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Senaca Falls Convention
Approximately three hundred people attended the Seneca Falls Convention, held at the Wesleyan Chapel of the Wesleyan Methodist Church, an abolitionist denomination, on 20 and 21 July 1848. The object of the meeting, as stated in their public call, was to discuss "the social, civil, and religious condition and rights of women." Women and men gave speeches, read aloud and discussed the content of the Declaration of Sentiments, made some revisions, and approved the document.The only known African A -
Wyoming
Territorial Governor John A. Campbell appreciated the publicity power of the policy and signed the bill into law, making Wyoming the first territory or state in the history of the nation to grant women this fundamental right of citizenship. -
Illegal Voting
On 19 June 1873, a day after Justice Ward Hunt found Susan B. Anthony guilty of the federal crime of voting without the right to vote, the judge denied her lawyer's motion for a new trial. Then before pronouncing sentence, Hunt asked Anthony a routine legal question. Her reply has become one of the best-known texts in the history of woman suffrage. Three different reports of her remarks survive, and in the absence of a transcript of the trial, their authenticity cannot be determined. All three r -
Supreme Court Decision
When the United States adopted the Fourteenth Amendment, Virginia Minor was president of the Woman Suffrage Association of Missouri. At the time, Missouri's constitution said only men could vote. Minor decided to challenge the law. On October 15, 1872, Minor went to register to vote in the November 1872 presidential election. Reese Happersett, the registrar of voters, refused to register Minor because she was a woman. With help from her husband, attorney Francis Minor, Virginia Minor filed a la -
NAWSA formed
The National Woman Suffrage Association and the American Woman Suffrage Association, both founded in 1869, were the main suffrage organizations in the U.S. during the 19th century. They pursued the right to vote in different ways, but by 1890 it became necessary to combine efforts to keep the cause alive. The newly formed organization, the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA), became the most mainstream and nationally visible pro-suffrage group. Its strategy was to push for suffr -
Carrie Chapman Catt
In 1887, Carried returned to Iowa and began her work for suffrage. She joined the Iowa branch of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union, becoming head of its suffrage section. As that local group began breaking apart, she began organizing women and creating suffrage clubs. In 1889, she was elected secretary of the Iowa Woman Suffrage Association and, the next year, was a delegate and minor speaker at the convention of the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) in Washington, D.C. ( -
Triangle Shirtwaist Fire
275 girls started to collect their belongings as they were leaving work at 4:45 PM on Saturday. Within twenty minutes some of girls' charred bodies were lined up along the East Side of Greene Street. Those girls who flung themselves from the ninth floor were merely covered with tarpaulins where they hit the concrete. The Bellevue morgue was overrun with bodies and a makeshift morgue was set up on the adjoining pier on the East River. Hundred's of parents and family members came to identify their -
New NAWSA Tactics
Although NAWSA and the Congressional Union used similar tactics such as parades, rallies and protests, the NAWSA focused on the state legislatures and the Congressional Union concentrated on Congress. Later on, the Congressional Union broadened it focus to state level and even made itself into a political party, called the Woman’s Party. Despite their differences, NASWA and the Congressional Union worked well together. When tension mounted and Congress repeatedly rejected the Women Suffrage Amen
