Today’s history lesson : Being that it’s 100 years old today, let’s talk about the 19th amendment of the US constitution. It was officially ratified by the 34 states it needed to be adopted to law on the 18th of August 1920. This is the amendment that gave to right of some women to vote (more on that later).
Firstly, I’m not going to go into it but actually getting this amendment even written is a long and fascinating story including lots of peaceful and not so peaceful protests, massive and hugely misogynistic smear campaigns against it, prisons, beatings, hunger strikes, forced feeding,… and incredible heroism and persistence by the women’s suffrage movement in general and specifically people like Susan B Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton. Even after it passed in the house and senate It still needed to get ratified by 34 states which is another crazy story involving intrigue and bribery. It’s all fun. Seriously go read a book on it or listen to an excellent podcast. There’s plenty.
Now the text of the 19th is this “The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.
Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.” Which all seems pretty good in general. Women all over the US can vote! Rejoice! However there’s a catch. This only says you can’t be denied based on sex, nothing to do with race, financial situation, or anything else messy like that.
Now you’d think at least white women could vote then, but many were encouraged not to for many years by abusive husbands, threat to jobs, etc… but that didn’t last long. White women still had to fight for several years to be allowed on juries so if they were taken to court it would actually be by a jury of their peers.
And of course minorities were out of luck from the get go. Native Americans weren’t even given citizenship till 1924 and many states still blocked them from voting till 1957. Hispanic voters were mostly blocked in many states through intimidation and poll taxes. National immigration laws prevented Asians from gaining citizenship until 1952.
And of course black American women had the worst of it. They were legally allowed to vote and some could from 1920, but below the Mason-Dixon line most were blocked by intimidation, active blocking by election officials, and often beatings… and of course Poll Taxes actively designed to make voting harder for the poor. It wasn’t until the 24th amendment in 1962 and the voting rights amendment act in 1965 that most women were actually allowed to vote. Of course subsequent massive closures of polling stations in predominantly minority areas by republicans, and the recent attacks on vote by mail and the post office have made some backward progress there.
So everyone can vote now? Nope. There’s the obvious age restrictions, and I can’t vote as a non-citizen… and there’s also the massive breakdown of the voting rights act that allows politicians to close certain voting stations making it impossible for some people to vote. Also voting happens on a workday and there’s often lines so many poorer residents can afford to vote. Also convicted felons even after release can’t vote in many many states. Also and presidential elections are limited to only states, not territories so Puerto Rico, Guam, American Samoa and the rest are all out of luck there (they often still do but they’re not counted officially in the totals). Oh, and anyone in Washington DC can’t vote in the house, senate, or for presidential elections so are basically screwed.
So yay for the 19th! It did a few good things at the start, lots more eventually, but there’s still people who miss out on the benefits.
(Note: this is horribly truncated but a quick summary. Go read history, it’s fun!)