The Inevitable an Analysis of Carrie Chapman Catts...

The Inevitable: An Analysis of Carrie Chapman Catt’s Address to the United States Congress (1917) In November 1917, Carrie Chapman Catt, leader of National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA), gave an address to the United States Congress expressing her belief that woman’s suffrage was inevitable, and requesting that Congress see it as such and vote to pass the amendment. Catt’s speech was based on facts and figures (ethos) from our own country’s history, logic, reasoning, and common sense (logos); it was hard for any man to argue with, which was her goal. Catt had given hundreds of speeches in her life, and in this case, she planned her approach to be factual and unemotional to get through to those that thought of women as†¦show more content†¦3. The leadership of the United States in world democracy compels the enfranchisement of its own women. Catt tells much of what is going on in the war, at the time, and all the nations that are fighting for democracy, and lists many of the countries that were amidst giving women the right to vote (befo re the United States, their example of democracy). â€Å"It is true; democracy, votes for men and votes for women, making slow but certain progress in 1914, have suddenly become established facts in many lands in 1917. Already our one-time Mother Country has become the standard bearer of our Americanisms, the principles she once denied, and—cynical fact—Great Britain, not the United States, is now leading the world on to the coming democracy. Any man who has red American blood in his veins, any man who has gloried in our history and has rejoiced that our land was the leader of world democracy, will share with us the humbled national pride that our country has so long delayed action upon this question that another country has beaten us in what we thought was our especial world mission.† (Catt, 1917) Catt then addresses why they have chosen the federal route as opposed to the state route, â€Å"(1) Because it is the quickest process and justice demands immediate action, (2) Every other country dignifies woman suffrage as a national question. Even Canada and Australia, composed of self-governing states like our own, so regard it. Were