Wyoming Almanac of Politics

July 4, 2008

Back from the History of Wyoming June Tour 

For the first time in several years, I took a systematic tour across a big chunk of Wyoming during June. (I've been everywhere in Wyoming in recent years, but one destination at a time mostly). This time, it was on a tour bus with 36 other people in a very well-planned "History of Wyoming" tour of the state expertly organized by the UW Outreach School. I was the history guide.

The itinerary for the seven-day trip included stops of many significant historic sites, but even for that length of time, many places and a big piece of Wyoming (the southwest quarter) had to be left off.

Biggest surprise? The lush green grass across the Powder River Basin, the Big Horn Basin and even along the eastern border. While Casper-Shoshoni didn't look a lot like Ireland, there were parts of northern Niobrara County and Johnson County that did (and not through one's sunglasses either). The last time I remember it as green was in the middle 1970s.

The weather wasn't entirely kind to our tour. On June 13, when we were about to depart Cody for Mammoth Hot Springs in the Park, we were told that both passes in the Park were closed by snow--eights inches, according to one report. We had to settle for a quiet day at Old Faithful and, unfortunately, skip the history of old Fort Yellowstone on the site of Mammoth.

I was surprised that most of my fellow travelers were UW alumni, some from as far away as Oklahoma and Minnesota. Consequently, it was no wonder that, at any given site, one of the travelers would have specific insider knowledge that she/he would share with the rest of us. At every destination, we met or renewed acquaintance with many people, demonstrating once again Wyoming's one degree of separation. Why would anyone be surprised that the flagger on the highway construction project on Togwotee Pass was one of my students? Or that the museum director at Meeteetse's nicely organized Charles Belden museum was the mother of my former debate partner in high school?  Nearly everyone else had similar spontaneous meetings with old friends along the way.

One regret is that we didn't get to see everything on the schedule. I made some miscalculations about how long we'd stay at each historic site, thus having to leave off the last site or two on the planned itinerary on a couple of days. No matter how often I travel my state, I'm always learning more about it.  Maybe, if the interest exists, we can do it again next June.

 WYOMING ALMANAC REVIEW:

POLITICS IN WYOMING HISTORY 

When Wyoming Almost Repealed Women Suffrage

The first Territorial Legislature in 1869 passed the suffrage bill, giving women the right to vote for the first time anywhere in America. But it almost didn’t stay that way. Two years later, the second legislature nearly repealed the law. In fact, repeal failed by just one vote.

William Bright, the South Pass City Democrat who introduced the suffrage bill in 1869, didn’t run for re-election, but Ben Sheeks, his South Pass City colleague who opposed the suffrage bill in 1869, did win another term.  Sheeks was the only incumbent House member in the second legislature.      

Just as soon as the second legislature convened, newly elected Uinta County House member C. E. Castle said he intended to get the suffrage law repealed.

Why did the 2^nd legislature try to repeal women suffrage?  Castle did not state a reason, but historian Dr. T. A. Larson claimed it was because of alcohol.  Many men believed that women voters favored “Sunday closing” of saloons, a very unpopular move in the hard-drinking railroad towns in southern Wyoming.

Gov. John A. Campbell, the man who made history on Dec. 10, 1869, by signing the suffrage act into law, urged legislators not to repeal the law. “…women have voted in the territory, served on juries, and held office,” Campbell pointed out. “It is simple justice to say that the women entering, for the first time in the history of the country, upon these new and untried duties, have conducted themselves in every respect with as much tact, sound judgment, and good sense, as men.

Nonetheless, Castle introduced the repeal. The next day repeal passed the House by a vote of nine to three with one member absent and not voting. When the bill went to the Council, it passed there by a narrower vote of 5-4. It looked like Wyoming’s two-year experiment with women suffrage would be coming to an end.

But Gov. Campbell had other ideas. He vetoed the repeal attempt, returning the bill to the House. Both houses needed two-thirds votes to override and House Speaker Ben Sheets immediately sought to override the veto. On Dec. 9, just a day short of two years since Wyoming had become the first place to give women equal rights, nine legislators voted to override the governor’s veto--voting to repeal women suffrage.  Just two voted “no” while two others were absent and not voting. The House had mustered the necessary two-thirds vote. The veto override went to the Council.

There, on the 32^nd day of the session, the five Council members seeking to repeal suffrage voted to override the governor’s veto. The four who had voted against the bill when it first came before the Council again voted to keep women suffrage.   The override effort failed, falling just one vote short of the necessary two-thirds.

The opponents of women suffrage had taken their best shot and narrowly lost—by one vote. The four supporters of suffrage in the Council held firm and Campbell’s veto kept women suffrage part of the territory’s laws.

In 1873, Campbell told the legislators in his joint message: “. “Two years more of observation of the practical working of the system have only served to deepen my conviction that what we, in this Territory, have done, has been well done, and that our system of impartial suffrage is an unqualified success.”

From that day on, no serious effort was ever mounted to repeal the suffrage law, granting women the vote and equal political rights. Wyoming entered the Union on July 10, 1890, and embedded in its Constitution was the suffrage bill in the form of Article 6, Section 1, guaranteeing equal political rights for all.

