Given that women gained the right to vote on August 18, 1920, we’re dedicating the next three articles in our series on the Montana Constitution to the role of women in the 1972 constitutional convention.
Kudos to the Women
It would be hard to overstate the role and importance of women and women’s organizations in the calling of the 1972 Constitutional Convention and the ultimate ratification of the 1972 Constitution. The League of Women Voters and the American Association of University Women and a number of individual women were pivotal in educating and advocating for Montana’s need for a new constitution.
But no woman should get more credit for our 1972 Constitution than Margery Hunter Brown. She was a member of the League of Women Voters which had conducted a study of the 1889 Constitution as its state project and published “A Better Constitution, A Better Government: A Study of the Montana Constitution.” This document was instrumental in persuading the 1969 Legislature to create the Constitutional Revision Commission. She was one of 16 members, the only woman appointed to the Commission, whose purpose was to study Montana’s 1889 Constitution, and make a determination and recommendation as to whether that Constitution warranted the call of a convention to re-write or amend it. Along with Lucile Speer of Missoula, a documents librarian at University of Montana and fellow LWV member in Missoula, Brown wrote an informative and persuasive polemic, entitled “We the People”. It was published and distributed throughout the state, underscoring the importance of calling for a convention of their peers to examine the fundamental laws governing the State of Montana. The legislature agreed the voters should be asked, and it submitted Referendum 67 to the voters. The Referendum was approved by a vote of 133,482 to 71,643.
Subsequently, the 42nd Legislature, meeting in 1971, called for the election of 100 delegates to be held on November 2, 1971. To prepare for the Convention, the Legislature created a Constitutional Revision Commission of 16 illustrious members, only one of whom was a woman, and again it was Margery Hunter Brown. She and Dale Harris, the Director of the Commission, led a research team of University of Montana students and faculty that produced in-depth analyses of each article of the Constitution. These writings played a major role at the ensuing Constitutional Convention, as they were used extensively as a “reference guide” by all delegates.
