Middle West Review

Numerous women’s history scholars have rejected the once popular notion that women’s political activities were dormant between suffrage and the 1960s women’s movement. These historians, including Catherine E. Rymph and Amy Swerdlow among several others, have begun documenting the diverse political activities of women between the 1920s and 1950s. However, few have considered regionalism in their analysis, with the notable exception of Kathleen A. Laughlin’s analysis of Minnesota’s Federation of Business and Professional Women’s Clubs. Similar to Laughlin, Jayne Morris-Crowther’s [End Page 116] local study of 1920s Detroit women’s clubs resists a universal history of women’s clubs. During the 1920s, as Detroit rapidly industrialized and urbanized, over fifty thousand women in 107 clubs formed the Detroit Federation of Women’s Clubs. Morris-Crowther finds that white and black clubwomen confronted male-dominated politics by challenging notions of who should participate in public life and which issues should be advocated.

After gaining the right to vote Detroit women continued to pursue political participation through club membership. Prior to suffrage, women’s clubs offered women an opportunity to participate in civic activism. Morris-Crowther finds that after suffrage Detroit clubwomen carried on club work as a means of establishing their place in male-dominated Detroit politics. They continued to employ grassroots methods, such as letter writing, speeches, and door-to-door campaigns; however, they now utilized the vote to make political demands on the city, county, and state. Clubwomen encouraged women to vote with get-out-the-vote campaigns, hosted lectures and debates in order to educate women voters on the issues, and worked to guarantee voting rights, especially for black women. Although clubwomen encouraged Detroit women to vote, they seldom advocated for women holding office.

Rather than persuade women to pursue public office, Detroit clubwomen adopted traditional gender roles. Like many American women, they linked their participation in public life to the private sphere. During the 1920s Detroit immigration boomed, and the city quickly urbanized and industrialized. According to Morris-Crowther, clubwomen threatened by these changes seized this opportunity to expand their public activity. They pursued “womanly” politics and engaged in municipal housekeeping by advocating city sanitation, prison reform, Americanization, and changes in law enforcement, among other issues. Emphasizing the connection between family life and the community, they advocated for school board reform and child welfare. Clubwomen believed women’s main responsibility was raising good citizens, and as educated and elite white women, they were best suited for determining how to raise Detroit’s children. Morris-Crowther argues that by narrowly defining middle class morality according to white clubwomen’s beliefs, they failed to recognize that they did not speak for all women.

Most often white Detroit clubwomen could not speak for black women. The Great Migration brought high numbers of southern black migrants into industrial midwestern cities. This resulted in racial tensions in Detroit, which was already overcrowded by immigrants. Upper middle class black [End Page 117] women formed clubs to advocate for issues important to Detroit’s black community, including voting rights and an anti-lynching campaign, but black clubwomen were more focused on gaining the white communities’ respect. Black clubwomen sought to earn society’s approval by adhering to white clubwomen’s notions of middle class morality, which alienated lower class black women from the club movement. Similar to white clubwomen, Morris-Crowther suggests that Detroit’s black clubwomen inaccurately believed they spoke for all black women.

Detroit clubwomen often met with limited success. Their inability to appeal to all women, white and black clubwomen’s reluctance to work together, and their failure to gain men’s respect hindered their efforts. Furthermore, Morris-Crowther finds that Detroit clubwomen’s choice to pursue public policies stemming from private needs further limited women’s political involvement. She concludes, “Detroit women both black and white emerged from the 1920s as influential, but seldom...