The story of women’s suffrage is one of resiliency, courage, and determination. Imagine a world wherein females could not be a place where the voice of women was silenced and didn’t matter. That’s the world that existed a little while back. Take a look through some pieces of the history of suffrage for women, how it was challenged, its successes, and what we learned from it today.
Setting the Stage: A World Without Women’s Votes
The 19th century of a homemaker, and caregiver, but never the decision-maker. The political strata were all filled by men, and even the very idea of women voting was almost comical to contemplate. My grandmother used to tell me how her mother would feel when any law would affect her family, frustration was way too common.
Woman suffrage was not only a struggle for the right to vote, but it was also an issue of equality struggle to be recognized that women’s voice counts in shaping society. And that recognition did not come easily.
The Early Struggles: Speaking Out Against Injustice
It would then later be followed by the development and rise of women’s suffrage in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. During this time, it is when women from England and the United States, such as Mary Wollstonecraft and Abigail Adams respectively, began to speak about the injustices they were facing. The two thus paved the way with their writings and actions for further movements to take place.
By the mid-1800s, the suffrage movement was in an uproar. It wasn’t until the 1848 Seneca Falls Convention, under the leading roles of Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott, that things began to turn around. That was the historic conclave at which women demanded the right to a clarion call which was to set off a movement lasting several decades. My college professor once shared with me a passage Stanton wrote, and somehow the quote just stuck in my mind: “We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all people are created equal.” It sent goosebumps down my skin.
The Roadblocks: Resistance and Opposition
Of course, there was no way that the suffrage movement would escape without its set of problems; many were against it, men and some women included. The arguments varied between saying women were too emotional or uneducated to make any type of political decision; giving them this right will completely disrupt the social order.
It is hard to imagine today, but women were ridiculed, ostracized, and even arrested because they had dared to demand equality. British suffragettes, under the leadership of Emmeline Pankhurst, endured imprisonment and hunger strikes; in the United States, suffragists confronted court battles and public scorn accorded someone like Susan B. Anthony.
I once went to an exhibition at a museum about the women’s suffrage movement. There was this letter from a suffragist to her family, and inside she had written that during some protest, somebody spat at her. Just so sad yet rousing: “I endure this for the future the daughters who shall come after me.”
The Victories: Hard-Fought and Long-Overdue
Finally, after years of fighting, women started to see some success. In 1893 New Zealand was the first to extend women the right to vote in national elections, an action that galvanized suffragists worldwide.
Of course, that is the 19th Amendment to the Constitution, ratified in 1920. Won after decades of activism, it still can provoke that same kind of emotional and personal response as in the people who experienced that victory. My great-grandmother would always say that was the first time she felt like a citizen.
But this did not stop there. Many of the women, especially colored women, had to run a race with much larger barriers. The discriminatory practices prohibiting them from the ballot took decades more to eliminate. The passage of the Voting Rights Act in 1965 marked a dramatic step toward making things equal in regard to the ballot box, and the march toward full equality is far from over.
Lessons for Today: Why Women’s Suffrage Still Matters
The struggle for women’s suffrage was more than a fight; it was the making of history, one that taught how changes could be effected using people’s collective power. Where overwhelming odds were given, change is a possible legacy now inspiring modern movements on gender equality, racial justice, and human rights.
I get to go vote, remembering every time how those women fought so hard for me to have the right to do so. It’s a responsibility, yes—but also a privilege. It’s their stories that teach me above all that progress requires persistence and courage.
Moving On: What To Do?
But that wasn’t a fight that gave women equality, and the war is so on: gender pay gaps, underrepresentation in leading positions, and social biases remain very vivid in everyday life for women. But we can try to make some difference.
Educate Yourself: Learn about the history of women’s rights and the challenges women face today.
Speak Up: Use your voice for policies that advance equality.
Get Involved: Participate with organizations that help to bridge the gap towards gender equality.
