ed to be excused from voting. Protests came from all sides. Senator
Norbeck (afterwards Governor) in stentorian tones demanded that since
the Senator had craved the opportunity to record his opinion he should
do it now. Senator Mather meekly cast the only dissenting vote and
never was returned to the Legislature. In the Lower House the vote was
70 ayes, 30 noes.

The campaign of 1914 received most important and highly valued
assistance from Dr. Anna Howard Shaw, president of the National
American Suffrage Association; Miss Jane Addams, its vice-president;
Mrs. Catharine Waugh McCulloch, Mrs. Ella S. Stewart and Mrs. Florence
Bennett Peterson, all of Chicago, and from many others. One of the
best educational forces was the _South Dakota Messenger_, a weekly
paper controlled and edited by the State organization. It had a wide
circulation and was able to reach into the farthest corners of the
State. Other papers clipped freely from its editorial and news
columns. On November 3 the amendment received 39,605 ayes and 51,519
noes, lost by nearly 12,000. For the fifth time the men of South
Dakota had denied their women the right of representation in the
government.

The suffrage leaders were not in the least daunted or discouraged and
a convention was very soon called at Huron to decide whether or not
resubmission should be asked of the Legislature the next year and the
unanimous decision was that it should be. The district plan was
abandoned and county organization adopted. A "budget" was prepared and
each county assessed according to its population, which plan was
generally successful.

In January, 1915, the Legislative Committee, this time composed of
Mrs. Pyle, Mrs. Etta Estey Boyce of Sioux Falls and Mrs. Paul Rewman
of Deadwood, assisted by a number of Pierre suffragists for the
Universal Franchise League and Dr. Mary Noyes Farr of Pierre and Miss
Rose Bower for the W. C. T. U., once more climbed the steps of the
Capitol to ask for another referendum. Once more the request was
granted--in the Senate by 29 to 15, in the House by 57 to 40--during
the first two weeks of the session. A reception was given by the
committee and Pierre suffragists to the members of the Legislature,
the State officers and the ladies of their families in the ballroom of
the St. George Hotel, said to have been a social event second only to
the inaugural ball. Later in the session a bill to give women a vote
for presidential electors, county an