congressional district with a
membership of over 200,000 women. Mrs. Trout was soon called to
Washington by Mrs. Catt to work for the Federal Suffrage Amendment and
spent many months there while Mrs. McGraw directed the organization
work of the State association. She secured the co-operation of Mrs. R.
M. Reed, legislative chairman of the Illinois Federation of Women's
Clubs; they appointed two workers in each congressional district and
nearly every woman's society in the State had constitutional
convention programs. In the spring of 1918 Governor Lowden appointed
Judge Orrin N. Carter, of the Supreme Court, chairman of a state-wide
committee that worked in co-operation with the state-wide committee of
women. The annual suffrage convention was held in the latter part of
October, 1918, in Chicago, and Mrs. Trout was re-elected.

RATIFICATION. When Congress submitted the Federal Suffrage Amendment
June 4, 1919, Mrs. Trout and Mrs. McGraw immediately went to
Springfield where the Legislature was in session. They had already
made preliminary arrangements and without urging it ratified the
amendment on June 10. The vote in the Senate was unanimous, in the
House it was 135 ayes, 85 Republicans, 50 Democrats; three nays, all
Democrats, Lee O'Neil Browne, John Griffin and Peter F. Smith. A minor
mistake was made in the first certified copy of the resolution sent
from the Secretary of State's office at Washington to the Governor of
Illinois. To prevent the possibility of any legal quibbling Governor
Lowden telegraphed that office to send at once a corrected, certified
copy. This was done and the ratification was reaffirmed by the
Legislature on June 17, the vote in the Senate again being unanimous
and one Democrat, Charles F. Franz, added to the former three negative
votes in the House.

Owing to a misunderstanding of the facts for a short time there was
some controversy as to whether Illinois was entitled to first place,
as the Wisconsin Legislature ratified an hour later. Attorney General
Brundage prepared a brief showing that the mistake in the first
certified copy did not affect the legality of the ratification on June
10, as the mistake was made in copying the introductory resolution and
not in the amendment itself. This opinion was accepted in the
Secretary of State's office at Washington. So Illinois, the first
State east of the Mississippi River to grant suffrage to its women,
was the first to ratify the Federal Suffra