Women Voters
Debates over who can vote and how they can vote have focused new attention on this year's 100th anniversary of women gaining the right to vote.
“I would say because of the current climate, it's extremely important for women to vote and pay attention to what's going on,” said Lee Ann Hume, coordinator of ministry and volunteers for the Lighthouse Foundation, 116 Browns Hill Road, Middlesex Township.
Eileen Olmsted, communications director for the League of Women Voters of Pennsylvania and member of the League of Women Voters of Greater Pittsburgh, said the anniversary has been front and center as far as her organization is concerned.
The Pittsburgh league had its centennial event at the Heinz History Center in February before the COVID-19 pandemic.
Women have only had the right to vote in the United States since 1920, although the fight for the right to cast a ballot started long before that.
A long fight
Suffragists began their organized fight for women's equality in 1848 when they demanded the right to vote during the first women's rights convention in Seneca Falls, N.Y.
For the next 72 years, women fought for the right to the ballot.
The U.S. House of Representatives approved the Susan B. Anthony Amendment, which guaranteed women the right to vote, on May 21, 1919. The U.S. Senate followed two weeks later, and the 19th Amendment went to the states, where it had to be ratified by three-fourths of the-then-48 states to be added to the U.S. Constitution.
Tennessee became the last state needed to ratify the 19th Amendment on Aug. 18, 1920.
Secretary of State Bainbridge Colby issued a proclamation declaring the 19th Amendment ratified and part of the U.S. Constitution on Aug. 26, 1920.
For Deborah Kruger, assistant professor of history at Butler County Community College, the fight for women's right to vote began long before the Seneca Falls meeting in 1848.
“It is important to remember the fight for women's vote lasted 130 years,” she said.
“Abigail Adams told her husband (John Adams) 'remember the ladies,'” said Kruger of the future first lady when the new United States was fighting for its independence from Britain in 1776.
Kruger noted that for 30 years New Jersey women had the right to vote in the new nation because of a loophole in the state's constitution. The loophole was later closed.She said women's rights campaigners worked alongside abolitionists, and when African-Americans gained the right to vote it created complications for the women's movement.“Women were put aside again and told it was not yet your time,” Kruger said.By the time of World War I, suffragettes were staging hunger strikes and demonstrating 24 hours a day outside Woodrow Wilson's White House.Voting a responsibilityKruger said the fight for the 19th Amendment is a case of continuing political transformation.“We have a country in the process of evolving. We are not complete,” she said, noting this is a volatile time where the country is buffeted by fears of a pandemic, economic distress and a divisive political season.Some of the divisiveness comes from current debate over mail-in and absentee ballots.“The process is relatively easy now,” Hume said of voting.“Now, we need to have our vote be heard,” she said. “It was something that was fought for — for that freedom. Our responsibility is to help hold onto those freedoms.”Part of the responsibility is creating an educated and informed electorate, Olmsted said.“The League of Women Voters is tightly and very much tied to the suffrage movement,” she said. Carrie Chapman Catt, a suffrage leader, founded the league on Valentine's Day 1920, six months before the amendment's ratification.More appreciative
The Rev. Kimberly Van Driel, pastor of First English Lutheran Church, 241 N. Main St., said, “I don't know if the celebration was overshadowed by the entire set of circumstances.“But I feel more appreciative for the right to vote and a deep passion to make sure everyone can exercise that right,” she said.Van Driel said the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America has just issued a message covering social engagement and civil government.“The question is how do we as Christians participate faithfully in our democracy,” she said.Catherine “Cate” Graham, owner of the Just What the Doctor Ordered retail and wholesale medical supplier at 350 Hansen Ave., Lyndora, said she's grateful for the doors the 19th Amendment has opened for her.Noting she is both a certified woman business owner and a certified minority business owner, she said, “You realize it makes you a more active participant in contracts.”Dr. Stephanie Rhoads, owner of Rhoads Orthodontics., 132 Graham Park Drive, Cranberry Township, agreed the pandemic, economic woes, civil unrest and presidential election have overshadowed the anniversary of the 19th Amendment.
“I think it's been a hard year. 2020 has a lot going on. It's not publicized or promoted much,” Rhoads said.“With so much emphasis on equality as a pressing issue, I plan to vote,” she said.She added, “It's important that everyone gets out to vote whatever their opinion is and be accepting whatever the outcome and be more unified.”Continuing the fightOlmsted said the league plans to continue its voter education activities despite the pandemic restrictions.“The league has been having its meetings in Zoom,” she said. “We had six remote candidate forums before the primary election, and we plan to do that again for the general election.
The country today may be in turmoil, much as it was in August 1920 when the 19th Amendment's passage meant 27 million new voters would be able to go to the polls in the November presidential election.But Kruger believes it's all part of a long process dating back to the founding of the country.“America is also going to be evolving into something, hopefully something better,” said Kruger.“It's something that has to be worked on, pushed on. No country can ever experience perfection,” she said.
