SLO County League of Women Voters celebrates two centennials — and one important vote
The year 2020 celebrates two centennials: the founding of the League of Women Voters and the ratification of the 19th Amendment. The 100-year history of both is complicated, like much of American history, full of promise and fraught with problems. Looking back at the history can give us insights into making the future better.
Women fought for the right to vote long before the suffrage movement. Nearly 150 years before the House of Representatives voted to pass the 19th Amendment, future First Lady Abigail Adams wrote to her husband: “I long to hear that you have declared an independency…If particular care and attention is not paid to the ladies, we are determined to foment a rebellion, and will not hold ourselves bound by any laws in which we have no voice or representation.”
The rebellion that the ladies would foment formally began with the Seneca Falls Convention in 1848, which produced a Declaration of Sentiments stating: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men and women are created equal.” The push for woman’s right to vote, however, was largely set aside during the pre-Civil War era in favor of the struggle for abolition of slavery.
With Reconstruction, the 14th Amendment granted citizenship to the freed slaves. Unfortunately, it inserted the words “male citizens” when it came to voting rights; women were excluded. The 15th Amendment prevented denying the right to vote based on race, but it did not include wording that would prevent denying the right to vote based on sex.
The struggle for women’s suffrage grew in the early part of the 20th century, but the suffragists knew they were dependent on the votes of white men, and many of them feared that including African American women in their campaign might dilute that support. Many prominent Black women fought for suffrage, but they were, quite literally, relegated to the back of the parade.
For many years after ratification of the 19th Amendment, Black women continued to face hurdles in voting due to restrictive laws, largely in the South. It would not be until the 1960s that Black women — and men — were more fully enfranchised with the passage of the landmark Voting Rights Act of 1965, prohibiting discrimination in voting based on race.
In February 1920, foreseeing success, Carrie Chapman Catt founded the League of Women Voters to educate and empower the newly enfranchised women. From the beginning, the League was non-partisan. But Catt said in her inaugural speech that League members should be involved with the political parties because that is where policy is shaped. The League does take positions on policy issues, such as fighting voter suppression, redistricting, and money in politics.
Unfortunately, from the beginning the League also discriminated against Black women, a history it is striving to correct. A start in that direction was the election of Dr. Carolyn Jefferson-Jenkins as the first Black President of the national LWV (1998-2002). Dr. Jefferson-Jenkins, who recently published “The Untold Story of Women of Color in the League of Women Voters,” was the keynote speaker at the LWVSLOCO Feb. 22 celebration of the founding of the League.
The League continues to acknowledge its past and change its future. At its biannual convention in June, the US League elected as its 20th President Dr. Deborah Turner, a Black physician from Iowa and the League’s second Black president.
The 19th Amendment states that the right to vote cannot be abridged on account of sex. Between 1920 and 1965, Congress gradually expanded voting rights, with the Indian Citizenship Act of 1924, and the McCarren-Walter Act of 1952, which granted citizenship and voting rights to Asian-Americans. But the Constitution gives to the States the power to regulate voting, and many states continue to this day to chip away at the progress that has been made, with gerrymandering, voter ID laws, closing polling places, and other tactics. And in 2013, in Shelby County v. Holder, the Supreme Court ruled to remove an essential section of the Voting Rights Act which required federal oversight of elections in states that had historically limited voting rights. The effect was to allow those states more leeway in their voter suppression efforts.
Our charge today is to guard our right to vote, to work to protect and expand minority voting rights, to encourage eligible voters to register, and, most importantly, to use this precious right that so many have fought for and VOTE.
But it is also important to be an informed voter. A useful tool for knowing who and what you’re voting for is Voter’s Edge, a website from the LWV California that gives unbiased information about issues, candidates, and the money supporting them. It can be found at www.votersedge.org.
American democracy is a work in progress. There are serious issues facing the country. But 2020 is an election year, and our vote is our voice in this democracy. Make sure your voice is heard.
Juliane McAdam is co-chair of the Centennial Celebrations Committee, League of Women Voters of San Luis Obispo County.