From the Opera Stage to the Polls

One hundred years ago, Tennessee became the last state needed to ratify the 19th Amendment. On paper, at least, 26 million women gained the right to vote as citizens.

Today the centennial has a complicated legacy. Progress on voting access hasn’t been straightforward: Voter suppression tactics have thrown up barriers for many women of color, formerly incarcerated women and trans women.

From the opera stage to the voting booth, these two Roosevelt University alumnae reflected on 100 years of the right to vote.

Opera Cowgirls and the Great War

Rocking cowboy boots and impressive vocal chops, Opera Cowgirls has performed their signature mix of opera, country and rock at venues across the country. The group, founded by Caitlin McKechney (MM Voice and Opera, ’09), rearranges classical arias for countrified instruments: guitar, mandolin, mini-accordion, banjolele.

After one Cowgirls show pre-pandemic, a friend of McKechney’s mentioned that she was writing a libretto about women during World War I. In December 2018, Opera Cowgirls and contemporary music ensemble Hotel Elefant performed in the premiere of Letters That You Will Not Get: Women’s Voices from the Great War.

Caitlin McKechney in the 2018 performance of Letters That You Will Not Get. Video credit: Matt Suter

In Letters, six singers bring to life the stories of women affected by World War I. The libretto began as a song cycle that resurrects excerpts of poems and letters written by women during the war. The piece grew into a chamber opera in development with The American Opera Project and supported by a National Endowment for the Arts grant.

“Women weren’t necessarily on the ground fighting, but they were losing loved ones and doing so much on the home front,” McKechney said. “The major power of this piece is that it says so much about the universality of the pain caused by these kinds of conflicts, both past and present.”

During World War I, women poured into the workforce and served abroad as nurses, relief workers and operators. Their labor and civic engagement stood in stark contrast their lack of full citizenship.

As the National Park Service wrote, “how did it look for the United States to fight for liberty around the world while half its citizenry was denied the right to participate as equals?”

A League of Their Own

Martha Sklar (BA Mathematics, ’62) is only a few years younger than Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Recently, she’s been thinking about a question Ginsburg used to ask: “What is the difference between a bookkeeper in Brooklyn and a Supreme Court justice?”

Her answer: “One generation.’”

As a girl growing up in the 1940s and 50s, Sklar said, the expectation was “you get married and you have a family. If you have a job, you’re either a secretary or a teacher.”

When Sklar arrived at Roosevelt, she said, her “eyes were opened to a whole new world.” She made friends in the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee. She attended lectures in downtown Chicago.

Sklar graduated from Roosevelt in only three and a half years, but she says her time there has changed her direction ever since. “It’s the story of Roosevelt,” she said. “And I think in some ways, that has become part of my story.”

For four years, Sklar served as the president of the League of Women Voters – Los Angeles. The civic organization mobilizes voters with non-partisan information about ballot issues. University namesake Eleanor Roosevelt herself was a long-time member. While national and state chapters have full-time employees, the local chapters — even in cities as large as Los Angeles — are largely run by volunteers.

Sklar got more involved with the League after retirement. Its mission of voter education was right up her alley. “The key of being educated is to know what question to ask, and where to go find the answer,” she said.

“Finally”

McKechney has her hands in artistic ventures across New York: as a resident vocalist for Hotel Elefant, the doctoral program at SUNY Stony Brook and with the Cowgirls.

As a master’s student at the Chicago College of Performing Arts, McKechney enjoyed classes that encouraged her to “think outside of the box,” a skill that has unlocked all of her opportunities since graduation. During OperaFest, she performed small operas in random places, like the pop-up works she would later do with Opera Memphis.

Her advice to students is to make sure that their technique is in place, above all else. “Make sure that your voice is in line,” she said. “With that solid foundation, you can play.”

During the pandemic, McKechney has recorded passages in virtual workshops as Letters continues to develop. The creative team is nearly all women, from the instrumentalists to the composer. McKechney says the work has evolved to become “more encompassing,” drawing in stories from women in Asia, Africa and the Caribbean.

After a year that has upended our certainty about our jobs, our connections with others, and the country’s future, the piece felt eerily prescient.

“The passage ‘Finally’ really got to me,” McKechney said. “The letter states, ‘finally, when the end came,’ and that comes back multiple times in that poem. It made me imagine what it will be like to say that now.”

Paying it forward

The League of Women Voters also celebrated its 100th anniversary this year. When Sklar moved out to Los Angeles 50 years ago, the League was mostly made up of white and well-educated women who weren’t in the workforce. During her time with the organization, she has seen the League’s inclusion efforts pay off.

The League has brought in more members who are working women, more women of color and more men. More meetings are held at night and on the weekends.

The League of Women Voters holds itself to a strict set of values when supporting ballot initiatives. Its regulated forums, where the organization acts as moderator and timekeeper, is an unbiased place to hear from local candidates.

Sklar thinks it’s this neutral focus that makes the League such a trusted resource. “We take positions, depending on our principles, and what studies we have done,” Sklar said. “And sometimes we’re neutral, if we have values that conflict.”

In the leadup to the 2020 election, the League has embraced social media and intersectional issues. The organization hosted a tweetstorm to demand presidential debate questions on climate change and created a toolkit to help people vote from jail.

Sklar is looking forward to passing the baton to new leaders in the League.

“My philosophy has been to pay it forward, through leadership or financial support,” said Sklar. “And part of that is what I learned from Roosevelt.”