Singing for Suffrage: A Yiddish Musical Dialogue

In 1920, after more than seventy years of struggle, the Nineteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution granted women the right to vote. While nineteenth-century suffrage campaigns gained partial voting rights for women in twenty states, beginning in 1910 the push for suffrage took on a new urgency under the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) and the more radical National Woman’s Party (NWP). Their campaigns reached wide audiences, in part because suffragists had learned to spread their messages through imaginative use of various media. Supporters held old-fashioned pageants and street parades as well as statewide tours, thanks to the relatively new technology of automobiles. “Der Sufferegetsky,” a Yiddish suffrage song, illustrates yet another medium used in the campaign for women’s enfranchisement. In the lyrics, a female suffragist imagined the days when women would be treated like people and men would do the cooking. Her male interlocutor glumly predicted that emancipated women would mistreat men. [English translation follows Yiddish.]

Anna Hoffman: Hurey far ale vayber un strayk nider mit di mener. Vayber, es iz gekumen undzer tsayt, az mir zoln oykh vern mentshn un nisht mer zayn keyn tshatshkes. Ikh makh a forshpayz.

Jacob Jacobs: Vos far a forshpayz? Vos bistu in kitshn, makhst a forshpayz?

Hoffman: Neyn, neyn, neyn. Ikh meyn, ikh makh a farshlog. Azoy vi biz yetst hobn ale vayber gekokht far di mener, azoy zol fun yetst on ale mener opkokhn di vayber un oyb nit veln mir straykn mit di mener.

Jacobs: That’s right. Strayk mit di mener. Veln di mener poter vern fun zeyere alte, mise vayber un zikh araynnemen sheyne, yunge, . . . [inaudible] af zeyere pletser.

Ven di sufragetke kumt arayn, vet zogen di froy . . . [inaudible] mayn. Tsu a meting darf ikh geyn atsind, kent ir hitn oyf mayn libes kind.

Aheym vet zi kumen a zeyger fir. Zi vet shteyn . . . [inaudible] baym tir. Un den muz zi shvaygn khtotsh dray, fir. Vet zayn a brokh tsu mir!

Punkt vi di mener hobn gelibte, kenen mir oykh vayber hobn sheyne, yunge yinglekh. Mir kenen oykh zayn . . . [inaudible]. Mir kenen oykh zayn frum. Shpiln in poyk in undzer . . . [inaudible] martshing band.

Di . . . geyt di vayber . . . hot far di mener oysgeshpreyt a nes—opgebrote,

opgebrite dem orkest . . . ful mit rekht.

Zog mir, groyser khokhem. Vos heyst a sufragetke?

S’iz a mise khaye, a krenk un a . . .

Vayber, vayber, atsind iz es dokh tsayt tsu vern. . . .

Ver vet regirn? A toes vos ir meynt. Regirn vet der foter in a bank mit shenk.

Ven mir veln krign undzer froyen-rekht, alts vet umgebitn, nor der froys geshlekht.

Gevalt, vos redstu? Got zol dir ophitn, az alts zol ver bay dir umgebitn. Yo.

Ven di tsayt vet kumen, veln mir bashtimen. Ver zol zikh rimen? Di froy tsi der man? . . .

Ven mir veln krign undzer froyen-rekht, alts vet umgebitn, nor der froys geshlekht.

Anna Hoffman and Jacob Jacobs, “Di sufragetke.”

Performance/Master rights under license from RCA Records, a division BMG Entertainment, Inc.

English Translation

Anna Hoffman: Hurray for all women and strike against the men. Women, our time is come. We are to become human beings and no longer be playthings. I am making an appetizer.

Jacob Jacobs: What kind of appetizer? What are doing in the kitchen, making an appetizer?

Hoffman: No, no, no. I mean a proposal. Just as until now all wives have cooked for men, so should all men from now on cook up the women. If not, we’ll strike against the men.

Jacobs: That’s right. Strike against the men. And the men will get rid of their old, ugly wives and get pretty, young . . . [unclear] to replace them.

When the suffragette enters, the woman will say: my . . . [inaudible] I’ve got to go to a meeting now. So you can watch my child.

She’ll come home at four. She’ll stand . . . [inaudible] by the door. And then she’ll have to remain silent at least three or four. What a curse it will be on me!

Just as the men have lovers, so we women can also have handsome young boys. We can also be . . . [inaudible]. We can also be pious. Playing the drum in our . . . [inaudible] marching band.

. . . For the men, a miracle occurred—roasted, scalded the orchestra . . .

Tell me, smarty, what’s a suffragette?

It’s an ugly beast, a sickness and a . . .

Women, women, it’s time now to become . . .

Who will rule? You’re in error. The father will rule from the tavern.

When we gain our women’s rights, everything will be changed except the women’s sex.

Heavens, what are you saying? God forbid that everything about you be changed.

When the time comes, we’ll decide. Who should boast? The man or the woman? . . .

When we gain our women’s rights, everything will be changed except the women’s sex.

Source: Anna Hoffman and Jacob Jacobs, “The Suffragette.” Performance/Master rights under license from RCA Records, a division BMG Entertainment, Inc. Translated by Kalmen Weiser.

See Also:Suffrage On Stage: Marie Jenney Howe Parodies the Opposition
Suffrage in Print: Alice Duer Miller's Satiric Journalism
Starving for Women's Suffrage: "I Am Not Strong after These Weeks"