Club Femenino

The Club Femenino was formed in 1917 by a group of middle- and upper-class women to improve social conditions on the island and obtain suffrage for women. Members advocated the elimination of prostitution, establishment of women's prisons and juvenile courts, improvement of educational opportunities for women, and improved job conditions for working-class women.

The Club Femenino joined with five other women's rights groups in 1923 to form the umbrella organization Federación Nacional de Asociaciones Femeninas. The First Annual Women's Congress, headed by Club Femenino member Pilar Morlon y Menéndez, invited all women's organizations throughout the country. The congress addressed issues as varied as female participation in government to the beautification of Havana. Many of its leaders joined with the Veterans and Patriots Organization in calling for "regeneration" of the government.

By 1925, the Second Congress promised success because President Gerardo Machado pledged support for women's suffrage. When he reneged on his promises and began massive repression of opposition groups, Club Femenino members, led by Hortensia Lamar, formed another coalition, the Women in Opposition to Machado, and participated with students and labor unionists in street protests. Lamar met with U.S. ambassador Sumner Welles to call for Machado's removal from office. President Ramón Grau San Martín granted suffrage during his brief tenure, but the issue remained uncertain until it became a part of the formal Constitution of 1940.

After gaining suffrage, the club continued pressing for education and social reform, joining other women's organizations in running night schools and free classes for working-class women. In 1934 it successfully pressured the government to implement a 1913 law offering free breakfasts to school children.

The success of Club Femenino came from working within a male-dominated system in a manner that did not threaten the political structure of the island.

See alsoFeminism and Feminist Organizationsxml .

BIBLIOGRAPHY

An excellent book on the members and activities of the women's movement in this period is K. Lynn Stoner, From the House to the Streets: The Cuban Woman's Movement for Legal Reform, 1898–1940 (1991). Little else is available in English, but good sources for beginning a study are K. Lynn Stoner, Latinas of the Americas: A Source Book (1989), and Nelson Valdés, Cuban Women in the Twentieth Century: A Bibliography (1978).

Additional Bibliography

González Pagés, Julio César. En busca de un espacio—historia de mujeres en Cuba. La Habana: Ediciones de Ciencias Sociales, 2003.

Prins, Melissa Marisol, and K. Lynn Stoner. A Guide to The Women's Movement in Cuba, 1898–1958: The Stoner Collection on Cuban Feminism. Wilmington, DE: Scholarly Resources, Inc., 1990–1997?.

Sabas Alomá, Mariblanca. Feminismo: Cuestiones sociales y crítica literaria. Santiago de Cuba: Editorial Oriente, 2003.

                                 Jacquelyn Briggs Kent