Two Suffrage Sashes

Although sashes were worn for a variety of reasons (a NAWSA suffrage supplies catalog terms them “usher sashes”) they are most commonly associated with the massive parades that took place after Woodrow Wilson’s inauguration in 1913.  They were big enough so that onlookers could see clearly, as was not the case with buttons and ribbons, their “Votes for Women” message. But, in their display of color, they also served another purpose, that of advertising the organization of the wearer. 

Color was an extremely important part of the spectacle of suffrage parades and demonstrations, and each major group had its own distinctive official colors that set it apart from other such organizations.  The black on yellow scheme of the top sash indicates that it was the product of NAWSA or one of its local affiliates, in this case probably the Woman Suffrage Party of New York.  The purple, green, and white colors of the bottom sash were those of the Women’s Political Union, a more aggressively minded group, formed originally in 1907 by Harriot Stanton Blatch, daughter of Elizabeth Cady Stanton, as the Equality League of Self-Supporting Women.