Topic > The Powerful Influence of the Women's Suffrage Movement in American History

IndexWomen's Suffrage MovementBeginning of Women's Righteous TimeSeneca Falls ConventionCivil War and Civil RightsThe Progressive CampaignProtest and Progress for RightsResults of the 19th AmendmentConclusionLydia Taft was a wealthy widow , allowed to vote first in the town meeting in Uxbridge, Massachusetts, in 1756. In the colonial era, no other women are known to have voted. The New Jersey Constitution of 1776 emancipated all adult residents who owned a certain amount of property. Many laws passed in the 1790s and 1797s referred to electors as “he” or “she,” and women routinely voted. This law passed in 1807; however, women were excluded from voting in the State of America. Since New Jersey repealed women's suffrage rights in 1807, Kentucky passed the first state women's suffrage law in the New Republic era, allowing any widow or single woman over the age of 21 to pay property taxes for the county's new "common school" system. This right of partial suffrage for women was not expressed only for whites. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay Women's Suffrage Movement The women's suffrage movement was a decades-long fight to triumph over the right to vote for women in the United States of America. It took militants and reformers nearly 100 years to achieve this right, and the campaign to achieve it was not easy: disagreements over strategy threatened to paralyze the movement more than once. However, on August 18, 1920, the 19th Amendment to the Charter was finally passed, giving all American women the right to vote and proclaiming for the first time that they, like men, deserve all the rights and responsibilities of citizenship . Civil War, the campaign for women's suffrage began in earnest over the decades. During the 1820s and 1830s, most states had extended the right to vote to all white men, regardless of how much money or property they owned. At the same time, all kinds of reform groups were on the rise in the United States: temperance leagues, religious movements, moral reform societies, anti-slavery organizations – and in many of these women played a leading role. At the time, many American women were beginning to push back against the historians' "Cult of True Womanhood." This is the plan that only the “real” woman was a religious, humble wife and mother, interested entirely in home and family. Seneca Falls Convention In early 1848, a class of emancipationists, mostly women with contributions from a few men, met in Seneca Falls, New York, to talk about women's rights issues. All the women were invited there by the two leaders Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott. Most delegates agreed on one point: “American women were autonomous individuals who deserved their own political identity.” “We hold these truths to be self-evident,” manifested the Declaration of Sentiments produced by the envoys, that “all men and women are fashioned equal, that their Creator confers upon them certain inviolable rights, that among these are life, liberty of rights and the pursuit of happiness". What this actually means, of all of these, is that they believed that women should have the right to vote. Civil War and Civil Rights The women's rights movement gained momentum during the 1850s, but lost momentum whenthe Civil War broke out. When the war ended, the 14th and 15th Amendments to the Constitution highlighted the pros and cons of suffrage and citizenship. The 14th Amendment was reformed in 1868 and defines “citizens” as “male.” The Fifteenth Amendment, amended in 1870, guaranteed black men the right to vote. At that time, two reformers Stanton and Susan B. Anthony felt the need to push legislators for truly universal suffrage. As a result, both refused to support the 15th Amendment and even allied themselves with Southern anti-Semites who argued that white women's votes could be used to neutralize those cast by African-Americans. In 1869 they formed a group called the National Woman Suffrage Association. The founder of the Association was Lucy Stone. They began to fight against the United States Constitution and called for a universal suffrage amendment. This association fought for equal rights for women in the United States of America. The Progressive Campaign In 1890, the two groups joined together to form the National American Woman Suffrage Association. Elizabeth Cady Stanton was the first president (chief) of the organization. After the organization's founding, the goals had changed. Instead of proclaiming that women deserved the same rights and responsibilities as men because men and women were “created equal,” the newly formed Association argued that women deserved the vote because they were different from men. This altercation served many political agendas: temperance reformers, for example, wanted women to vote because they believed this would form a broad electoral alliance in favor of their cause, and many middle-class whites were once again swayed by the argument that white women's enfranchisement would “guarantee immediate suffrage and lasting, honestly achieved white supremacy. That same year, Alice Paul formulated the Congressional Union for Women's Suffrage, which later became the National Women's Party. The company has made numerous claims and regularly surrounded the White House, among other militant tactics. As a consequence of these actions, some members of the group were arrested and sentenced to prison. In 1918, President Wilson shifted his position on women's voting rights from protest to support through the impact of Catt, who had less antagonistic behavior than Paul. Wilson also limited the proposed suffrage amendment to America's involvement in World War I and enhancing the major role women had played in the war fight. Wilson addressed the Senate in favor of suffrage when the amendment was voted on. As demonstrated in the New York Times of October 1, 1918, Wilson said, “I regard the increase of women's suffrage as vitally important to the success of the great war of mankind in which we are engaged.” , the United States. Representative James R. Mann, Illinois legislator and chairman of the Suffrage Committee, suggested the House resolution to authorize the Susan Anthony Amendment allowing women the right to vote. The initiative passed the Chamber with 304 votes in favor and 89 against: 42 votes above the necessary two-thirds of generality. After two weeks, on June 4, 1919, the United States. The Senate passed the 19th Amendment by two votes of a two-thirds majority, 56-25. The amendment was delivered to the states for ratification. Within six days of the authorization cycle, Illinois, Michigan and Wisconsin each authorize the change. Kansas, New York, and Ohio joined on June 16, 1919. By March of the following year, a total of 35 states had approved.