[United States Statutes at Large, Volume 130, 114th Congress, 2nd Session]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

 
Proclamation 9423 of April 12, 2016

Establishment of the Belmont-Paul Women's Equality National Monument

By the President of the United States of America

A Proclamation

The Sewall-Belmont House (House), located at 144 Constitution Avenue,
Northeast, in Washington, D.C.--a few steps from the U.S. Capitol--has
been home to the National Woman's Party (NWP) since 1929. From this
House, the NWP's founder Alice Paul wrote new language in 1943 for the
Equal Rights Amendment, which became known as the ``Alice Paul
Amendment,'' and led the fight for its passage in the Congress. From
here, throughout the 20th century, Paul and the NWP drafted more than
600 pieces of legislation in support of equal rights and advocated
tirelessly for women's political, social, and economic equality not just
in the United States but also internationally.
While the House's role in women's history makes it a nationally
significant resource, the building itself has an interesting past.
Robert Sewall constructed the House on Jenkins Hill, known today as
Capitol Hill, around 1800. Secretary of the Treasury Albert Gallatin
used the House during the Jefferson Administration, and the House was
the site of the only resistance to the British invasion of Washington,
D.C., during the War of 1812. In retaliation, the British set fire to
the House, but by 1820, Sewall had rebuilt it. The House remained in the
Sewall family until 1922, when it was acquired by Vermont Senator Porter
Dale.
The NWP purchased the House in 1929 to serve as its headquarters. The
NWP named it the ``Alva Belmont House'' in honor of its former president
and major benefactor who had helped purchase the NWP's previous
headquarters. A prominent suffragist herself, Belmont said of the new
headquarters, ``may it stand for years and years to come, tell

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ing of the work that the women of the United States have accomplished;
the example we have given foreign nations; and our determination that
they shall be--as ourselves--free citizens, recognized as the equals of
men.'' What is now called the Sewall-Belmont House became the staging
ground for the NWP's advocacy for an equal rights amendment and other
significant domestic and international action for women's equality.
Alice Paul, the women's suffrage and equal rights leader closely
associated with the Sewall-Belmont House, led the NWP from its
headquarters at the House from 1929 to 1972. A Quaker and well educated,
before her work in the United States, Paul had been inspired by the
women's suffrage movement in Britain in the early 20th century. During
her years there from 1907 to 1910, she joined with Emmeline Pankhurst,
her daughters, and other suffragettes to secure the vote for British
women. Paul's participation in meetings, demonstrations, and depositions
to Parliament led to multiple arrests, hunger strikes, and force-
feedings.
Paul brought home her focus on women's suffrage when she returned to the
United States in 1910. After earning a Ph.D. in economics at the
University of Pennsylvania in 1912, she devoted herself to the American
suffrage movement. She feared that the movement was waning at the
national level because efforts had shifted to State suffrage. Paul
believed that the movement needed to concentrate on the passage of a
Federal suffrage amendment to the United States Constitution.
Paul became a member of the National American Woman Suffrage Association
(NAWSA) and by 1912 served as the chair of its Congressional Committee
in Washington, D.C. In 1913, she and Lucy Burns created a larger
organization, the Congressional Union of Woman Suffrage, which soon
disagreed with NAWSA over tactics. The Congressional Union split from
NAWSA in 1914 and evolved into the NWP through steps taken in 1916 and
1917.
Paul was the most prominent figure in the final phase of the battle for
the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, ratified in
1920, granting women the right to vote. As part of her strategy, she
adopted the philosophy to ``hold the party in power responsible'' from
her work on women's suffrage in Britain. The NWP withheld its support
from the existing political parties until women gained the right to
vote, and ``punished'' those parties in power that did not support
suffrage. In 1913, the day before Woodrow Wilson's first inauguration,
Paul organized a women's suffrage parade of more than 5,000 participants
from every State in the Union. Through a series of dramatic nonviolent
protests, the NWP demanded that President Wilson and the Congress
address women's issues. The NWP organized ``Silent Sentinels'' to stand
outside the White House holding banners inscribed with incendiary
phrases directed toward President Wilson. The colorful, spirited
suffrage marches, the suffrage songs, the violence the women faced as
they were physically attacked and had their banners torn from their
hands, the daily pickets and arrests at the White House, the recurring
jail time, the hunger strikes which resulted in force-feedings and
brutal prison conditions, the national speaking tours, and newspaper
headlines all created enormous public support for suffrage.
Through most of the last century, the NWP remained a leading advocate of
women's political, social, and economic equality. Following

