"Intruding in Sacred Territory": Forging Women's Suffrage on the Buffalo-Niagara Frontier

Abstract

"Intruding in Sacred Territory":Forging Women's Suffrage on the Buffalo-Niagara Frontier1 Shannon M. Risk (bio) Rochester, New York, and New York City saw a great deal of suffrage agitation in the late 1800s and early 1900s, but pro- and anti-suffrage women and men were also active in Western New York. As Buffalo and Niagara Falls became host to larger enterprises, some elite women with wealth, time, and a desire for action emerged as strong proponents of the women's vote. Niagara Falls and Buffalo suffragists did not coalesce until the early 1900s, after attracting a National American Woman Suffrage Association convention in 1908. The region's suffragists chose the "maternalism" path in their campaign, using domesticity as one of their main themes. This softened the conservative response to their efforts, making suffrage plausible. Theirs was an uphill battle against staunchly conservative, patriarchal ethnic enclaves, and certain economic titans. Wealthy women might engage in charity, in keeping with the "woman's sphere," but press, clergy, and civic leaders discouraged their forays into the political realm. To wage a successful suffrage campaign, wealthy women had to build a fragile coalition of different groups. For Buffalo's African American community, formed from canal workers, descendants of ex-slaves, restaurant and domestic workers, teachers, ministers, and industrial laborers, maintaining the middle class was more precarious. Female leaders in the black community not only headed charity endeavors, but also sought to "uplift" their race and protect their right to be citizens, and they did this without the wealth of elite white women. However, local leaders like Mary Talbert were instrumental in forming the National Association for Colored Women in the late 1890s. Their network became a base for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), in effect, a suffrage organization. For this community, [End Page 367] the women's vote was about self-respect and survival, but it also fed into a larger movement for black civil rights. While there was some collaboration between black and white suffragists in the area, their efforts remained mostly separate, reflecting state and national trends. Despite the delay in more formal suffrage agitation in the region for black and white suffragists, their efforts were crucial for the state campaign. To run a successful campaign, well-known organizers in other parts of New York State needed the labor and fundraising of these Western New Yorkers. Buffalo and Niagara Falls women gave needed money and respectability to the suffrage movement in a conservative region. Their donations were important during the last decade of the fight for the vote, but they also needed to coalesce different factions in the region. They helped to empower New York State as the linchpin for greater suffrage success on the east coast, and to put pressure on Congress to pass a national women's suffrage amendment. In the last two decades of the women's suffrage movement, women from Niagara and Erie counties organized, countered conservative voices in their society, and worked with state leaders to realize their main goal–the vote–bettering their communities generally.2 This work allowed these regional suffragists to overcome a devastating loss in the 1915 New York State suffrage referendum, and turn their districts towards a positive vote in the next referendum in 1917.3 Early Reform Work Shaped Woman Suffragists Towns along the western portion of the Erie Canal saw major economic gains by the late 1800s and early 1900s due to heavy industry along the canal and on the Great Lakes. This prosperity gave upper class and educated white women in the region time to devote to the betterment [End Page 368] of their communities. They could employ other women to care for their children and their households, thus freeing them for voluntary work. As these women fanned out beyond their own neighborhoods to provide socio-economic uplift, they experienced a transformation in their own lives. The women soon realized that they needed a voice in politics to create meaningful change. The male, "public" political sphere was not welcoming to women's participation, so women in Western New York readily adopted the maternal approach to...