Page:History of Woman Suffrage Volume 6.djvu/80

66 HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE all three names. It requires three days for action on a resolu- tion and the ratification was completed on the I2th, both Houses voting unanimously in favor. The day of the final passage was made a great occasion for the Equal Suffrage Association. Legis- lators referred to it in their speeches and Mrs. Walling, one of its board of directors, was escorted to a seat beside Speaker Allyn Cole. Mrs. Hosmer was out of the city. A short recess was taken that the first vice-president, Mrs. Anna M. Scott, might be heard, who made a brief but eloquent speech. When the time came for the final vote Speaker Cole surrendered his place to Representative Bigelow, so that a woman might wield the gavel when the result was announced. 1 The bill went immediately to the Governor, who signed it on the I5th. Colorado had by this ratification placed the seal of her approval on the twenty-six years of woman suffrage in the State. During the war, the Woman's State Council of Defense was a most efficient organization, Governor Gunter saying that he ascribed its remarkable work to the experience which the women had gained by their quarter-of-a-century of active citizenship. On June 17, 1920, the State Equal Suffrage Association became incorporated under the name of the League of Women Voters with Mrs. Scott as chairman. A number of prominent eastern women en route to the Democratic national convention in San Francisco stopped at Denver and were guests at the banquet in celebration of the new league. The legislative council of the State Federation of Women's Clubs holds weekly meetings during the sessions of the Legisla- ture and takes up bills for consideration, particularly those relat- ing to women and children, education and public health. After discussion and study these bills are approved or not approved and the legislators, the club women and the general public are in- formed as to their action. There is no law prohibiting women from filling any offices in the State and it has been said that a really determined effort could place a woman even in that of chief executive. The office 1 The day before a joint session of the two Houses had been held that they might listen to the reading of a poem written for the occasion by one of the oldest members of the association, Mrs. Alice Polk Hill.