First Woman to Vote in America Lived in Laramie  

In coming weeks, we will highlight 52 brief biographies of little-known historical figures from Wyoming history.  This weekly series will be based on original research done in the collections of the American Heritage Center, University of Wyoming, and the Wyoming State Archives collections in Cheyenne.  Political commentaries will continue, but these historical features will be interspersed with those entries on current events and opinions.

Louisa Swain was the first woman to vote in a general election in the United States. She voted on Sept. 6, 1870, in Laramie.

Born Louisa Gardner in Norfolk, Va., in 1801, she was the daughter of a sea captain who was lost at sea while she was a child. She and her mother moved to Charleston, S. C., where her mother died. Orphaned, Louisa went to Baltimore to live with an uncle, Ephraim Gardner. While in Baltimore, she met and, in 1821, married Stephen Swain who operated a chair factory. When their fourth child was six weeks old, Stephen Swain sold the chair factory and the family moved, first to Zanesville, Ohio, and later to Indiana. Soon after their son Alfred and his young family moved to the new town of Laramie, Wyoming, in 1869, the Swains joined them.

On Sept. 6, 1870, Louisa Swain rose early, put on her apron, shawl and bonnet, and walked downtown with a tin pail in order to purchase yeast from a merchant. She walked by the polling place and concluded she would vote while she was there. The polling place had not yet officially opened, but election officials asked her to come in and cast her ballot. She was described by a Laramie newspaper as "a gentle white-haired housewife, Quakerish in appearance." (Laramie Daily Sentinel, September 7, 1870). She was 69 years old when she cast the first ballot by any woman in the United States in a general election.

Soon after the election, Stephen and Louisa Swain left Laramie and returned to Maryland to live near a daughter. Stephen died Oct. 6, 1872, in Maryland. Louisa died Jan. 25, 1880, in Lutherville, Maryland. Her body was buried in the Friends Burying Ground, Harford Road, Lutherville. A statue in her honor, by sculptor John Baker, was dedicated in front of the Women's History House, Laramie, Wyoming, in 2005.

 Dec. 26, 2007

New Coal Gasification Project Will Force School Board to Reopen High School/Junior High in Medicine Bow 

The new coal gasification project announced earlier this month ought to bring many people back to the towns of eastern Carbon County--to places emptied during the last bust of the 1980s, In at least one case, Medicine Bow, the town declined even further because of poor decisions by school officials. In coming months, new residents will need houses to live in, stores to patronize, and schools to educate their children. Recipients of such growth likely will include Hanna and Rock River, but in the center nearest the project site is Medicine Bow.

Fortunately, the Medicine Bow school building, closed as a high school and junior high arbitrarily back in 1998 by the absentee-controlled Carbon County School District #2 board, remains standing.  In coming months, the school board may have a chance to reconsider that poorly made plan and reopen the Medicine Bow High School and junior high. Fortunately for quality education, this board is not made up of the same members as the one that so callously destroyed Medicine Bow by arbitrarily closing the school back in '98.

It isn't too late to correct the bad mistake. The board ought to plan now to reopen the school in time to meet the projected educational needs. Such a move will give the town another chance at growth, but more important, provide the opportunity for children of workers on the coal gasification plant to be educated close to home. Today's education theorists now believe smaller schools are better than mega-schools.  Combine that pedagogical truth with the much higher costs of fuel--both for workers who may decide to live far away if there is no school or school buses, needed to transport students to distant schools, and the decision ought to be clear. With any luck, the new board will take action now. Reopening Medicine Bow's schools will be a win for everyone all the way around.

Who We Are

Wyoming Politics: An Almanac Blog of Current Events, History and Opinion  The opinions expressed here are the views of Phil Roberts and do not represent the views of his university, his family, or any political party, interest group or candidate.

For in-depth information about Wyoming history, check Phil's University webpage: http://uwacadweb.uwyo.edu/ROBERTSHISTORY/

Books by Phil Roberts

Readings in Wyoming History, edited by Phil Roberts, is a book consisting of essays by numerous historians covering various aspects of Wyoming history. It is primarily designed as a book for instruction in Wyoming history. The 5th revised edition will be available soon.

A Penny for the Governor, A Dollar for Uncle Sam: Taxation History of Washington. (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2002). The book tells the story of why Washington is one of just seven states not having an income tax and how politics has influenced tax policy in that Northwest state since the Civil War. 

Wyoming Almanac, soon to be released in its sixth revised edition, is a book of facts about the Equality State/Cowboy State. It has no connection to this site except that Phil Roberts is a co-editor of the book, along with his two brothers, David L. Roberts and Steven L. Roberts.

David is assistant professor of journalism at Missouri Valley College and former publisher/editor of the Medicine Bow Post, a prize-winning weekly newspaper he founded in 1977 in Medicine Bow, Wyoming. Steven L. Roberts works for the U. S. Postal Service in Denver. He formerly taught high school and coached in Wyoming high schools. 

Wyoming Politics: An Almanac Blog of Current Events, History and Opinion is a website featuring comment and opinion about everything involving Wyoming. Some pages contain factual data, history, or feature stories about the state. Primarily, however, this site presents observations and analysis of Wyoming politics, mostly from a historical perspective, written by a long-term observer of that subject.