I received this email today and had to share.

It had pictures in it, but I don't know how to cut and paste them into this.

THIS IS MOVING. HOW QUICKLY WE FORGET.....IF ....WE EVER KNEW...... WHY
WOMEN SHOULD VOTE

This is the story of our Grandmothers and Great-grandmothers; they lived
only 90 years ago. Remember, it was not until 1920
that women were granted
the right to go to the polls and vote.

The women were innocent and defenseless, but they were jailed nonetheless
for picketing the White House, carrying signs asking for the vote. And by the
end of the night, they were barely alive. Forty prison guards wielding clubs and
their warden's blessing went on a rampage against the 33 women wrongly convicted
of 'obstructing sidewalk traffic.'

(Lucy Burns)They beat Lucy Burns, chained her hands to the cell bars above
her head and left her hanging for the night, bleeding and gasping for air.

(Dora Lewis) They hurled Dora Lewis into a dark cell, smashed her head
against an iron bed and knocked her out cold. Her cellmate, Alice Cosu, thought
Lewis was dead and suffered a heart attack. Additional affidavits describe the
guards grabbing, dragging, beating, choking, slamming, pinching, twisting and
kicking the women.

Thus unfolded the 'Night of Terror' on Nov. 15, 1917, when the warden at
the Occoquan Workhouse in Virginia ordered his guards to teach a lesson to the
suffragists imprisoned there because they dared to picket Woodrow Wilson's White
House for the right to vote. For weeks, the women's only water came from an open
pail. Their food--all of it colorless slop--was infested with worms.

(Alice Paul) When one of the leaders, Alice Paul, embarked on a hunger
strike, they tied her to a chair, forced a tube down her throat and poured
liquid into her until she vomited. She was tortured like this for weeks until
word was smuggled out to the press. http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/collections/suffrage/nwp/prisoners.pdf

So, refresh my memory. Some women won't vote this year because- -why,
exactly? We have carpool duties? We have to get to work? Our vote doesn't
matter? It's raining?Last week, I went to a sparsely attended screening of HBO's
new movie 'Iron Jawed Angels.' It is a graphic depiction of the battle these
women waged so that I could pull the curtain at the polling booth and have my
say. I am ashamed to say I needed the reminder.All these years later, voter
registration is still my passion. But the actual act of voting had become less
personal for me, more rote. Frankly, voting often felt more like an obligation
than a privilege. Sometimes it was inconvenient.My friend Wendy, who is my age
and studied women's history, saw the HBO movie, too. When she stopped by my desk
to talk about it, she looked angry. She was--with herself. 'One thought kept
coming back to me as I watched that movie,' she said. 'What would those women
think of the way I use, or don't use, my right to vote? All of us take it for
granted now, not just younger women, but those of us who did seek to learn.' The
right to vote, she said, had become valuable to her 'all over again.'HBO
released the movie on video and DVD . I wish all history, social studies and
government teachers would include the movie in their curriculum I want it shown
on Bunco night, too, and anywhere else women gather. I realize this isn't our
usual idea of socializing, but we are not voting in the numbers that we should
be, and I think a little shock therapy is in order.It is jarring to watch
Woodrow Wilson and his cronies try to persuade a psychiatrist to declare Alice
Paul insane so that she could be permanently institutionalized. And it is
inspiring to watch the doctor refuse. Alice Paul was strong, he said, and brave.
That didn't make her crazy.The doctor admonished the men: 'Courage in women is
often mistaken for insanity.' Please, if you are so inclined, pass this on to
all the women you know. We need to get out and vote and use this right that was
fought so hard for by these very courageous women. Whether you vote democratic,
republican or independent party - remember to vote.History is being made.