ficers was extended from one to two years. A unique program was
carried out in the afternoon under the direction of the second
vice-president, Mrs. Katharine Dexter McCormick--The Handicapped
States, a Concrete Lesson in Constitutions. The States whose
constitutions practically could not be amended were grouped under
these heads: The Impossibles; The Insuperables; The Inexecutables; The
Improbables; The Indubitables; The Inexcusables; The Irreproachables.
Each group was represented by one or more women who quoted from the
constitutions. It was intended as an object lesson to show the
necessity for a Federal Amendment.

At 3:30 Mrs. Catt began her president's address before an audience
that filled the large theater and listened with intense interest until
the last word was spoken at five o'clock. It was a masterly review of
the movement for woman suffrage and a program for the work now
necessary to bring it to a successful end. The opening sentences were
as follows:

I have taken for my subject, "The Crisis," because I believe that
a crisis has come in our movement which, if recognized and the
opportunity seized with vigor, enthusiasm and will, means the
final victory of our great cause in the very near future. I am
aware that some suffragists do not share in this belief; they see
no signs nor symptoms today which were not present yesterday; no
manifestations in the year 1916 which differ significantly from
those in the year 1910. To them, the movement has been a steady,
normal growth from the beginning and must so continue until the
end. I can only defend my claim with the plea that it is better
to imagine a crisis where none exists than to fail to recognize
one when it comes, for a crisis is a culmination of events which
calls for new considerations and new decisions. A failure to
answer the call may mean an opportunity lost, a possible victory
postponed....

This address, coming at the moment when woman suffrage was accepted as
inevitable by the President of the United States and all the political
parties, was regarded as the key-note of the beginning of a campaign
which would end in victory. In pamphlet form it was used as a highly
valued campaign document.

Mrs. Catt showed the impossibility of securing suffrage for all the
women of the country by the State method and pointed out that the
Federal Amendment was the one and only way. "Our