Suffrage | Volunteer Resources

Women's Suffrage

Margaret Brown's involvement in civic life and the suffrage movement has been one of the more confusing areas of her history until recently. Thanks to some good research and the loan of her niece's scrapbook to the Museum, there are now a few things that we can say definitively about this aspect of her life:

Margaret participated in many “social” aspects of the suffrage movement in Newport
- Meetings, rallies and fundraisers that involved the people with money
- She helped organize the most prominent suffrage conferences that were held at Alva Vanderbilt Belmont’s Marble House.
- Margaret also hosted and spoke at her own suffrage meetings at her Newport cottage, Mon Etui.
Margaret campaigned for months to run for United States Senate
- Leading suffragists like CO State Senator Helen Ring Robinson and Judge Ben Lindsey were urging Margaret to run to be Colorado’s next U.S. Senator
- National Women’s Suffrage association of New York was officially backing her run
- Suffrage leaders hoped to switch the Senate seats to go pro-suffrage to get the 19th amendment passed
- That would allow women the right to vote in America for the first time
- “I believe that the men of Colorado would be willing to help send a woman to Washington. If I do go to the Senate I shall naturally be specifically interested in all matters relating to women and children. In general, I shall stand for the human side of every question.”
Margaret campaigned for about 6 or 7 months, but eventually withdrew
- Suffrage leaders began to change their minds
- Some had concerns about a woman running for office – even suffrage leaders
- And when Senator Thomas from CO decided to run for another term, many didn’t like the idea of Margaret going against him since he was pro-suffrage
- “It would be treason and nothing else for any woman to run against Senator Thomas, who is a very good friend of suffrage.” Dr. Shaw, president of National American Woman’s Association