The Woman's Vote in National Elections

Report Outline
Woman Suffrage and Prohibition Movements
Strategic Mobilization of Women's Votes
Voting Habits of American Women

Fifty eight million American citizens will be eligible to qualify under the election laws of the states and vote in the presidential election of 1928. Of this number of potential voters, 28,500,000, or about 49 per cent, are women.

In presidential elections since the nation-wide enfranchisement of women in 1920, net more than 35 to 40 per cent of the women eligible have gone to the polls. The National League of Women Voters, in a recent address to the President, admitted “the truth of the popular belief that in non-voting women are the worst offenders.” However, it is recognized by national politicians, notwithstanding the poor record made by the woman voters, that in any presidential election which presented issues by which they were thoroughly aroused—and were aligned on one side in predominant numbers, while the men were fairly evenly divided—the result would be determined by the woman's vote.

Seven years ago, in the presidential campaign which immediately followed the adoption of the nineteenth amendment, the woman's vote was regarded as a leading political problem, and the parties keenly competed for the support of the new voters. Politicians reported, however, upon their return to Washington and the state capitals after the election, that the enfranchisement of women, aside from increasing the size of the electorate, had shown no effects of which the parties need take serious account.