Women's Suffrage

Per request, here is more information on women's suffrage in America in handy timeline format:

1776: While her husband attends the second Continental Congress, Abigail Adams writes John to "remember the ladies" in the Declaration of Independence.

1790: The New Jersey colony gives the vote to "all free inhabitants."

1807: New Jersey women lose the vote when a repeal is sponsored by a politician who was nearly defeated by female voters.

1854: Massachusetts grants property rights to women.

1855: Suffragists Lucy Stone and Henry Blackwell marry and delete the vow "to obey" from the ceremony. (Those of you who read Laura Ingalls Wilder's books may remember that this was an issue for her as well, even though she was not a suffragist.)

1869: The territory of Wyoming is the first to grant unrestricted suffrage to women.

1870: Esther Morris becomes justice of the peace of South Pass City, Wyoming and the first female government official. The Fifteenth Amendment is ratified. Although its gender-neutral language appears to grant women the vote, they are turned away from the polls. Utah territory women get the vote.

1872: A suffrage proposal in Dakota Territory loses by one vote.

1875: Michigan and Minnesota women win the right to vote in school elections.

1878: The first federal amendment to grant women the right to vote is introduced by Senator Sargeant of California. It fails.

1883: Women in the Washington territory are granted full voting rights.

1887: The Supreme Court strikes down the law that enfranchised women in the Washington territory. Congress takes away the vote from Utah's women. Kansas women win the right to vote in municipal elections.

1893: Colorado men vote and give women full voting rights.

1896: Idaho enfranchises women. Utah becomes a state, and Utah women regain the vote.

1910: Washington State gives women full enfranchisement.

1911: California women win full voting rights.

1912: Alaska's territorial legislature enfranchises women. Oregon and Kansas women win the vote. Arizona becomes a state and includes women as voters. Presidential candidates court the female vote for the first time. Democrat Woodrow Wilson wins the election.

1913: Illinois grants women the right to vote only in presidential elections.

1914: The Senate votes on the "Susan B. Anthony" amendment, but it does not pass. Nevada and Montana women get the vote.

1916: Woodrow Wilson promises the Democratic Party Platform will endorse suffrage. Montana elects Republican Jeanette Rankin to the House of Representatives.

1917: The Arkansas legislature grants white women the right to vote in primary, but not general elections. Rhode Island grants women the right to vote in presidential elections only. New York is the first eastern state to give full voting rights to women.

1918: Rankin opens debate in the House on a new suffrage amendment, which passes. President Wilson addresses the Senate in support of the Nineteenth Amendment, but it does not win the necessary 2/3 majority of Senate votes.

1919: Michigan, Oklahoma, and South Dakota join the full suffrage states. The House votes to enfranchise women for the third time. The Senate finally passes the Nineteenth Amendment.

1920: Three quarters of state legislatures ratify the Nineteenth Amendment on August 26. American women finally have full voting rights.

Posted by Jennifer at September 7, 2003 11:36 AM

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