1776

Abigail Adams writes to husband John Adams while he is in Philadelphia working on the Declaration of Independence to “…and by the way, in the new code of laws…I desire you to remember the ladies…do not put such unlimited power into the hands of the husbands…we are determined to foment a rebellion, and will not hold ourselves bound by any laws in which we have no voice or representation.”  His reply dismisses her request for equality for women “…as for your extraordinary Code of Laws, I cannot but laugh.”  The Declaration's wording specifies "all men are created equal.”

1820 to 1880

Americans continue to hold traditional ideas about women and men’s roles in society, excluding women from education, business, and public affairs and confining them to a life focused on their husbands and children.

1821

Emma Hart Willard founded the Troy Female Seminary in New York, the first school for the higher education for women.  

1833

Oberlin College becomes the first co-ed college in the US.  In 1841, Oberlin awards the first academic degrees to three women graduates, including Lucy Stone who will later influence Susan B. Anthony to take up the cause of women’s suffrage.  

1836

Sarah Grimke, widely held as the mother of the women’s suffrage movement, begins her role as the first woman to speak in public to promote the women's rights and anti-slavery movements. The clergy criticized Grimke as “threatening the female character” and male abolitionists considered her public speaking a liability to their cause.

1837

Suffragist Lucretia Mott organizes the first National Female Anti-Slavery Society as a result of being denied membership in other abolition groups because she was a woman. 

1837

Mary Lyon, determined to provide women the same kind of meaningful education existing in men's colleges, founds Mount Holyoke College in Massachusetts, the first four year women’s college in the US.  Holyoke is soon followed by Vassar in 1861, and Wellesley and Smith Colleges, both in 1875.

1838 

Sarah Grimke becomes the first woman to address a legislative body in the US at the Massachusetts State Legislature, speaking on women’s rights and abolition. 

1839

Mississippi passes the first Married Woman's Property Act which would grant married women the right to receive income from their property and protect them from their husbands’ debts. Husbands were still in control of buying, selling, and managing property. 

1840 March

Lucretia Mott and Elizabeth Cady Stanton are refused entry at the World Anti-Slavery Convention in London because they are women; they would soon begin their cause for women’s rights. 

1844

Female textile workers in Massachusetts organize the Lowell Female Labor Reform Association (LFLRA) and demand a 10-hour workday. This was one of the first labor groups for working women in the US. 

1848 July 19-20

The women's rights movement in the US is officially launched in Seneca Falls, New York, initiated by Lucretia Mott and Elizabeth Cady Stanton. Only women were allowed to attend the first day of the two-day conference, and despite minimal publicity over 300 women and men attended.  Sixty-eight women and thirty-two men sign the “Declaration of Sentiments and Resolutions” establishing the issues and goals for women’s equality in politics, education, jobs, religion, family, and morals that would define their cause for the next 72 years. 

1849

Lucretia Mott writes Discourse on Woman, arguing that the inferiority of women can be attributed to their limited educational opportunities, that “her self-respect will be increased; reserving the dignity of her being, she will not suffer herself to be degraded into a mere dependent. Nor will her feminine character be impaired.” 

1850

Amelia Jenks Bloomer launches the Dress Reform Movement as an emancipation from the “dictates of fashion.”  Wearers were mostly middle class suffragists like Elizabeth Cady Stanton and the new outfits allowed the first wave feminists to bicycle and swim comfortably. The Bloomer costume was eventually abandoned by many suffragists who feared it detracted from more serious women's rights issues. 

1851

Former slave Sojourner Truth delivers her "Ain't I a Woman?” speech extemporaneously before a spellbound audience at the Women's Rights Convention in Akron, Ohio.

1852

Harriet Beecher Stowe's bestselling anti-slavery novel Uncle Tom's Cabin is released and has a profound effect on attitudes about slavery in the US; it is even thought to have played an influence in the Civil War.  Later it was reported that President Lincoln greeted Stowe visiting the White House with “Is this the little woman who made this great war?” 

1853-1855

Paulina Wright Davis publishes Una, the first women's rights periodical that was owned, written, and edited entirely by women.  Una signifies truth and the quote “Out of great heart of nature seek we truth” is from their first edition.   

1859

Women now have reliable condoms and the birth rate in the US continues a downward trend. By the late 1900s women will raise an average of only two to three children, in contrast to five or six children at the beginning of the 20th century.

1861 to 1865

The Civil War disrupts the women’s suffrage movement. Women across the US focus on nursing wounded soldiers and supporting the war effort, giving the suffragists an opportunity to gain critical organizational and occupational skills that they will later use in the votes for women campaign.

1865 to 1880

Newly emancipated Southern black women form thousands of groups across the US with the goal of "uplifting the race.”  Southern white women create Confederate memorial social groups to help preserve the memory of the “Lost Cause” of the Confederacy.

1866

Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony form the American Equal Rights Association dedicated to the goal of universal suffrage for white and black women and black men. 

1868

The 14th Amendment is ratified and grants citizenship to all persons born or naturalized in the US, including former slaves, and guarantees all citizens "equal protection of the laws.” It is important to note that this is the first amendment that defines and states "citizens" and "voters" as "male."

1869

The women's rights movement splits into two factions as a result of disagreements over the Fourteenth and soon-to-be-passed Fifteenth Amendments. Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony form the more radical National Woman Suffrage Association (NWSA).  Lucy Stone, Henry Blackwell, and Julia Ward Howe organize the more conservative American Woman Suffrage Association (AWSA).  The Wyoming Territory is created with a provision for women to vote.  

