Historical Exploration of Woman's Suffrage
Historical Exploration of Woman's Suffrage
My name is Stephanie Lotzman and I am a very interested in gaining suffrage for woman. Suffrage is officially taken away from us in 1868, when the Fourteenth amendment defines “citizens” and “voters” as “male.” This amendment gives all citizens protection by the constitution against unjust State laws. It also causes the Women’s Rights Movement to be split into two factions. One is a more radical New York-based National Woman Suffrage Association (NWSA). Lucy Stone, Henry Blackwell, and Julia Ward Howe organize the more conservative American Woman Suffrage Association (AWSA), which is centered in Boston. In this same year, the Wyoming territory is organized with a woman suffrage provision. In 1890, Wyoming is admitted to the Union with its suffrage provision still standing. The best thing for me to do is support whichever group I feel has the most chance of winning our battle.
In 1874 Annie Wittenmyer founds the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union (WCTU). With Frances Willard at its head in 1876, the WCTU becomes an important force in the fight for woman suffrage. Our group finally gets a woman suffrage amendment introduced in the United States Congress in 1878.
The NWSA and the AWSA reunite in 1890 as the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) under the leadership of Elizabeth Cady Stanton. During this same year, Jane Adams and Ellen Gates Starr found the Hull House, a settlement house project in Chicago's 19th Ward. Within one year, there are more than a hundred settlement houses, largely operated by women, throughout the United States. The settlement house movement and the Progressive campaign of which it was a part cause thousands of college-educated white women to partake in lifetime careers in social work. It also made women an important voice to be reckoned with in American politics.
Some women find that writing books helps their cause. In 1895 Elizabeth Cady Stanton publishes The Woman's Bible. After its publication, NAWSA moves to distance itself from this suffrage leader because many conservative suffragists consider her to be too radical and potentially damaging to the suffrage campaign. From this time, Stanton, who had resigned as NAWSA president in 1892, is no longer invited to sit on the stage at NAWSA conventions. Soon after this Mary Dreier, Rheta Childe Dorr, Leonora O'Reilly, and others form the Women's Trade Union League of New York,...