the same bill passed the Senate
by 35 votes for it to 33 votes against it.

The most interesting features of the Washington convention of 1913 were
the labor mass-meetings led by Jane Addams and the hearing before the
Rules Committee of the Lower House of Congress--the latter the first
hearing ever held before this Committee for the purpose of securing a
Committee on Suffrage in the Lower House to correspond with a similar
committee in the Senate. For many years we had had hearings before the
Judiciary Committee of the Lower House, which was such a busy committee
that it had neither time nor interest to give to our measure. We
therefore considered it necessary to have a special committee of
our own. The hearing began on the morning of Wednesday, the third of
December, and lasted for two hours. Then the anti-suffragists were given
time, and their hearing began the following day, continued throughout
that day and during the morning of the next day, when our National
Association was given an opportunity for rebuttal argument in the
afternoon. It was the longest hearing in the history of the suffrage
movement, and one of the most important.

During the session of Congress in 1914 another strenuous effort was made
to secure the appointment of a special suffrage committee in the Lower
House. But when success began to loom large before us the Democrats were
called in caucus by the minority leader, Mr. Underwood, of Alabama, and
they downed our measure by a vote of 127 against it to 58 for it. This
was evidently done by the Democrats because of the fear that the united
votes of Republican and Progressive members, with those of certain
Democratic members, would carry the measure; whereas if this caucus were
called, and an unfavorable vote taken, "the gentlemen's agreement" which
controls Democratic party action in Congress would force Democrats in
favor of suffrage to vote against the appointment of the committee,
which of course would insure its defeat.

The caucus blocked the appointment of the committee, but it gave great
encouragement to the suffragists of the country, for they knew it to be
a tacit admission that the measure would receive a favorable vote if it
came before Congress unhampered.

Another feature of the 1913 convention was the new method of electing
officers, by which a primary vote was taken on nominations, and
afterward a regular ballot was cast; one officer was added to the
members of the official boar