August 26 is a national holiday of substantial import. It started so many years ago but a pivotal tipping point occurred in 1848 surrounding the Seneca Falls New York Convention with Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott at the helm. Women’s struggle for the right to vote (suffrage) was on the agenda. It took 30 more years for the 19th Amendment to the US Constitution to be drafted (1878). That draft was summarily rejected in 1887 with a Senate 16-34 vote. The Amendment reads:
“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.”
Sounds pretty simple doesn’t it? Not quite. Partial or total suffrage was not permitted to women, people of Japanese descent, American Indians, people who could not read, “Asian Indians,” Afro-Americans in Washington DC, and residents of US colonies (Puerto Rico, Guam, Virgin Islands). Believe it or not — New Jersey initially allowed women’s suffrage in 1789 but revoked it in 1807. Nuttier than that — women suffrage laws before adoption of the 19th Amendment “permitted” suffrage in a number of interesting genres. These included absolutely no vote or partial voting rights for presidential, primary, municipal, school bond tax and other city elections. Go figure.
Women’s suffrage got serious in America after the Civil War. Alas — in 1875, the US Supreme Court ruled that the 14th and 15th Amendments (citizenship and voting rights) did not apply to women. State activity then began to take place. Wyoming enabled women’s suffrage in 1869. Native Americans were granted citizenship in 1924 but were prohibited suffrage by many state laws. In 1947, Native Americans received the right to vote in New Mexico and Arizona.
Alaska was admitted as a Territory in 1912. The first Territorial Legislative act put in place was to provide the right of women to vote. After 12 more years, all Alaska Natives gained the suffrage but not without multiple complexities.
After the 19th Amendment was ratified (1920) by 36 states (a story unto itself), 60 more years passed before the remaining states ratified this Amendment. The last state to do so was Mississippi in 1984. Are we still figuring?
Thankfully, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 was passed to allow universal suffrage. Sadly, that legislation has not yet come to complete fruition because of America’s voter identification battles, gerrymandering, alleged voter fraud and other machinations of “mind change” attempts by media, “alternative facts” and “fake news”.
So — what is wrong with this picture for the celebration of Women’s Equality Day? Let’s start with:
• Why do we have a gender pay gap?
• Why is there lack of paid maternity and paternity leave?
• When will we have fair and just reproductive education and rights for women and men?
• Why is there a significant disparity in the number of women in elected office?
• Why is our child day care for working parents so inadequate?
• Do we really know and understand the political and community issues before us? Worse than that — do we care? Where do we get our information? How can voters come to “know what they know” and act on it?
Women’s Equality Day is much more than a “then” to be remembered. It is a “now” to be engaged. If we do not decide, someone else will be delighted to do this for us. Women’s Equality Day is more than a holiday. It suggests a mandate for each of us.
• carolyn V Brown is a resident of Juneau.
