Kate Barnard

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Kate Barnard
Kate Barnard

Kate Barnard (May 23, 1875–February 23, 1930) was the first woman to be elected as a State official in Oklahoma, and the United States in 1907. She served as the first Oklahoma Commissioner of Charities and Corrections for two four year terms (this position was the only one that the 1907 Oklahoma State Constitution permitted a woman to hold).

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[edit] Early work in charity

Prior to Oklahoma statehood, Barnard was involved in aid and charity work in Oklahoma City and was the head of the union-label organization in Oklahoma. She also participated in the Farm-Labor meetings of 1906 in Shawnee which drafted the "Shawnee Demands" that later formed the basis of the soon-to-be-drafted Oklahoma state constitution.

[edit] Elected Charities and Corrections Commissioner

[edit] Compulsory education, child labor, abuse of prisoners

After her election as the Charities and Corrections Commissioner, she was a key player in the enactment of the compulsory education laws, state support of poor widows dependent on their children's earnings, and statutes implementing the constitutional ban on child labor. She also was an advocate for working Oklahomans through the work she did in securing legislation aimed at eradicating unsafe working conditions and the blacklist of union members. Some have said that her most important action may have been when we she uncovered the horrid treatment of Oklahoma prisoners who were being held in Kansas prisons under contract, which included forced labor in coal mines and torture. Her work and the pressure she put on Oklahoma's first Governor, Charles N. Haskell, resulted in the return of the prisoners to Oklahoma and the construction of the Oklahoma state penitentiary in McAlester, Oklahoma.

[edit] End of her political career

Her political career ended during her second term in office, after she began to advocate on behalf of Indian wards who were being cheated out of their land as a result of grafting. Her work on behalf of Indian children raised the ire of William H. Murray and other prominent Oklahoma businessmen and officials who convinced the state legislature to defund her office.

[edit] Later life, death, and legacy

During the rest of her life, Barnard continued to live in Oklahoma (often traveling to Colorado and other states during the summer due to her severe health problems) and she died on February 23, 1930 in Oklahoma City (where she was found dead in a hotel bathroom). She was buried in Oklahoma City (in a grave that was not marked until the 1980s), but today a bronze statute of her is on display on the first floor of the Oklahoma State Capitol.

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