Back American Women’s Suffrage: Voices from the Long Struggle for the Vote 1776–1965

American Women’s Suffrage: Voices from the Long Struggle for the Vote 1776–1965

Edited by Susan Ware

“Amid the flood of books marking the centennial of women’s suffrage, this anthology stands out for its scope and authority. . . . Essential for libraries and a go-to book for anyone seriously interested in women’s suffrage in America.”—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

Overview
News & Views
Table of Contents
Contributors

Overview

Video Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom with David W. Blight
February 22, 2023

Story of the Week Charlotte Perkins Gilman, “The Unnatural Mother”
August 15, 2022

Story of the Week Ida M. Tarbell, “Is Woman’s Suffrage a Failure?”
May 13, 2022

Here for the first time is the definitive story of the movement for women’s right to vote in all its diversity, told by the women and men who lived it. The voices of legendary figures in the suffrage struggle like Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Lucy Stone join those of black, Chinese, and American Indian women and men who expanded its directions and aims, as well as anti-suffragists worried about where universal suffrage might lead the country.

Expertly curated and introduced by scholar Susan Ware, 90 pieces by over 70 writers tell the full history of the movement—from Abigail Adams in 1776, urging that the Continental Congress attend to women’s political and economic rights, to the Declaration of Sentiments in 1848 that took up that call again; from the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920 to passage of the Voting Rights Act in 1965, which finally ended the Jim Crow era disenfranchisement of black women and men in the South. Here are Maria W. Stewart, Frederick Douglass, Ida B. Wells, Mabel Lee, Constance Baker Motley, and many more arguing for suffrage for women and men of all races; presidents Grover Cleveland writing an anti-suffrage editorial and Woodrow Wilson urging passage of the Nineteenth Amendment as a wartime measure; Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s groundbreaking suffragist play; and stinging satire by Marie Jenney Howe and Alice Duer Miller. Here too are the women who campaigned against suffrage, as well as the women who picketed, marched, and were arrested for their belief that the right to vote is the heart of citizenship. Braided together into one coherent narrative, the writings gathered in this collection chart as never before the tumultuous course of early feminist activism in America.

American Women’s Suffrage includes an introduction, headnotes, explanatory endnotes, and an index, as well as sixteen pages of full-color illustrations and photographs.

Susan Ware is a celebrated feminist historian and biographer, the author of Why They Marched: Untold Stories of the Women Who Fought for the Right to Vote, American Women’s History: A Very Short Introduction, and Letter to the World: Seven Women Who Shaped the American Century, among other books. She is Honorary Women’s Suffrage Centennial Historian at the Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, Harvard University, and General Editor of American National Biography. Her commentary is featured in The Vote, the multipart PBS American Experience documentary on the suffrage movement.

This Library of America series edition is printed on acid-free paper and features Smyth-sewn binding, a full cloth cover, and a ribbon marker.

This volume is available for adoption in the Guardian of American Letters Fund.
News & Views

Video Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom with David W. Blight
February 22, 2023

Story of the Week Charlotte Perkins Gilman, “The Unnatural Mother”
August 15, 2022

Story of the Week Ida M. Tarbell, “Is Woman’s Suffrage a Failure?”
May 13, 2022

News Nicholas Lemann: What a functioning democracy would look like
October 27, 2020

Story of the Week Fannie Barrier Williams, “Women in Politics”
October 7, 2020
Table of Contents

Introduction by Susan Ware

PART ONE: 1776–1870
Abigail Adams and John Adams
Letters
New Jersey State Constitution
Voter Qualifications
Maria W. Stewart
Lecture at the Franklin Hall
Sarah Moore Grimké
from Letters on the Equality of the Sexes
Angelina Grimké
Address to the Massachusetts Legislature
Margaret Fuller
from “The Great Lawsuit”
Eleanor Vincent, Lydia A. Williams, Lydia Osborn, Susan Ormsby, Amy Ormsby, Anna Bishop
Petition to the Constitutional Convention of the State of New York
Seneca Falls Convention
Declaration of Sentiments and Resolutions
Sojourner Truth
Speech to Ohio Woman’s Rights Convention
Ernestine L. Rose
Speech to the Second National Woman’s Rights Convention
New York Herald
The Woman’s Rights Convention—The Last Act of the Drama
Harriot K. Hunt
Tax Protest
Elizabeth Cady Stanton
Address to the Legislature of New-York
Lucy Stone and Henry Browne Blackwell
Marriage Protest
Lucy Stone
Address to the Seventh National Woman’ Rights Convention
Woman’s Loyal National League
Call, Resolutions, and Debate
Frances Ellen Watkins Harper
Speech at the Eleventh National Woman’s Rights Convention
Sojourner Truth
Address to the First Annual Meeting of the American Equal Rights Association
Debates at the American Equal Rights Association Meeting
Frederick Douglass
Woman and the Ballot

PART TWO: 1870–1900
Victoria Woodhull
Address to the House Judiciary Committee
Minor v. Happersett Ruling
National Woman Suffrage Association
Declaration of Rights of the Women of the United States
Susan B. Anthony
Woman Wants Bread, Not the Ballot!
Matilda Joslyn Gage
Indian Citizenship
Mary Tape
Letter to the San Francisco Board of Education
Mormon Women of Utah
Protest
The New York Times
They Enter a Protest
George Vest
Remarks on the Amendment to Extend Suffrage to Women
Alice C. Fletcher
The Legal Conditions of Indian Women
Anna J. Cooper
from A Voice from the South, by a Black Woman of the South
Colorado Equal Suffrage Association
Suffrage Referendum Leaflet
Committee on Protest against Woman Suffrage
To the Constitutional Convention of New York State
Fannie Barrier Williams
Women in Politics
Josephine St. Pierre Ruffin
Address at the First National Conference of Representatives of Black Women’s Clubs
Elizabeth Cady Stanton
Significance and History of the Ballot
Frances E. Willard
The Ballot for the Home
National American Woman Suffrage Association
On Behalf of Hawaiian Women
Abigail Scott Duniway
How to Win the Ballot

