The 19th Amendment Did Not Give All Women The Right To Vote
January 28, 2020Often hailed as giving American women the right to vote, the 19th Amendment celebrates its 100th anniversary this year. However, just as the constitution effectively placed an asterisk after the words “all men are created equal”, the 19th amendment’s promise that no United States citizen would be denied the right to vote “on account of sex” wasn’t intended for all by neither lawmakers nor the white suffragists who helped pass it.
Take this quote as an example: “[I]f you will not give the whole loaf of suffrage to the entire people, give it to the most intelligent first. If intelligence, justice, and morality are to have precedence in the government, let the question of the woman be brought up first and that of the negro last.”