1. Women’s Suffrage (20th Century)

2. Just the Facts:
Suffragists had fought for women’s right to vote since the middle of the nineteenth century.
When the 15th amendment guaranteed blacks the right to vote, many women believed that their turn would come soon. A
Another 50 years would pass before Congress approved the 19 Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, guaranteeing equal voting rights for women

3. 19th amendment
The 19th Amendment not only gave women the right to enfranchisement in all elections, and a say in government
Legitimized women’s participation in all areas of society.
The “founding mothers” of American women’s enfranchisement — among them, Lucretia Mott, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and later Carrie Chapman Catt and Alice Paul — would always see women’s suffrage as their number one priority; they would recognize that with the right to vote, would come other rights also.

5. 1st convention of women's’ rights
At Seneca Falls, Elizabeth Cady Stanton would present the Declaration of Sentiments and Resolutions, based on the American Declaration of Independence.
Among the demands in the declaration was equality with men before the law, in education and employment. Here, too, was the first pronouncement demanding that women be given the right to vote. The assembled crowd of over 300 — including about 40 men — passed all the resolutions except the one giving women the vote.
It was not until Frederick Douglass, the great black orator and abolitionist, spoke to the assembly advocating women’s enfranchisement that the delegates passed this resolution also. From this point on, gaining the right to vote would be the rallying cry at every successive women’s rights convention until passage of the 19th Amendment.

6. Results from the 1st convention
Women were gradually allowed to speak in public, something that had been strictly forbidden before.
Individual states adopted laws protecting the rights of married women, granting them the right to own property in their own name, keep their own earnings and retain guardianship of their children in case of divorce.
But with the advent of the Civil War, women’s rights, and especially women’s enfranchisement, began to take a back seat to the abolition of slavery, and hence to securing the black male’s right to vote

7. Susan B. Anthony Arrested
Susan B. Anthony was first to test the voting, when she and her sisters tried to register to vote in Rochester, New York, in When the registrar refused, Anthony read aloud from the 14th Amendment, which she claimed superseded the New York state constitution.
Two voting inspectors agreed with her, and let the sisters register. When Election Day came, officials allowed the women to vote.
Two weeks later, they were arrested and indicted under an act of Congress making it illegal for a woman to vote. Anthony thought if she refused to pay bail, the case would go to court and she would have a chance to bring her argument before the Supreme Court.
But her lawyer, fearing what might have awaited her in jail, paid her bail and she was denied the chance to appeal.

8. Where will women's votes count 1st?
When Congress declared war on Germany in April 1917, the pickets continued despite threats of arrest, for the suffragettes had been going strong for almost six months.
Not even arrest and jail could stop them. Conditions in the workhouse where they were sent were appalling and the superintendent was belligerent toward them.
After large play in newspapers nationwide, protests of their treatment came from around the country, so much so, that those who had been against suffragists previously began supporting their cause.
It even became fashionable to picket for suffrage and then serve time in jail.
By the end of 1917, six state legislatures had granted presidential suffrage, including Rhode Island, the first state in the East.

9. How long did it truly take?
In the 71 years since Elizabeth Cady Stanton had called women to Seneca Falls, there had been 56 referenda campaigns, 480 state legislature campaigns and 277 state party convention campaigns to write suffrage into state constitutions, and 19 Congresses where a woman’s suffrage amendment had been introduced.
It would take another 15 months and more fulltime battles to get the required 36 states to ratify the 19th amendment.
Ratified August 18, 1920

10. Who was Gertrude Weil?
Gertrude Weil (1879–1971) was a women’s rights activist who led North Carolina’s campaign for women’s suffrage.
Throughout her life, she worked for social equality for all North Carolinians and was active in the fight for workers’ rights and in the Civil Rights Movement.
Spent two years at Horace Mann College (NY), Weil attended Smith College, where she was educated to become a teacher. Although Weil wanted to teach, her parents encouraged her to return to North Carolina after graduation.
Weil returned home to Goldsboro and became active in the political life of North Carolina. One of her main causes was women’s suffrage. In 1914, she became president of the Goldsboro Equal Suffrage Association, and five years later she was elected president of the North Carolina Equal Suffrage League.
After suffrage had been attained, Weil turned her attention to other causes. As early as the 1930s, she began to fight for racial equality, and she continued as an active member of the Civil Rights Movement into the 1960s.

11. “Why We Oppose Votes for Men”
Because man’s place is the army.
Because no really manly man wants to settle any question otherwise than by fighting about it.
Because if men should adopt peaceable methods women will no longer look up to them.
Because men will lose their charm if they step out of their natural sphere and interest themselves in other matters than feats of arms, uniforms and drums.
Because men are too emotional to vote. Their conduct at baseball games and political conventions shows this, while their innate tendency to appeal to force renders them peculiarly unfit for the task of government.

12. Votes for Women: What people say?
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