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ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment, the NWP, under the leadership
of Alice Paul, turned its attention towards the larger issue of complete
equality of men and women under the law. Paul reorganized the NWP in
1922 to focus on eliminating all discrimination against women. In 1923,
at the 75th anniversary of the Seneca Falls Convention, the first
women's rights convention, Paul proposed an equal rights amendment to
the Constitution, which became known as the ``Lucretia Mott Amendment,''
and launched the campaign to win full equality for women. In 1943, Alice
Paul rewrote the amendment, which then became known as the ``Alice Paul
Amendment.'' What we now refer to as the ``Equal Rights Amendment'' was
introduced in every session of Congress from 1923 until it finally
passed in 1972, though it still has not been ratified by the required
majority: three-fourths of the States.
Throughout the 1920s and 1930s, the NWP drafted more than 600 pieces of
legislation in support of equal rights for women on the State and local
levels, including bills covering divorce and custody rights, jury
service, property rights, ability to enter into contracts, and the
retention of one's maiden name after marriage. It launched two major
``Women for Congress'' campaigns in 1924 and 1926 and lobbied for the
appointment of women to high Federal positions. The NWP also worked for
Federal and State ``blanket bills'' to ensure women equal rights and
helped change Federal laws to equalize nationality and citizenship laws
for women. The NWP fought successfully for the repeal of a statute that
prohibited Federal employees from working for the Federal Government if
their spouses also were Federal employees. The NWP helped eliminate many
of the sex discrimination clauses in the ``codes of fair competition''
established under the New Deal's National Recovery Administration, and
assisted in the adoption of the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938. Paul
and the NWP also played a role in getting language protecting women
included in the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
Alice Paul and the NWP did not limit their fight for women's rights to
domestic arenas but also became active in international feminism as
early as the 1920s. Among other actions, in 1938 Paul formed the World
Woman's Party, which served as the NWP's international organization. It
first assisted Jewish women fleeing the Holocaust and then became the
NWP's office for promoting equal rights for women around the world. The
NWP helped both Puerto Rican and Cuban women in seeking the vote, and in
1945 advocated successfully for the incorporation of language on women's
equality in the United Nations Charter and for the establishment of a
permanent United Nations Commission on the Status of Women.
The political strategies and tactics of Alice Paul and the NWP became a
blueprint for civil rights organizations and activities throughout the
20th century. In 1997, the NWP ceased to be a lobbying organization and
became a non-profit, educational organization. Today, the House tells
the story of a century of courageous activism by American women.
WHEREAS, section 320301 of title 54, United States Code (known as the
``Antiquities Act''), authorizes the President, in the President's
discretion, to declare by public proclamation historic landmarks,
historic and prehistoric structures, and other objects of historic or
scientific interest that are situated upon the lands owned or controlled
by the Fed

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eral Government to be national monuments, and to reserve as a part
thereof parcels of land, the limits of which in all cases shall be
confined to the smallest area compatible with the proper care and
management of the objects to be protected;
WHEREAS, in 1974, the Secretary of the Interior designated the Sewall-
Belmont House a National Historic Landmark for its association with
Alice Paul, the NWP, and the fight for equal rights, and later the same
year the Congress enacted legislation creating the Sewall-Belmont House
National Historic Site, an affiliated area of the National Park System;
WHEREAS, the National Park Service completed a study in November 2014,
which recommended that the Sewall-Belmont House become a unit of the
National Park System and operate through cooperative management between
the National Park Service and the NWP;
WHEREAS, for the purpose of establishing a national monument to be
administered by the National Park Service, the NWP has donated to the
Federal Government fee title to the Sewall-Belmont House and the
approximately 0.34 acres of land on which it is located;
WHEREAS, the National Park Service and the NWP agree that the NWP should
continue to own and manage its collection, which includes an extensive
library and archival and museum holdings relating to the women's
movement, and the NWP has indicated its intention to enter into
appropriate arrangements with the National Park Service that would
further the preservation of the permanent collection at the Sewall-
Belmont House and provide for cooperative interpretation and management
activities with the National Park Service;
WHEREAS, it is in the public interest to preserve and protect the
Sewall-Belmont House and the historic objects associated with it;
NOW, THEREFORE, I, BARACK OBAMA, President of the United States of
America, by the authority vested in me by section 320301 of title 54,
United States Code, hereby proclaim the objects identified above that
are situated upon lands and interests in lands owned or controlled by
the Federal Government to be the Belmont-Paul Women's Equality National
Monument (monument) and, for the purpose of protecting those objects,
reserve as a part thereof all lands and interests in lands owned or
controlled by the Federal Government within the boundaries described on
the accompanying map, which is attached to and forms a part of this
proclamation. The reserved Federal lands and interests in lands
encompass approximately 0.34 acres. The boundaries described on the
accompanying map are confined to the smallest area compatible with the
proper care and management of the objects to be protected.
All Federal lands and interests in lands within the boundaries described
on the accompanying map are hereby appropriated and withdrawn from all
forms of entry, location, selection, sale, or other disposition under
the public land laws, from location, entry, and patent under the mining
laws, and from disposition under all laws relating to mineral and
geothermal leasing.
The establishment of the monument is subject to valid existing rights.
The Secretary of the Interior (Secretary) shall manage the monument
through the National Park Service, pursuant to applicable legal authori

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ties, consistent with the purposes and provisions of this proclamation.
The Secretary shall prepare a management plan, with full public
involvement and in coordination with the NWP, within 3 years of the date
of this proclamation. The management plan shall ensure that the monument
fulfills the following purposes for the benefit of present and future
generations: (1) to preserve and protect the objects of historic
interest associated with the monument, and (2) to interpret the
monument's objects, resources, and values related to the women's rights
movement. The management plan shall, among other things, set forth the
desired relationship of the monument to other related resources,
programs, and organizations, both within and outside the National Park
System.
The National Park Service is directed to use applicable authorities to
seek to enter into agreements with others, and the NWP in particular, to
address common interests and promote management efficiencies, including
provision of visitor services, interpretation and education,
establishment and care of museum collections, and preservation of
historic objects.
Nothing in this proclamation shall be deemed to revoke any existing
withdrawal, reservation, or appropriation; however, the monument shall
be the dominant reservation.
Warning is hereby given to all unauthorized persons not to appropriate,
injure, destroy, or remove any feature of this monument and not to
locate or settle upon any of the lands thereof.
IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this twelfth day of
April, in the year of our Lord two thousand sixteen, and of the
Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and
fortieth.
BARACK OBAMA



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