Page:History of Woman Suffrage Volume 6.djvu/699

WASHINGTON 683 on Jan. 14, 1911, the National Council of Women Voters at the home of Mr. and Mrs. John Q. Mason in Tacoma. Governor James H. Brady of Idaho issued a call to the Governors of the four other equal suffrage States Wyoming, Colorado, Utah and Washington asking them to send delegates to this first con- vention. He presided at the opening session and spoke at the evening meeting which filled the largest theater. Mrs. DeVoe was elected president and was re-elected at each succeeding con- vention. It was non-partisan and non-sectarian and its objects were three-fold: i. To educate women voters in the exercise of their citizenship ; 2. To secure legislation in equal suffrage States in the interest of men and women, of children and the home ; 3. To aid in the further extension of woman suffrage. As new States gained suffrage they joined the Council. Before Mrs. DeVoe went to the National Suffrage Convention at St. Louis in March, 1919, she was authorized by the Council to take whatever steps were necessary to merge it in the National League of Women Voters which was to be organized there. Mrs. Catt requested her to complete the arrangements when she returned to Washington and act as chairman until this was ac- complished. On Jan. 6, 1920, the Council became the State League of Women Voters. Mrs. Nelle Mitchell Pick was elected temporary and later Mrs. W. S. Griswold permanent chairman. On the afternoon of August 21, old and new suffrage workers joined in a celebration at Seattle of the final ratification by the Legislature of Tennessee, which was attended by over two hun- dred women. Klection returns furnish conclusive proof that the women of hington use the ballot. After 1910 the total registration of the State nearly doubled, although men outnumber women, and the women apparently vote in the same proportion as men. A tremendous increase of interest among them in civic, economic and political affairs followed the adoption of suffrage and the 'ts were evidenced by a much larger number of laws favor- ably affecting the status of women and the home parsed in the ten year period following IMIO than during the previous ten year period. Uniform hostility to liquor, prostitution and vice has