Note 140 — Chapter XX
Reading edition
As soon as the certificate was despatched Mrs. Catt left Nashville, where she had been for six weeks, accompanied by Mrs. Harriet Taylor Upton, vice-chairman of the National Republican Executive Committee; Miss Charl Williams, vice-chairman of the Democratic National Committee, and Miss Marjorie Shuler, the National Association's chairman of publicity, who had been working with her during this time. They went to Washington, called on the President and Secretary of State and in the evening addressed an enthusiastic mass meeting that filled the largest theater to overflowing. Secretary Colby represented President Wilson, from whom he brought this message:
"Will you take the opportunity to say to my fellow citizens that I deem it one of the greatest honors of my life that this great event, the ratification of this amendment, should have occurred during the period of my administration. Nothing has given me more pleasure than the privilege that has been mine to do what I could to advance the cause of ratification and to hasten the day when the womanhood of America would be recognized by the nation on the equal footing of citizenship that it deserves."
From Washington the women, joined by others, went to New York, where Governor Alfred E. Smith was waiting at the station and said in greeting Mrs. Catt: "I am here on behalf of the people of the State of New York to convey congratulations to you on your great victory for the motherhood of America." [See frontispiece Volume VI.]