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Alice Paul was born
Alice was the oldest of her and her sibling and spent life on the “home farm” which influence her work as an adult. She was raised with a high focus on her religion as a Hicksite Quakers, Alice’s parents raised her with a belief in gender equality, and the need to work for the betterment of society. -
Alice moved to England
Alice moved to England to further her education in Social work but this is where she gained her passion for working within the Women's equality movement. During her time in England she worked along side women leaders such as Christabel Pankhurst, she was imprisoned, and endured forced feedings while incarcerated because of hunger strikes she would partake in. -
Returned to the United States and joined the NAWSA
Alice began attending school at the University of Pennsylvania after arriving to the U.S, she then got involved with the National American Women’s Suffrage Association (NAWSA). She was quickly appointed as head of the Congressional Committee in charge of working for a federal suffrage amendment, a secondary goal to the NAWSA leadership. -
Womens suffrage march of 1913
With little funding Alice Paul and co-activist Lucy Burns organized an event to gain national attention;a massive parade by led by women that would interrupt the presidential inauguration of Woodrow Wilson’s . The scene turned ugly when male onlookers attacked the suffragists; first with verbal insults and then with physical violence. The following day, Alice’s group of suffragists made headlines and suffrage became a popular topic of discussion among politicians and the general public alike. -
Formation of National Woman's Party (Silent sentinels)
When discussing strategies with the president of NAWSA, Alice came to realize that her goals of activism were very different since she no longer wanted to focus on ending suffrage at the state level but at a National level. Alice & her close colleagues left the NAWSA and created the National Woman's Party which focused on change at a federal level putting blame specifically on Woodrow Wilson & the democratic party for the lack of change in regards to women's rights. -
Occoquan Workhouse Imprisonment controversy
When the U.S got involved many believed that the protesting would stop but as it continued and becoming more extreme women protesters were then incarcerated. News got out that prison conditions for the imprisoned women were extremely handouts and hunger strikes were happening; the press, politicians, and the public began demanding the women’s release. Sympathy for the prisoners brought many to support the cause. -
19th Amendment was ratified
Tennessee ratified the 19th Amendment. Six days later, Secretary of State Colby certified the ratification, and American women gained the right to vote after a seventy-two year battle. August 26th is now celebrated as Women’s Equality Day in the United States. -
Introduction of Equal Rights Amendment
In 1923, at the Seneca Falls Convention, Paul announced that she would be working for a new constitutional amendment, this amendment called for absolute equality stating, “Men and women shall have equal rights throughout the United States and every place subject to its jurisdiction." In 1943, the ERA was rewritten and dubbed the “Alice Paul Amendment.” The amendment read, “Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.” -
World Woman's Party
She began the World Woman’s Party (WWP), headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland, in 1938. The WWP worked alongside the League of Nations for the inclusion of gender equality into the United Nations Charter and the establishment of the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women. -
Sexual Discrimination clause added
Alice Paul moved back to the United States in 1941 and regained activism in American women’s issues. She led a group that was successful in adding a sexual discrimination clause to Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. -
Equal Rights Amendment Passed
On March 22, 1972, the Senate passed the Equal Rights Amendment to the United States Constitution, which proposed banning discrimination based on sex. -
Alice Paul death
She continued to work out of the National Woman’s party headquarters in Washington, D.C., until failing health forced her to relocate to the Connecticut countryside in 1972. Alice Paul passed from a stroke in Moorestown, New Jersey in 1977.
