Making the Oklahoma Constitution

Delegates to the Oklahoma Constitutional Convention met on November 6, 1906, in the territorial capital of Guthrie, and over the course of the next four months they drafted a constitution. In the minds of Progressives, including former Populist leader and two-time Democratic nominee for US president William Jennings Bryan, the Oklahoma Constitution was well poised to become the most perfect state constitution in the country. The original US Constitution was fewer than 5,000 words. In contrast, the finished Oklahoma Constitution was nearly 50,000 words (and more than 80,000 words by the start of the twenty-first century).

Comparing Constitution Preambles

The Oklahoma Constitution and the US Constitution both protect the rights of Oklahoma citizens. Yet as we discuss in the main text, the Oklahoma Constitution is much longer and more detailed than the US Constitution. They also both reflect the particular time and place in which they were written. The US Constitution was written in the late eighteenth century while the Oklahoma Constitution was written in the early twentieth century. Read the preambles to both constitutions and consider their similarities and differences:

Preamble to the US Constitution:

We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

Preamble to the Oklahoma Constitution:

Invoking the guidance of Almighty God, in order to secure and perpetuate the blessing of liberty; to secure just and rightful government; to promote our mutual welfare and happiness, we, the people of the State of Oklahoma, do ordain and establish this Constitution.

FIG. 6.5

William “Alfalfa Bill” Murray Presiding at the Constitutional Convention

Passed by Congress, the Enabling Act provided for a single state to be formed from the twin territories of Indian Territory and Oklahoma Territory. Each territory elected 55 delegates, and the Osage Nation elected two delegates. Of the 112 delegates, 99 were Democrats, 12 were Republicans, and 1 independent. William “Alfalfa Bill” Murray presided at the Constitutional Convention (photographed here) and played a key role in drafting the constitution. The public approved the Oklahoma Constitution by 71 percent of the vote in September 1907.

Courtesy of the Oklahoma Historical Society.

Both constitutions are similar in that they establish three branches of government (executive, legislative, and judicial). However, the Oklahoma Constitution contains numerous provisions and policies that are highly specific. The first ten amendments of the US Constitution are called the Bill of Rights. The Oklahoma Constitution also has a Bill of Rights, containing 33 specific rights.

There are notable similarities between the Oklahoma Bill of Rights (Article II) and the Bill of Rights to the US Constitution, even though the Oklahoma Bill of Rights is much longer. For example, Section 30 of the Oklahoma Bill of Rights, which protects individuals from unreasonable search and seizure, is almost identical to the Fourth Amendment of the US Constitution. In some areas, such as freedom of religion and freedom of speech, the Oklahoma Bill of Rights is more detailed, because the framers in 1907 were particularly concerned about limiting the power of government to control the rights of citizens. We see further evidence of these concerns in sections of the new state constitution devoted to limiting the power of corporations.

The Oklahoma Constitution also included several Progressive reforms, such as direct primary elections, and the initiative (propose legislation by petition) process and referendum (repeal legislation by petition) process. These reforms gave voters a more direct say. The Oklahoma Constitution could also be amended through constitutional conventions or by legislative statutes. The new constitution provided many ways for Oklahomans to play a role in state government. In fact, the constitution has been amended more than 150 times since statehood.

It is important to keep in mind that Oklahomans are protected by and must follow both the US Constitution and the Oklahoma Constitution. They are subject to US federal laws and Oklahoma state laws. Any provision in the Oklahoma Constitution that conflicts with the US Constitution may be nullified, or canceled, by federal judicial review. The Oklahoma Statutes contain the laws passed by the Oklahoma legislature. These laws and the provisions of the Oklahoma Constitution are often interpreted by the Oklahoma Supreme Court, the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals (the highest court in Oklahoma for criminal cases), and the Oklahoma Court of Civil Appeals. Three federal district courts in Oklahoma also issue decisions that may affect Oklahoma residents. These are the Eastern, Western, and Northern District Courts of Oklahoma. The Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals holds the authority to review decisions by federal district courts in Oklahoma. Sometimes the US Supreme Court may review a case that has been appealed from the Tenth Circuit or from the Oklahoma Supreme Court or the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals.

