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Laws prevented women from holding important government positions.
A local law in Waltham, Mass., stated that “the Inspector of Buildings and his assistants shall be competent men.”
The Boston Globe, Jan 7, 1913, p. 1.
Year after year, Waltham lawyer Amy Acton and others tirelessly presented bill after bill to the Massachusetts state legislature.
“Legislators listen to voters. Women must become voters.” Leaflet drafted by Florence Luscomb, ca. 1912. Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe Institute, Harvard University.
Generations of women worked to secure the right to vote in state elections and learned to show their progress through persuasive maps.
Sophia Smith Collection, Smith College
Work at the state level paid off when it came time for the men in the U.S. House and Senate to ratify the constitutional amendment.
Here, Florence Luscomb paints in Tennessee, the 36th and final state needed to pass the 19th Amendment. Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe Institute, Harvard University.
In 1919, Massachusetts and 35 others ratified the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution thanks to a dramatic change in strategy.
Just a few years earlier, suffragists switched from the slow strategy of changing voting laws in every state to focus instead on changing federal law.
Courtesy of the Massachusetts Archives.
1920—the year women won the vote—marks a major milestone in American democracy. But there is a long, long road ahead.
1920
Library of Congress