March 2013: From the Director's Chair

http://en.wikipedia.org

March is National Women's History Month. This month has been set aside to celebrate the achievements of women which are often omitted from history textbooks. One such achievement of particular importance is women's suffrage, or the right to vote. It was not the frivolous endeavor as portrayed by the mother of Mary Poppins, with song and dance routines.

When asked by Abigail Adams to "remember the ladies" as her husband, John Adams, was helping form a new government, his response was that men would fight the "despotism of the petticoat."

This opinion held fast and within seven years (1777-1784), New York, Massachusetts, and New Hampshire, which had previously granted women the right to vote, revoked that right. In 1807, New Jersey revoked this right as well.

Throughout the 1800s, the anti-slavery and women's suffrage movements were sometimes allied and other times at odds. In 1867, Congress passed the 14th amendment, limiting citizenship to males only. The 15th amendment, ratified in 1870, gave black males the right to vote.

In 1869 and 1870, Wyoming and Utah gave its women the right to vote. In 1872, Susan B. Anthony and others were arrested for voting in Albany, New York.

The women's suffrage amendment was first introduced in Congress in 1878. Eight years later, the suffrage amendment was defeated by a two to one margin. Utah revoked a woman's right to vote in 1887, while Idaho, Washington (state), California, Oregon, Arizona, and Kansas granted them that right.

Harriet Stanton Blatch introduced the English suffragists' tactics of parades, street speakers, and pickets to the United States in 1910. Three years later, a mob attacked a woman's march for suffrage and hundreds were injured. No arrests were made.

Early in 1917, women were posted as "sentinels of liberty" at the White House gates. In June, nearly 500 women were arrested, 168 jailed. Some were brutalized by their jailers; some severely injured. A year later, as suffragists were released from prison, an appellate court declared the arrests illegal. The 19th amendment, giving women the right to vote, was finally passed and became the law on August 26, 1920.

This compressed timeline of the fight for the right of any woman to vote in America does not do justice to the dedication and sacrifices (financial and personal) that these women and their daughters made throughout their lifetimes.

Whether you vote because of the issues, political affiliation, physical attributes, or first ladies, remember that you owe that right to a relatively small group of determined women who worked for over 174 years to accomplish this. Also remember that as the 18th amendment (prohibition) was rescinded, any other amendment can be as well.

Pam Coyle, Director
Martinsburg-Berkeley County Public Libraries