Minnie Fisher Cunningham (1882–1964) was a savvy and highly effective leader for women’s suffrage. As president of the Texas Equal Suffrage Association (TESA) from 1915–1919, she quadrupled the number of local affiliates, established a headquarters near the state capitol in Austin during legislative sessions, and organized suffragists across the state by legislative district. Under her leadership, Texas women won the right to vote in primary elections in 1918—two years before ratification of the 19th Amendment. In those days, being able to vote in the primaries was nearly tantamount to full voting rights because Texas was essentially a one-party state.
In 1919, Cunningham worked for the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) in Washington DC, as part of a team that lobbied President Woodrow Wilson and members of Congress for passage of the 19th Amendment. Once the measure passed, NAWSA President Carrie Chapman Catt dispatched her to southern and western states to lobby governors and legislators for ratification.
In 1920, suffrage leaders founded the League of Women Voters. Cunningham worked with other Texas suffragists to transform TESA into LWV of Texas. She then returned to Washington DC to serve as executive secretary to Maud Wood Park, president of the national League. Speaking at the second national LWV convention in 1921, Cunningham left a vivid impression on Eleanor Roosevelt. In a letter to her husband Franklin, Eleanor said Cunningham made her feel that “you had no right to be a slacker as a citizen, you had no right not to take an active part in what was happening to your country as a whole.” In 1924, Cunningham chaired the League’s national get-out-the-vote campaign for the first presidential election open to women in every state. A lifelong political activist, she ran for U.S. Senate in 1928 and for governor of Texas in 1944. In both races, she trailed in the polls, but she was blazing trails that other women could follow.
“Minnie Fish,” as she was known to her friends, was my great-great-aunt. She lived about 100 miles away, but my family went to visit occasionally, and I loved to be around her. I was too young to fathom the significance of her achievements, but I recognized that she was different from any other woman I knew. She lived simply in a modest little house, nothing fancy. But in the closet—behind a partially drawn curtain—hung the attire of a woman who knew how to dress when it was time to go lobby. She was good with kids, too, and always treated us as intelligent people. I remember one time she took a box of political buttons down off a shelf and let me play with them within earshot of the adults’ conversation. What a savvy way to introduce children to politics!
Not surprisingly, as an adult I wanted to know more. In 1985 I wrote my master’s thesis about her governor’s race—and later, as a hobby, pored through much of her suffrage correspondence at various archives. I’ve presented talks about her on several occasions, including the Texas League of Women Voters Centennial Celebration in 2019.
Photo courtesy of the Smithsonian Institution