When the conventions of the Democratic and Republican parties met in June, 1916, suffragists applied pressure to both. Catt was invited to express her views in a speech to the Republican convention in Chicago. An anti-suffragist spoke after Catt, and as she was telling the convention that women did not want to vote, a crowd of suffragists burst into the hall and filled the aisles. They were soaking wet, having marched in heavy rain for several blocks in a parade led by two elephants. When the flustered anti-suffragist concluded her remarks, the suffragists led a cheer for their cause. At the Democratic convention a week later in St. Louis, suffragists packed the galleries and made their views known during the debate on suffrage.