Again, the women chose jail. Lucy Burns argued that the women should be treated as political prisoners, but that designation had never been used in America. When the number of women being arrested surpassed the resources of the District of Columbia Jail, the prisoners were taken to Virginia's Occoquan Workhouse (now the Lorton Correctional Complex). Once there, they were asked to give up everything except for their clothing. They were then taken to a showering station where they were ordered to strip naked and bathe. There was only one bar of soap available for everyone in the workhouse to use, so all of the suffragists refused to use it. Afterwards they were given baggy, unclean, and uncomfortable prison clothes and taken to dinner. They could barely eat dinner because it was so sour and distasteful. The conditions of the District Jail and the Occoquan Workhouse were very unsanitary and unsafe. Prisoners had to share cells and many other things with those who had syphilis, and worms were frequently found in their food. After a heated debate, the House of Representatives created a committee to deal with women's suffrage in September 1917. Massachusetts Representative Joseph Walsh opposed the creation of the committee, thinking the House was yielding to "the nagging of iron-jawed angels." He referred to the Silent Sentinels as "bewildered, deluded creatures with short skirts and short hair." On September 14, Representative Jeannette Rankin took the chair of the Senate Select Committee on Woman Suffrage to visit the activists in the Workhouse and the next day, the committee sent on the suffrage amendment bill to the Senate. As the suffragists kept protesting, the jail terms grew longer. Finally, police arrested Alice Paul on October 20, 1917, while she carried a banner that quoted Wilson: "The time has come to conquer or submit, for us there can be but one choice. We have made it." She was sentenced to seven months in prison. Paul and others were sent to the District Jail and many others were again sent to the Occoquan Workhouse. Paul was placed in solitary confinement for two weeks, with nothing to eat except bread and water. She became weak and unable to walk, so she was taken to the prison hospital. There, she began a hunger strike, and others joined her. In response to the hunger strike, the prison doctors forcefed the women by putting tubes down their