PART THREE: 1900–1920
Belle Kearney
The South and Woman Suffrage
Annie Nathan Meyer
Woman’s Assumption of Sex Superiority
Mary Church Terrell
The Progress of Colored Women
Grover Cleveland
Would Woman Suffrage be Unwise?
Finley Peter Dunne
Mr. Dooley on Woman’s Suffrage
Alice Hill Chittenden
The Counter Influence to Woman Suffrage
Florence H. Luscomb
Our Open-Air Campaign
Jane Addams
Why Women Should Vote
Harriot Stanton Blatch
from “The Women’s Political Union”
Charlotte Perkins Gilman
Something to Vote For
Alice Stone Blackwell
Militant Methods
Leonora O’Reilly
Statement before Joint Congressional Session of Congress
Max Eastman
Values of the Vote
Josephine Jewell Dodge
The Lesson That Came from the Sea—What it Means to the Suffrage Cause
Marie Jenney Howe
An Anti-Suffrage Monologue
Los Angeles Times
Squaws Beat Militants to Right of Franchise
Alice Paul
Testimony at Suffrage Parade Hearings
Helen Hamilton Gardener
Woman Suffrage, Which Way?
Mary Johnston
A Difference of Opinion
Mabel Lee
The Meaning of Woman Suffrage
Mary Roberts Coolidge
Raising the Level of Suffrage in California, Or What Have They Done With It?
Hazel MacKaye
Pageants as a Means of Suffrage Propaganda
Ida B. Wells
Seeking the Negro Vote
The Crisis
Votes for Women: A Symposium by Leading Thinkers of Colored America
Oreola Williams Haskell
The Greatest Thing
Arthur Raymond Brown
from How It Feels to be the Husband of a Suffragette
Alice Duer Miller
from Are Women People?
Abby Scott Baker
Letter to the Editor of The Outlook
Carrie Chapman Catt
The Crisis
Boston Equal Suffrage Association for Good Government
Letter Series No. 1–10
Maud Wood Park
To NAWSA Congressional Chairmen
The New York Times
“Silent, Silly, and Offensive” and “Militants Get 3 Days; Lack Time to Starve”
Alice Hill Chittenden
Woman’s Service or Woman Suffrage
Lavinia Dock
The Young Are at the Gates
Caroline Katzenstein
Prison Experiences with Emphasis on the Night of Terror
Woodrow Wilson
Address to the Senate on the Nineteenth Amendment
The Suffragist
Reminding the President When He Landed in Boston
Southern Women’s League
Declaration of Principles for the Rejection of the Proposed Susan B. Anthony Amendment to the Constitution of the United States
Maud Wood Park
A Perfect Moment

PART FOUR: 1918–1965
Gertrude Foster Brown
From Your Vote and How to Use It
Fairchild v. Hughes and Leser v. Garnett Rulings
Indian Citizenship Act
Doris Stevens and Dr. Alice Hamilton
The “Blanket” Amendment—A Debate
Ida M. Tarbell
Is Woman’s Suffrage a Failure?
Doris Stevens
Address to the Sixth Pan American Conference, Havana, Cuba
Dr. Marta Robert
Statement on Woman Suffrage in Porto Rico
El Congreso de Pueblo de Habla Española
Resolutions Adopted by the Second Convention
Eleanor Roosevelt
Women in Politics
John F. Kennedy
President’s Commission on the Status of Women
Fannie Lou Hamer
Testimony to the Credentials Committee, Democratic National Convention
Constance Baker Motley
Speech to the Southern Christian Leadership Conference
Contributors

Abigail Adams
John Adams
Jane Addams
Susan B. Anthony
Abby Scott Baker
Anna Bishop
Alice Stone Blackwell
Henry Browne Blackwell
Harriot Stanton Blatch
Arthur Raymond Brown
Gertrude Foster Brown
Carrie Chapman Catt
Grover Cleveland
Alice Hill Chittenden
Anna J. Cooper
Mary Roberts Coolidge
Lavinia Dock
Josephine Jewell Dodge
Frederick Douglass
Abigail Scott Duniway
Finley Peter Dunne
Max Eastman
Alice C. Fletcher
Margaret Fuller
Matilda Joslyn Gage
Helen Hamilton Gardener
Charlotte Perkins Gilman
Angelina Grimké
Sarah Moore Grimké
Fannie Lou Hamer
Dr. Alice Hamilton
Frances Ellen Watkins Harper
Oreola Williams Haskell
Marie Jenney Howe
Harriot K. Hunt
Mary Johnston
Caroline Katzenstein
Belle Kearney
John F. Kennedy
Mabel Lee
Florence H. Luscomb
Hazel MacKaye
Annie Nathan Meyer
Alice Duer Miller
Constance Baker Motley
Leonora O’Reilly
Amy Ormsby
Susan Ormsby
Lydia Osborn
Maud Wood Park
Alice Paul
Dr. Marta Robert
Eleanor Roosevelt
Ernestine L. Rose
Josephine St. Pierre Ruffin
Elizabeth Cady Stanton
Doris Stevens
Lucy Stone
Doris Stevens
Maria W. Stewart
Mary Tape
Mary Church Terrell
Sojourner Truth
George Vest
Eleanor Vincent
Ida B. Wells
Fannie Barrier Williams
Frances E. Willard
Lydia A. Williams
Woodrow Wilson
Victoria Woodhull

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