in front of President Wilson’s White House.
The president of NAWSA, Carrie Chapman Catt, was horrified by NWP’s tactics. Suffrage had always been a nonpartisan cause, and NAWSA aligned itself with pro-suffrage politicians of both parties. Being nonpartisan was important to the movement because partisan politics was considered “dirty business,” rendering women “unfeminine.” (Heaven forbid!) And NAWSA had suffered repercussions in the 1890s after aligning with a political party (Populist) that later faltered. Catt did, however, publicize each candidate’s position on suffrage and “recommended” suffrage candidates to voters.
This was not the first time, nor the last, a social movement split due to a difference in strategy. Single-minded in their goal to secure the vote for women, activities of both groups bordered on partisanship at various times. The cause overrode party and candidate.
Catt went on to found the League in 1920 to help women use their right to vote in their own self-interest. Three years later, recognizing that voting rights were not enough to ensure fair and equal treatment of women in our nation, Alice Paul proposed the still-elusive 24-word Equal Rights Amendment.
Through more than one century of advocacy, the League has remained bound by its nonpartisan mandate ‒ stricter now than our foremothers’ interpretation. While members might have personal partisan affiliations, when serving in an official capacity, they must honor their obligation to nonpartisanship in words and deeds. It’s what makes the League credible and sustainable through shifting partisan alliances.
The League proves people can work together on a mutual goal, such as women’s equality, regardless of political affiliation. Those who want to work together to build a more-inclusive democracy, regardless of party or gender, should join their local League of Women Voters.
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Patricia Nugent is a past president of the Saratoga County League of Women Voters and is currently active in their Women’s Rights Action Coalition. She will be presenting “Deeds, Not Words” about Alice Paul’s campaign strategies at Saratoga Springs Public Library on June 11 at 7pm.