The Bennington evening banner. (Bennington, Vt.) 19??-1961, 1920-08-19
SUFF FIGHT HAD
B { c INN IN c IN
COLONIAL DAYS
Organized Effort in Progress
Fifty Years
AMENDMENT DRAFT IN rs
pocumont Has Been Unchanged since
First introduced in Senate
in 1878.

Washington, Aug. 10. Ratification
of the suffrage amendment to the Con
st.tution ends struggle which began
in this country before the Colonies
d clared their independence. 1t will
eventually enfranchise 25,OOOoOO wo-
men.
Woman suffrage first raised its
voice in America in Maryland in l64i
when Mistress Margaret Brent, heir
of Lord Calvert demanded aplace IN
the legislature OF the colony as a pro
perty holder of wide extent And in
the days Of the Revolution Abigail
Adams wrote her husband John Adams
at the Continental Congress which
was framing the laws of the infant ma
tion that. f. in the new laws par
ticuar care and attention are not paid
ito the ladies'. we are determ ned to
foment rebellion and will not hold
ourselves bound to obey any laws in
which we have no voice
Organized work for woman suf-
frage began in the United States with
the Woman's Rights Convention in
Seneca Falls. N. Y, in 1S4S which
was called by Lucret Mott and Eli
zabeth Cady Stanton, early leaders of
Massachusetts and New York, in res
lponse to the Indignation aroused by
the refusal to permit women to take
part i'm the anti-slayery convention OF
IlS40. From the date OF that conven-
tion the suffrage movement in the
limited States began the fight that last
ed seventy years and ended with vic
tory. Another convention fol owed in
llS52 at Syracuse, N ", at which dele
lgates from Canada were present and
il was there that Susan b. Anthony
as uined leadership of the cause to
which she devoted her life,
In 1869 the National Woman Stuff
rage Assoc alton, with Miss Anthony
and Mrs. Stanton at its head was form
cd in New York and in the same year
1.-THE American Woman Suffrage Assoc
iation was organized in Cleveland with
Lucy Stone and Julia Ward Howe as
its leaders, At first differenting wide
lily in policy, the National Association
working to put a suffrage amendment
through the federal Congress and its
sister organization bending its efforts
10 convert the country state by state,
the two organizations later united un-
der the name of the National Woman
Suffrage Association. The Associa
tions drive for the vote was led in
turn by Mrs. Stanton, Miss Anthony
Or. Anna Howard Shaw and Mrs. Car
rie Chapman Gait the latter OF whom
Is now its president
/ The nineteenth amendment, which
. bear5 her name was drafted by Miss
, Anthony in 1875 and was first intro
, duced in Congress in 1873 by Senator
| A. A. Sargent of California; and it is
in the same language that the new
+ princlp of the national law reads.
Article, Section / The right o
cit zeas of the United States to vote
/ shall not be denied or abriged by tho
+ United States or by any state on &C
1 count of sex
/. Section 2 Congress shall have pow
A or, by appropriate legislation to en-
4 force the provisions of this article.
The amendment holds the record o
! being before the country longer thar
& any other successful amendment t.
h the Constitution 1t was introduced a
@ the 10th amendment and has been sue
# cessively the 18th, 18th and 10Th AM
Il has been before every session of Cor
:. gress since its in tial appearance,
d During the first 35 years after it
=. introduction into Congress the amend
n ment made practically no progress an
- until seven years ago it had not bee
~ debated on the floor for 80 years.
l. But the campaign for the moyemer
,r was slowly but steadily gaining groun
l. in the states.
!, Meanwhile Miss Anthony made
8 test OF the right of women to cast tn
- ballot by going to the polls and votini
~ She was arrested and convicted ant
~. though she refused to pay her fin
y was never jailed She became, hoy
ever, the forerunner Of the "militantS
~ who adopted the forceful tactics of Il
49,. ldLJeT udSS Ol lHe CdlnpdlSH
~ State after state gradually enfra
g chised its women citizens Beginnir
80 with Wyoming in 1869, by 1919 81
~ teen states had given women the rig
~ to vote and fourteen states had pres
I'll dental suffrage previous to rattle
u tion of the amendment.
IN Militancy in the fight for suffrage
su America made its appearance with Il
IT, formation of the National Woman
ss' Party in 1913 On the eve OF Pre-
lu dent Wilson's Inauguration, 5000 v
IL men led by Alice PAU, now the cha
an man of the party, attempted to mar
le from the Capitol to the White Hous
lr- They were harassed by hostile croN
which oyerran an unsympathetic |
ng lice and the capital of the Unit
an States had its first experience wi
er- suffrage riots.
lid Continuing their demonstrate
he over a period of seven years membe
aw of the women's party picketed {
he White House with banners in thu
en- hands and served terms in Jail for t
ire disturbances of the peace which grt
No ont nf their Darades and blockade