It is also important to understand that the Oklahoma Constitution was very much a product of its time. Many Progressives thought that including as many rights and limitations as possible would make for a more perfect document. This assumption, however, has long been debated. Certainly the founders of the country did not follow this approach. Instead, the original framers of the US Constitution believed that a shorter, less specific, and more flexible document would have greater longevity.

FIG. 6.6

Front Page of the Daily Oklahoman, “Proclaims Statehood”

The front page of the Daily Oklahoman newspaper, with the headline “Proclaims Statehood.” Oklahoma became a state on November 16, 1907.

Courtesy of the Oklahoma Historical Society.

Women’s Suffrage Movement

Despite the length of the Oklahoma Constitution, and all its modern Progressive elements, it disappointed some residents. Progressives who supported women’s suffrage were frustrated by the final result. Several western states, including Montana, Utah, and Wyoming, granted women the right to vote in the mid- to late nineteenth century as part of the push toward statehood. However, Oklahoma emerged as a state with both western and southern influences. Perhaps southern ideas about the proper place of women played a role in women not getting the right to vote at this time, or perhaps there was too little vocal support for women’s suffrage. Whatever the case, the delegates to the Oklahoma Convention decided to support suffrage for men with only one exception. Women were allowed to vote in school board elections. Despite the denial of suffrage in all other areas, women in Oklahoma found other ways to influence Oklahoma politics and culture.

On September 17, 1907, white men, along with some African American and Indigenous men, in Oklahoma got their chance to vote on the new, very long constitution. Among these groups, 71 percent voted in favor of the constitution. Two months later, on November 16, 1907, President Theodore Roosevelt signed legislation making Oklahoma the forty-sixth state in the Union.

FIG. 6.7

Statehood Day Activities in Guthrie, November 16, 1907

Statehood Day activities and the inauguration of Oklahoma’s first governor, Charles N. Haskell, took place on November 16, 1907, in Guthrie on the front steps of the Carnegie Library. The library building is now part of the Oklahoma Territorial Museum.

Courtesy of the Oklahoma Historical Society.

FIG. 6.8

“Votes for Women Victory Map,” 1919

“Votes for Women Victory Map,” 1919. The vote was extended to women in Oklahoma in 1918, two years before the Nineteenth Amendment was ratified extending women’s suffrage nationally in 1920. However, Black and Indigenous women continued to face voting restrictions for decades. This map shows that some states voted in favor of women’s suffrage and some did not.

Courtesy of the Oklahoma Historical Society.

Women’s Suffrage Movement

Many important progressive movements happened before Oklahoma was a state. One was the fight for women’s suffrage. Some groups worked to get women the right to vote. These included such national organizations as the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA). From 1890 to 1910, leaders like NAWSA president Carrie Chapman Catt came to Oklahoma. They worked to convince lawmakers to grant women voting rights. Some western states and territories gave the vote to women. One was Wyoming Territory in 1869. Another was Colorado in 1893. Utah and Idaho followed their lead in 1896. Oklahoma seemed more reluctant, though.

The Oklahoma Constitutional Convention met in Guthrie in 1906. This was the first chance for women’s rights to become law in Oklahoma. Kate Biggers was the president of the Equal Suffrage Association of Oklahoma and Indian Territory. She came to the convention to lobby for voting rights for women. She argued that women needed the vote to protect the morality of their homes. Other women were “anti-suffragists.” They worried about giving women political rights. They thought women’s suffrage would take away from their roles as homemakers and guardians of virtue. Members of NAWSA went around the state to gather support. Despite all these efforts, women did not get the right to vote when Oklahoma became a new state. Cherokee citizen Narcissa Owen kept working to raise money and lobby for women to get the right to vote. She worked with her son, US Senator Robert L. Owen.

