50 Alice Paul Quotes from the Women’s Suffrage Movement

You’ll hear the passion of her work through these Alice Paul quotes.

Alice Paul was a leading voice during the women’s suffrage movement and her work helped lead to the passage of the U.S. Constitution’s 19th Amendment which grants women the right to vote.

Alice was the daughter of a Quaker family who supported gender equality and issues such as education for women. She saw the example of her mother who was a suffragist.

Eventually, Alice took up the battle as well and dedicated her entire life to the work. You can see how passionate she was about her life’s mission through these Alice Paul quotes.

Don’t forget to also check out these Dorothy Day quotes from the revolutionary activist.

Famous Alice Paul Quotes about Women Empowerment and Gender Equality

1. “There will never be a new world order until women are a part of it.” – Alice Paul

2. “We women of America tell you that America is not a democracy. Twenty million women are denied the right to vote.” – Alice Paul

3. “The Woman’s Party is made up of women of all races, creeds, and nationalities who are united on the one program of working to raise the status of women.” – Alice Paul

4. “This world crisis came about without women having anything to do with it. If the women of the world had not been excluded from world affairs, things today might have been different.” – Alice Paul

5. “I never doubted that equal rights was the right direction. Most reforms, most problems are complicated.” – Alice Paul

6. “Mr. President, how long must women wait to get their liberty? Let us have the rights we deserve.” – Alice Paul

7. “Men and women shall have equal rights throughout the United States and every place subject to its jurisdiction.” – Alice Paul

8. “I think if we get freedom for women, then they are probably going to do a lot of things that I wish they wouldn’t do. But it seems to me that isn’t our business to say what they should do with it. It is our business to see that they get it.” – Alice Paul

9. “It was a feeling of loyalty to our own sex and an enthusiasm to have every degradation that was put upon our sex removed.” – Alice Paul

10. “All the girls planned to start in and support themselves—and you know it wasn’t so general then for girls to support themselves.” – Alice Paul

11. “To me, there is nothing complicated about ordinary equality.” – Alice Paul

12. “There is danger that because of a great victory women will believe their whole struggle for independence ended. They have still far to go.” – Alice Paul

13. “I think that American women are further along than any other women in the world. But you can’t have peace in a world in which some women or some men or some nations are at different stages of development.” – Alice Paul

14. “It has become impossible to forget ‘votes for women,’ just as it was impossible to forget the reformation of Luther.” – Alice Paul

15. “I have joined the ‘suffragettes’ – the militant party on the woman suffrage question.” – Alice Paul

16. “Nobody ever dreamt that women—you were always seeing these Elks and people going around in processions—but they never thought of women doing such a thing. And so there really was a great interest in it.” – Alice Paul

Alice Paul Quotes about Courage, Wisdom, and Knowledge

17. “When you put your hand to the plow, you can’t put it down until you get to the end of the row.” – Alice Paul

18. “I will settle down & teach for the rest of my days.” – Alice Paul

19. “I read just endlessly, ceaselessly, almost every book, it seems!” – Alice Paul

20. “When you’re young, when you’ve never done anything very much on your own, you imagine that it won’t be so hard.” – Alice Paul

21. “It may be an instinct, it is with me anyway, when you’re presenting something to the world, to make it as beautiful as you can.” – Alice Paul

22. “Courage in women is often mistaken for insanity.” – Alice Paul

23. “Each of us puts in one little stone, and then you get a great mosaic at the end.” – Alice Paul

24. “Isn’t memory a strange thing?” – Alice Paul

25. “I don’t think there would be much use in my doing this because whether I studied or not I will always read.” – Alice Paul

26. “I had learned enough to know that I didn’t know anything about this field, the political and economic field which, if I had known it existed in the beginning, I think I would have majored in always because that just was what I really was interested in.” – Alice Paul

27. “I’ve done all I can on composing, and now the awful problem, with my complete lack of oratorical knowledge or any oratorical power, how will I deliver it outdoors to all these people?” – Alice Paul

28. “You know if you feel some group that’s your group is the underdog you want to try to help; it’s natural I guess for everybody.” – Alice Paul

29. “I wanted to learn what life was like, as many aspects as I could.” – Alice Paul

30. “I didn’t think I was much of a success, but anyway I tried.” – Alice Paul

Alice Paul Quotes and Sayings about Politics and Society

31. “It is better, as far as getting the vote is concerned, I believe, to have a small, united group than an immense debating society.” – Alice Paul

32. “I always feel the movement is a sort of mosaic.” – Alice Paul

33. “To me, it was shocking that a government of men could look with such extreme contempt on a movement that was asking nothing except such a simple little thing as the right to vote.” – Alice Paul

34. “Too many terms corrupts politicians so they only want to be reelected.” – Alice Paul

35. “Abortion is the ultimate exploitation of women.” – Alice Paul

36. “Unless women are prepared to fight politically they must be content to be ignored politically.” – Alice Paul

37. “It occurred to me that I just didn’t see how I could go ahead and continue to eat meat. It just seemed so… cannibalistic to me. And so, I’m a vegetarian, and I have been ever since.” – Alice Paul

38. “Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.” – Alice Paul

39. “The building up of a new, far-reaching system of inspection on the question of equal pay, with power to investigate every business in the United States, administered by a colossal new government agency with vast enforcement powers, would not be helpful to women, as far as I can see.” – Alice Paul

40. “I know my father believed and my mother believed in and supported the suffrage movement, and I remember my mother taking me to suffrage meetings held in the home of a Quaker family that lived not far from us.” – Alice Paul

41. “The President can pardon us again… and again and again, but… picketing will continue, and sooner or later, he will have to do something about it.” – Alice Paul

Other Famous Alice Paul quotes from the Women’s Suffrage Movement

42. “People wouldn’t pay enough and didn’t want to pay enough.” – Alice Paul

43. “I knew in a very short time I was never going to be a social worker because I could see that social workers were not doing much good in the world. That’s what I thought anyway.” – Alice Paul

44. “Every person had his own seat, always.” – Alice Paul

45. “It was sort of a generation—I think maybe people are marrying in colleges now much more than they were then.” – Alice Paul

46. “I thought I got a very thorough idea of the poverty situation in a big city.” – Alice Paul

47. “I never heard of anybody advocating anything either radical or not radical, it was so purely scholarly.” – Alice Paul

48. “This was just—you felt that you were living the life and that you could see what the life of the ordinary person and all the handicaps and troubles and so on that they had.” – Alice Paul

49. “So sad, you know, not to keep up all your connections with these people that you think we’re so wonderful.” – Alice Paul

50. “Just the natural thing that comes in all political campaigns when you desperately want to get before the people; it is about all you can do.” – Alice Paul

What did you learn from these Alice Paul quotes?

This movement and the fight for equality was one of the most important things to Alice Paul. The women she was working shoulder to shoulder with were most important to her and she never married.

She was well educated, especially for a woman during the early 1900s, even earning two doctorates. While her personality was originally known as being on the quieter side, she learned how to step into the leadership role.

She was arrested several times for her active role in public demonstrations and when in jail would continue to spread her message through hunger strikes. She supported and worked for the movement in both England and America, even organizing a parade that more than 8,000 women marched in.

What’s your biggest takeaway from these Alice Paul quotes and sayings? Do you have any other favorite quotes to add? Let us know in the comment section below.

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