“Suffrage Special” Envoys Seek Women’s Voting Bloc

In April 1916, the Congressional Union (CU) organized the “Suffrage Special,” a five-week railroad tour to appeal to “the four million enfranchised women of the west” to support a federal suffrage amendment and to vote against Democratic Party candidates, who failed to endorse women’s suffrage. In early June 1916, the CU formed the National Woman’s Party (NWP), also briefly known as the Woman’s Party of Western Voters, which initially included only women voters, not their disenfranchised sisters. In March 1917, the NWP and CU united into a single organization–the NWP.