Phebe A. Hathaway was born on April 14, 1822 in New York and was a longtime resident of Portsmouth, Rhode Island. Miss Hathaway, who never married, was a
teacher in Portsmouth and an active member of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union (WCTU). The WCTU Rhode Island chapter was created on January 20, 1875, though the key participants had been engaged
in temperance efforts for many years by this date. The inaugural meeting was held at the Providence Central Baptist Church on Pine Street, where Phebe Hathaway and Phebe Jackson were elected as the
two vice presidents and Mrs. W. F. Bainbridge, wife of Central Baptist’s pastor Rev. William Bainbridge, was elected president. A description of the
meeting indicates that discussion focused on whether including the word Christian in the name of the new organization would discourage others from joining
the temperance movement. Ultimately those who favored inclusion prevailed. In May of that year, the first annual meeting of the WCTU of Rhode Island was
held in the chapel of the Beneficent Church of Providence. Mrs. Bainbridge announced that she
wished to resign the presidency, and Phebe Hathaway was elected as her replacement. Hathaway served as president for the next two years. Bainbridge and
Mrs. Freeborn Johnson were chosen as delegates to the WCTU’s national convention, held in Cincinnati, Ohio in November 1875.
WCTU members were wives, mothers and daughters who had witnessed the effects that alcoholism had upon families and strongly believed that alcohol
consumption was the root of all evil in American society. The WCTU initially recruited exclusively native born women of American heritage (who were also
over the age of twenty) but by the end of the nineteenth century the immigrant population had grown large enough that the WCTU ended its policy of
exclusion and enlisted the support of like-minded immigrant women. The members pledged abstinence from all liquors, wines, beers, and ciders. They also
agreed to actively discourage others from selling or consuming alcohol. This included walking into saloons or stores and pleading with proprietors to cease
their sale of alcohol. Their objectives were to build support for the temperance movement and to eliminate alcohol and all of the social problems that they
believed were caused by its consumption. The Rhode Island WCTU held rallies and created pamphlets to help spread the message throughout the state. Their
determination caught the attention of the public and convinced enough politicians to change the law.
In 1874 Rhode Island passed a state prohibition law banning the manufacture and sale of alcohol statewide, with the exception of medicinal purposes.
Providence at this time had ten breweries and a number of liquor retailers. This act was revoked a year later as municipal and state treasuries began to
mourn the lost tax revenue. The WCTU gained popularity in Rhode Island through the end of the decade and by 1880 the state had fifteen local chapters. The
WCTU continued to fight for a ban on alcohol until the ratification of the18th Amendment and passage of a national prohibition law in 1919.
As early as 1886 the WCTU argued that women’s suffrage was necessary to successfully pass a ban on alcohol. Union members thus became deeply involved in
the women’s suffrage movement until passage and ratification of the 19th amendment in 1920.
Miss Hathaway did not live to see the dried fruits of her labor. She died on December 20, 1886 and was buried in Providence at the North Burial Ground.
Lisa Boutin, Student at Rhode Island College
Further Reading
Carcieri, Paul T. “A History of Temperance and Prohibition In Rhode Island, 1820-1916.” PhD diss., Providence College, April 17, 2007.
Spooner, Walter W., ed. The Cyclopaedia of Temperance and Prohibition. New York: Funk & Wagnalls, 1891.
The Rhode Island Historical Society holds the records of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union of Rhode Island ( http://www.rihs.org/mssinv/MSS811.htm)