In 1875, the United States Supreme Court unanimously ruled that the 14th Amendment did not grant anyone the right to vote, including women. Forty-five years later, 1920 marked the 72nd year of the fight for women’s suffrage, as well as the year women won their voting rights. Their organized struggle for equal rights started in 1848 with the Seneca Falls Convention, 72 years after the Declaration of Independence that railed against taxation without representation. By early 1920, only 28 of our then 48 states approved some form of women’s suffrage - eight states short of the needed three-quarters to ratify the 19th Amendment. And only 15 of those 28 states had approved unlimited suffrage.

The (19th) Anthony Amendment (named for women’s rights pioneer Susan B. Anthony), was first introduced in Congress in 1878. It was subsequently stuck in committee, not considered by Congress, or voted down until 1914, only to be rejected again. President Woodrow Wilson, who did not publicly support the amendment for the first five years of his presidency, finally did so in early 1918.

On January 10th of that year, the House of Representatives voted in favor of the amendment; but the Senate fell short in two separate votes over the next thirteen months. Wilson called a special session in 1919 for another vote.. This time the House voted in favor, by a larger margin than before, and the Senate followed suit on June 4, 1919.

The last step was ratification by three-quarters of the states. Tennessee became the 36th and final state needed to ratify, on August 18, 1920. Along the way, Alice Paul, of the National Woman’s Party, made a ratification flag in the suffrage movement’s tri-colors (purple, white, and gold) and sewed on a new star each time a state ratified: 35 were affixed by March 1920.

Today we celebrate Women’s Equality Day on August 26th because that is the day in 1920 that Secretary of State Bainbridge Colby signed the proclamation that certified the ratification of the 19th (Anthony) Amendment.