CREATED BY: ANNIE VIROSTEK, SOPHIA ABSHIRE, & CARLY DIFFENDERFER Women’s Suffrage

Women's Suffrage

Susan B. Anthony Susan Brownell Anthony was a prominent American civil rights leader who played a pivotal role in the 19th century women's rights movement to introduce women's suffrage into the United States Susan B. Anthony was born February 15, 1820 in Adams, Massachusetts. She was brought up in a Quaker family with long activist traditions. Early in her life she developed a sense of justice and moral zeal. After teaching for fifteen years, she became active in temperance. Because she was a woman, she was not allowed to speak at temperance rallies. This is what motivated to fight for women's rights.

Lucy Burns Lucy Burns was an American suffragist and women's rights advocate. She was a passionate activist in the United States and in the United Kingdom. Burns was a close friend of Alice Paul, and together they ultimately formed the National Woman's Party. Lucy Burns was a suffragist because she was influenced by her friend Alice Paul, and Alice Paul got her on to be in the "Women's Social and Political Union a union dedicated to fighting Women's rights in the United Kingdom. After this she became hooked and dedicated her life to woman suffrage.

Suffrage Timeline 1900 Two-thirds of divorce cases are initiated by the wife; a century earlier, most women lacked the right to sue and were hopelessly locked into bad marriages Women garment workers strike in New York for better wages and working conditions in the Uprising of the 20,000. Over 300 shops eventually sign union contracts Juliette Gordon Low founds first American group of Girl Guides, in Atlanta, Georgia. Later renamed the Girl Scouts of the USA, the organization brings girls into the outdoors, encourages their self-reliance and resourcefulness, and prepares them for varied roles as adult women.

Suffrage Timeline Cont Alice Paul and Lucy Burns organize the Congressional Union, which later becomes the National Women's Party. Members picket the White House and engage in other forms of civil disobedience, drawing public attention to the suffrage cause Margaret Sanger calls for legalization of contraceptives in her new, feminist publication, The Woman Rebel, which the Post Office bans from the mail.

Suffrage Timeline Cont During WWI women move into many jobs working in heavy industry in mining, chemical manufacturing, automobile and railway plants. They also run street cars, conduct trains, direct traffic, and deliver mail Jeannette Rankin of Montana becomes the first woman elected to the US Congress The House of Representatives passes the women's suffrage amendment, 304 to 89; the Senate passes it with just two votes to spare, 56 to 25.

Suffrage Timeline Cont Margaret Sanger organizes the American Birth Control League, which becomes Federation of Planned Parenthood in Supreme Court strikes down a 1918 minimum- wage law for District of Columbia women because, with the vote, women are considered equal to men. This ruling cancels all state minimum wage laws.

Changes The 19 th Amendment:  In May, 1919, the necessary two-thirds vote in favor of the women suffrage amendment was finally mustered in Congress  The proposed amendment was sent to the states for ratification.  By July 1920, with a number of primarily southern states opposed to the amendment, it all came down to Tennessee.  It appeared that the amendment might fail by one vote in the Tennessee house, but twenty-four- year-old Harry Burns surprised observers by casting the deciding vote for ratification.  At the time of his vote, Burns had in his pocket a letter he had received from his mother urging him, "Don't forget to be a good boy" and "vote for suffrage." Women had finally won the vote.

Primary Source An Article by Alice Paul Alice Paul describes her disruption of Lord Mayor's banquet and subsequent force feeding after hunger strike in Holloway jail. She refused to wear prison clothes or to work, so spent the month in bed She was boycotting her punishment for disruption

Primary Source Document #2 Theodore Roosevelt, The Outlook, February 3, 1912  Theodore Roosevelt expressed his support for woman suffrage in an editorial entitled "Women's Rights; and the Duties of Both Men and Women," in The Outlook, February 3, “....I believe in woman suffrage wherever the women wish it. I would not force it upon them where, as a body, they do not wish it.... Most of the women who I know best are against woman suffrage precisely because they approach life from the standpoint of duty. They are not interested in their "rights" so much as in their obligations. It is, however, with me a question whether these women, busy, happy, duty-filled lives, are really typical of those other women who are more or less defenseless. These other women, wage-earning girls for instance, and wives whose husbands are brutal or inconsiderate, would, I believe, be helped by the suffrage, if they used it wisely and honorably.”

Critical Thinking Questions 1. How do you think we can improve women’s rights around the world? 2. How are the roles of women now different from the past? 3. Why should women be treated any differently to men?

Works Cited "Alice Paul Describes Force Feeding." American Memory. N.p., n.d. Web. 17 Dec “Chafe, William H. The Paradox of Change: American Women in the Twentieth-Century.” New York: Oxford University Press, “Dubois, Carol Ellen. Feminism and Suffrage: The Emergence of an Independent Women's Movement in America.” New York: Cornell University Press, “Flexner, Eleanor. Century of Struggle: The Women's Rights Movement in the United States.” Revised Edition. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, "Susan B. Anthony Biography." Bio.com. A&E Networks Television, n.d. Web. 17 Dec "Taylor Self: Women's Rights." Taylor Self Womens Rights. N.p., n.d. Web. 17 Dec