The United States entered the First World War in 1917. Women organized to work for the war effort. In Oklahoma, local chapters of the American Red Cross formed. They gathered clothing, sewed medical supplies, and hired nurses. Also, women across the nation helped with President Woodrow Wilson’s campaign.

Women’s suffrage groups, on both the state and national levels, kept working to pass laws to get women the right to vote. On October 5, 1918, Oklahomans voted in favor of a state constitutional amendment to grant women the right to vote. Now Oklahoma women could join men in using their political voice. More work was needed, though, to get the national amendment granting women the right to vote approved. Finally, on August 18, 1920, the Nineteenth Amendment guaranteeing women’s suffrage was passed. Oklahoma joined the majority of US states in voting for this historic amendment.

FIG. 6.9

In 1907, Kate Barnard became the first woman elected to a statewide office in Oklahoma, as Oklahoma’s first Commissioner of Charities and Corrections. This was before women could vote. A powerful orator, Barnard successfully convinced the state legislature to require compulsory education, limit child labor, and establish a juvenile justice system. In addition, Barnard called for the protection of the property rights of Indigenous orphans, as she was concerned about guardians profiting from children in their care.

Courtesy of the Oklahoma Historical Society

Kate Barnard knew what it was like to have people listen to her. She learned quickly during the territorial days of Oklahoma that she could make her voice heard. She could get things done. And she could play a role in making the new state. She might not be able to vote, but she could influence the way other people voted.

Barnard was the only woman delegate to the Oklahoma Convention, and even she did not come to the support of women’s right to vote. Although she could not vote, she was elected Oklahoma Commissioner of Charities and Corrections. She was the first woman in Oklahoma to hold such a position and only the second woman in the entire country to be elected to a public office at the state level. She went on to serve two terms and used her job to advocate for women, children (especially orphans, regardless of race), and workers.

FIG. 6.10

Newspaper Clipping Focusing on Cora Diehl

A newspaper clipping focusing on Cora Diehl. In 1890, at age twenty-one, Cora Diehl was elected Recorder of Deeds in Oklahoma Territory. She was the first and only woman elected to public office in the territory. A popular speaker, Diehl often accompanied other well-known Populists, including Mary Elizabeth Lease, and campaigned nationally for women’s rights and labor unions.

St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

Cora Diehl

When Americans began flooding Oklahoma Territory during the late 1800s, there were no political structures yet in place. The local government had not been set up, and there was no constitution or sets of laws or government offices in existence. Because there were no settled systems of governance, an open space existed for people who previously had not been included in government. One of these people was Cora Diehl, the first and youngest woman to be elected to territorial office.

Diehl came with her parents and sister to Oklahoma Territory from Kansas. She campaigned for the Populist Party and gave speeches in rural towns to convince farmers to vote in the very first Oklahoma elections. The Populist and Democratic parties in Oklahoma joined forces to support her as a candidate for the position of Register of Deeds. She had previously held the position of Deputy Register of Deeds in Kansas. Diehl’s new job would be to record and file all the legal documents that affected land property. Since Oklahoma land was being claimed and exchanged quickly, her office would be very busy.

With the combined support of both parties, Cora Diehl won the election in 1891 and should have immediately taken office. The Republicans filed a lawsuit to keep her out of office, however. They argued that her gender disqualified her from holding public office. Her party issued a statement defending Diehl’s right to hold the office. It said: “We nominated and elected Cora Diehl (not as an ornament to grace the ticket) but a young woman having the necessary qualifications to fill the office by virtue of her ability and experience.” The Oklahoma Supreme Court ruled in her favor, but because the suit took such a long time, she was only able to hold her office for seven months before she had to be re-elected. In the election in 1893, Diehl was not allowed to represent both the Populist and the Democratic parties, and she lost.

