E.C. Warriner worked not only on international issues such as Peace, but also on domestic issues such as the enfranchisement of women. Women's suffrage appeared as a Michigan referendum in 1912. It failed. In 1913, the Michigan Equal Suffrage Association, of which Warriner was a local President (see item below), issued this flyer claiming that the referendum failed due to election fraud. Warriner was not President of Central Michigan University at the time of the Michigan suffrage referendum. Rather, he was superintendent of Saginaw Public Schools. However, Warriner publicly endorsed women's suffrage as President of Central State Normal (see below).
To download the pdf of "Why Michigan Lost the Equal Suffrage Amendment in 1912, click here. The backside contains a number of standard arguments against women's suffrage. Images courtesy of the Anne Lewis Suffrage Collection.
To download the pdf of "Why Michigan Lost the Equal Suffrage Amendment in 1912, click here. The backside contains a number of standard arguments against women's suffrage. Images courtesy of the Anne Lewis Suffrage Collection.
As President of the Michigan Equal Suffrage Association, E.C. Warriner supported women's equality and publicly spoke in favor of women's suffrage. A letter (pictured left) from Alice Paul is addressed "Dear Suffrage President." Paul chaired the Congressional Committee of the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA). In 1916, she formed the National Woman's Party - which departed from NAWSA's state-by-state strategy. The National Woman's Party was focused on the federal remedy of Amending the U.S. Constitution to recognize the political equality of women. This letter can be found in Warriner's papers, held by the Clarke Historical Library.
In 1914, while addressing the "Winter Club" in Saginaw Michigan in a speech titled "A History of the Suffrage" he wrote "I am fully persuaded in my own mind of the justice of the demand of the women for a right to vote." Warriner was a member of the Michigan Equal Suffrage Association, and helped Michigan to become one of the first states to ratify the 19th Amendment, which recognized women's Constitutional right to vote.
In 1914, while addressing the "Winter Club" in Saginaw Michigan in a speech titled "A History of the Suffrage" he wrote "I am fully persuaded in my own mind of the justice of the demand of the women for a right to vote." Warriner was a member of the Michigan Equal Suffrage Association, and helped Michigan to become one of the first states to ratify the 19th Amendment, which recognized women's Constitutional right to vote.
In 1918, approximately one year into his Presidency of "Central State Normal," Warriner spoke at a "Big Mass Meeting" for women's suffrage at Alma High School. The image to the left, from the Alma Record (September 5, 1918). Many thanks to the official historian of Gratiot County, Jim Godpseed who discussed this item on his Gratiot County History blog in 2018 and supplied this image to us at the EC Warriner project. Jim graduated from CMU in 1983.