Ninety-six years ago, our foremothers won the right to vote as the Nineteenth Amendment was ratified and added to our nation’s constitution. This right was not just given away freely and civilly but was brutally fought for by almost one hundred years’ worth of powerful, persevering, “nasty” women. It all started with Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott, who held the first women’s rights convention in Seneca Falls in 1848. They penned the Declaration of Sentiments that called for the equal political treatment of both men and women. They were met with much opposition from both men and women at the prospect of enfranchising women by giving them the right to vote.
The next notorious name in Women’s Suffrage is Susan B. Anthony, who refused to have her political voice quelled. During the 1872 election, Anthony cast a vote, even though at that time, women were not allowed to vote. She maintained that since she owned property (since that was technically the only qualification one needed to vote at that time) it was her right to do so. Two weeks later, she was arrested and later found guilty of illegal voting.
Alice Paul took the work of her predecessors and amplified it in the early twentieth century. Paul was unafraid of male government officials and organized parades and protests that were directed toward the President at the time, Woodrow Wilson. After her meeting directly with the President, Paul decided that the women take matters a step further by standing outside of the gates of the White House until women were granted the right to vote. Beginning in January 1917, Paul and other members of the National Women’s Party stood outside for eighteen months in rain and snow and winds to champion for a basic right that many Americans took for granted (and still do today). They held signs that bared messages such as “Mr. President, how long must women wait for liberty?" and some directly asked the President how he could send American men to die for democracy when there were women at home who he did not allow to vote.
As the U.S. entered into World War I, the peaceful protests were met with more and more violence as spectators lashed out at the women with vulgar words, spit, and even physical violence. The police reacted not by arresting the harassers, but by arresting the women instead. Alice Paul did not let her arrest stop her from achieving her goal. She initiated a hunger strike in prison, as the women still on the outside fought for her release, as well as the release of other members of the National Women’s Party. However, the powers that were would not stand Paul’s further insubordinate actions and brutally force-fed her after threatening to send her to an insane asylum. Once the public heard about the horrible mistreatment of the women in prison, President Wilson was forced to intervene and finally show his support for women’s suffrage.
The journey to women’s suffrage was not a tranquil one equivocal to a lackadaisical walk on the beach. It was one wrought with suffering, imprisonment and even death. So know that if you are a woman who deliberately chooses to not vote, you are spitting in the face of every foremother before you who sacrificed her entire life to give you the right you so frivolously take for granted.
Furthermore, this election, in particular, is pivotal for women. According to PBS Newshour, women made up 53 percent of the vote in 2012. This astonishing statistic means that women have a majority of the say in this upcoming election if we all band together and show up at the voting polls. The results of this election have put a lot at stake for women, people of color, immigrants and the LGBTQ population. The only way we can continue to live in an America that is safe for people of all backgrounds, ethnicities, and genders is if we go to the polls. As President Obama said during the Democratic National Convention: “Don’t boo; vote.” Don’t let the change women have worked so hard to effect these past one hundred years go to waste. Use your voice to ensure democracy for all.