Diehl went on to campaign nationally for workers’ rights and benefits for the unemployed. She spoke at rallies across the country for the International Brotherhood Welfare Association. She often entered political spaces where she was the only woman. Sometimes newspaper writers insulted her in their stories for speaking out “like a man,” but she did not let their opinions stop her. Cora Diehl continued to fight for workers’ rights for many years.

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Loss of Tribal Sovereignty

The discussions about segregation, much like the discussions about women’s suffrage, did not go the way that advocates of expanded rights had hoped. The vast majority of delegates were Democrats who wanted the constitution to include legal requirements that Blacks and whites be segregated. The twelve Republicans and one independent were largely silent on the issue. The only reason that segregation was not written into the constitution was that President Roosevelt made clear that he would not support statehood if that happened. However, once Oklahoma became a state, the legislature quickly moved to pass segregation laws. Senate Bill One, which required segregation of whites and Blacks in public transportation and waiting rooms, overwhelmingly passed the Oklahoma Senate a month after statehood and shortly thereafter passed the House. It was signed into law by Governor Charles N. Haskell on December 18, 1907.

Only a few Republicans had won seats in the state legislature, and most of them opposed the segregation law, but they were greatly outnumbered. The Senate voted 37 to 2 in favor of the law and the House voted 91 to 14 in favor. E. P. McCabe and other African Americans tried to challenge the new law, but it was ruled constitutional and Oklahoma’s segregation laws stayed in place until the mid-1960s. New restrictions were also put in place to make it hard and sometimes impossible for Black men to vote. This meant that Black men who voted in elections before statehood (after having gained the right to vote with the adoption of the Fifteenth Amendment in 1870) lost that ability in the years following statehood. However, in 1915, the US Supreme Court ruled in Guinn v. United States that some grandfather clauses, commonly used to keep African American men from voting, were unconstitutional. In Oklahoma, literacy tests had been required to vote, but exceptions were made for illiterate men who could show that their grandfathers had voted. The Supreme Court ruling was important, but it continued to be difficult for Blacks in Oklahoma to vote.

For African Americans, statehood brought with it segregation and disenfranchisement, or loss of voting rights. Indigenous people faced a different situation: the loss of power they once exercised.

Individual Indigenous nations lost their power when they had their governments and their sovereignty stripped from them. There are several ways this happened. As discussed in previous chapters, they had to give up their lands. The effort to get rid of tribal governments was another way the US government attempted to undercut tribal sovereignty. The original Dawes Act of 1887 did not apply to Indian Territory. However, the Curtis Act in 1898 applied the Dawes Act to Indian Territory, which meant that the Five Tribes eventually ended up losing a significant amount of land in the individual land allotment process. This opened the door to increased settlement and land runs.

In addition, the Five Tribes lost control over tribal membership because the Dawes Commission assumed control of determining who was a member of the tribe and who was not. Some non-Indians made corrupt agreements to get on the Dawes Rolls and some Indigenous people were left off of the rolls because they did not trust the government enough to enroll with the Dawes Commission. Tribes not only lost control over deciding who was a member of the tribe, they lost control over their own laws and government. Perhaps the worst part of the Curtis Act in relation to Indigenous sovereignty was the provision that called for tribal governments to be abolished by March 6, 1906, which put those residing in Indian Territory under federal law and jurisdiction. Tribal courts were abolished and there was no longer a way for tribes to make and enforce law. This was devastating for Indigenous people, and they spent the next several decades working to retake and strengthen the rights that were taken from them.

FIG. 6.11

A 1908 Street Scene in Ada, Oklahoma

A 1908 street scene in Ada, Oklahoma, located in Chickasaw Nation. One year later, in large part due to the advocacy of women in Ada, East Central College (today’s East Central University) was founded as a “normal” school. Normal schools helped train teachers in the new state. Today the Chickasaw Nation Headquarters are located in Ada.

Courtesy of the Oklahoma Historical Society.