National American Woman Suffrage Association Formed as Merger Heals 21-Year Split

On February 18, 1890, the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) was formed through the merger of the rival National Woman Suffrage Association (NWSA) and American Woman Suffrage Association (AWSA), healing a 21-year split that had fractured the women’s rights movement since 1869. The two organizations had divided over both strategy and principle following disagreements about the 15th Amendment, with NWSA led by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony favoring a federal constitutional amendment while AWSA, led by Lucy Stone, Henry Blackwell, and Julia Ward Howe, pursued state-by-state campaigns. Alice Stone Blackwell, daughter of Lucy Stone, spearheaded successful negotiations to merge the groups. In January 1889, AWSA and NWSA committees negotiating merger terms signed a basis for agreement, followed by an “Open Letter to the Women of America” in February from Stone, Stanton, Anthony and other leaders declaring their intention to work together.

The merger created the largest voluntary organization in the nation, with membership growing from approximately 7,000 at formation to eventually reach 2 million members. Elizabeth Cady Stanton became president of the new organization, though she disliked administrative duties and Susan B. Anthony effectively led NAWSA during Stanton’s presidency (1890-1892) and then served as president herself (1892-1900). The consolidated organization combined the strategic approaches of both predecessor groups, pursuing both federal constitutional amendment and state-level campaigns simultaneously. This dual-track strategy allowed the movement to capitalize on western states’ greater openness to women’s suffrage while maintaining pressure for a national solution. The reunion enabled more efficient resource allocation and reduced the confusion caused by competing organizations claiming to represent the women’s suffrage movement.

The NAWSA merger demonstrated both the necessity and difficulty of building broad coalitions to challenge entrenched power structures. The 21-year split had enabled opponents of women’s suffrage—including liquor manufacturers, textile companies dependent on cheap female and child labor, and political machines threatened by an expanded electorate—to exploit divisions within the reform movement. Corporate interests and conservative political forces had benefited from suffragists expending energy on internal conflicts rather than focused external pressure. The merger recognized that defeating systematic institutional resistance to democratic expansion required unified action. NAWSA played a pivotal role in passing the 19th Amendment in 1920, guaranteeing women’s right to vote. Following this victory, the organization transformed into the League of Women Voters, continuing advocacy for informed democratic participation. The merger’s success illustrated that movements challenging concentrated power must balance principled disagreement with strategic unity, though the organization would later face new internal divisions over tactics when Alice Paul’s National Woman’s Party adopted more militant approaches after 1913.