Carrie Chapman Catt Quotes

There are whole precincts of voters in this country whose united intelligence does not equal that of one representative American woman.

White supremacy will be strengthened, not weakened, by women's suffrage.

In the adjustment of the new order of things, we women demand an equal voice; we shall accept nothing less.

For two generations groups of women have given their lives and their fortunes to secure the vote for the sex and hundreds of thousands of other women are now giving all the time at their command. No class of men in our own or any other country has made one-tenth the effort nor sacrificed one-tenth as much for the vote.

Just as the world war is no white man's war, but every man's war, so is the struggle for woman suffrage no white woman's struggle, but every woman's struggle.

The woman suffrage movement in the United States was a movement of the spirit of the Revolution which was striving to hold the nation to the ideals which won independence.

The vote is the emblem of your equality, women of America, the guarantee of your liberty.

Everybody counts in applying democracy. And there will never be a true democracy until every responsible and law-abiding adult in it, without regard to race, sex, color or creed has his or her own inalienable and unpurchasable voice in government.

More powerful than kings and armies is an idea whose time has come to move.

The world taught women nothing skillful and then said her work was valueless. It permitted her no opinions and said she did not know how to think. It forbade her to speak in public and said the sex had no orators. It denied her the schools, and said the sex had no genius. It robbed her of every vestige of responsibility, and then called her weak. It taught her that every pleasure must come as a favor from men and when, to gain it, she decked herself in paint and fine feathers, as she had been taught to do, it called her vain.

To the wrongs that need resistance,
To the right that needs assistance,
To the future in the distance,
Give yourselves.

The system which admits the unworthy to the vote provided they are men, and shuts out the worthy provided they are women, is so unjust and illogical that its perpetuation is a sad reflection upon American thinking.

When a just cause reaches its flood-tide ... whatever stands in its way must fall before its overwhelming force.

Do not stand in the way of the next step in human progress. No one living who reads the signs of the times but realizes that woman suffrage must come. We are working for the ballot as a matter of justice and as a step for human betterment.

The answer to one is the answer to all. Government by 'the people' is expedient or it is not. If it is expedient, then obviously all the people must be included.

Roll up your sleeves, set your mind to making history, and wage such a fight for liberty that the whole world will respect our sex.

No written law has ever been more binding than unwritten custom supported by popular opinion.

The belief that we are defending the highest good of the mothers of our race and the ultimate welfare of society makes every sacrifice seem trivial, every duty a pleasure.

The struggle for the vote was an effort to bring men to feel less superior and women to feel less inferior.

If we learn from the experience, there is no failure, only delayed victory.

The vote has been costly. Prize it ... understand what it means and what it can do for your country.