1870

The 15th Amendment grants black men the right to vote: “the right of citizens to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.”  The newly formed National Woman Suffrage Association (Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton) refused to work for its ratification, arguing that it be removed in favor of a Sixteenth Amendment that would provide universal suffrage. Frederick Douglass, an early champion of women’s rights, breaks with Stanton and Anthony over their position. 

1870

The American Woman Suffrage Association (AWSA) begins publishing the "Woman's Journal” edited by Lucy Stone, Henry Blackwell, and Mary A. Livermore.  

1872

Victoria Woodhull is the first woman to run for President of the United States under the Equal Rights Party ticket with Frederick Douglass as her running mate. 

Myra Bradwell is disallowed to practice law by the Supreme Court on the basis that married women are not allowed to draw up legal contracts, which is a necessity for any lawyer. Prior to this Bradwell had written several key state laws regarding the rights of women, notably the 1861 Married Women’s Property Act and the Earnings Act of 1869, both of which helped married women gain control over their property and finances.  

1872

Susan B. Anthony is arrested in Rochester, New York for attempting to vote in the presidential election. Sojourner Truth appears at a polling booth in Grand Rapids, Michigan demanding a ballot but is refused. 

1874

The Woman's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU) is founded and becomes a strong ally in the fight for woman suffrage. One of the suffragists strongest opponents is the liquor lobby, which feared women would vote to prohibit liquor.  

1876 to 1879

Lawyer Belva Ann Lockwood, one of the first female lawyers in the US, spends three years lobbying Congress to become the first woman to practice before the US Supreme Court.  

1878

A Woman Suffrage Amendment is unsuccessfully introduced to the US Congress. The original wording of this 1878 Amendment will be used 42 years later when the 19th Amendment is drafted. 

1880 to 1910

The number of women employed in the US increased from 2.6 to 7.8 million, of which 60% work as domestic servants. 

1884

Belva Ann Lockwood runs for President of the United States on the National Equal Rights Party ticket.  “I cannot vote but I can be voted for.” Lockwood secures 4,149 votes in six states.

1890

The National Woman Suffrage Association and the American Woman Suffrage Association groups unite as the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) with Elizabeth Cady Stanton as president and Susan B. Anthony as vice president.

Hull House, a settlement house project in Chicago’s 19th Ward, is founded by suffragists Jane Addams and Ellen Gates Starr.  Within a year there will be more than 100 settlement houses throughout the US, largely operated by educated white and black women seeing a need for social reform to help bridge the gap of the urban poor and assist immigrant families settling in America. This is the first step for women to become an important voice in social agenda of America. 

Wyoming is admitted to the Union with its suffrage provision intact, making it the first place in the world to grant women the right to vote. 

1891

Ida B. Wells begins a national anti-lynching campaign after a white mob abducts and murders three black businessmen in Memphis, Tennessee. Her campaign would continue over four decades and in May 2020, Wells is awarded a posthumous Pulitzer Prize “for her outstanding and courageous reporting on the horrific and vicious violence against African Americans during the era of lynching.” 

1893 

Colorado becomes the first State to adopt a state amendment granting women the right to vote.

1895

Elizabeth Cady Stanton publishes the bestseller "The Woman’s Bible" which addressed sexism in the Bible and challenged that women should not be subservient to men. Denounced by clergy as “the work of Satan” and outraging many conservative suffragists, the National American Woman Suffrage Association was forced to formally denounce Stanton’s book and distance themselves from their beloved and venerable suffrage pioneer. 

1896

National Association of Colored Women is formed by Harriet Tubman, Ida B. Wells, Mary Church Terrell, Margaret Murray Washington, Josephine St. Pierre Ruffin and others. Their motto “lifting as we climb” to demonstrate to “an ignorant and suspicious world that our aims and interests are identical with those of all aspiring women."

1900

Susan B. Anthony, 80 years old, steps down as president of National American Woman Suffrage Association and chooses 41 year old Carrie Chapman Catt as her successor to lead the next generation of suffragists. Catt would later found the League of Women Voters and the International Woman Suffrage Alliance.

Maud Wood Park, 29, is the youngest delegate at the National American Woman Suffrage Association convention.  As one of the few students at Ratcliffe College interested in women’s right to vote, Park is determined to recruit other young members to the cause and tours colleges across the US to form the College Equal Suffrage League. 

1903

The Women’s Trade Union League, the first national trade union for women is formed to advocate for fair wages, better working conditions, an eight-hour work day, and the end of child labor.

1908 March 4

Dozens of suffragists, wives and daughters of Congress  invade the Capitol to demand votes for women. The women were spouses and daughters of members of Congress and gave reasons why women should vote, asking if African American men could vote, why not women. 

1911

The National Association Opposed to Women Suffrage is founded with its most powerful chapters in Texas and Virginia. Comprised of wealthy members, many of whom are men fearing that women voting would lead to “domination by the black race” and “feminism, sex antagonism, socialism, anarchy, and Mormonism.” The “Antis” were financially supported by the liquor industry, plantation owners, Southern Congressmen, and railroad magnates.   

1912

Theodore Roosevelt’s Progressive Party is the first national political party to adopt the women’s suffrage plank. 

1913

Alice Paul and Lucy Burns organize the controversial, militant National Women’s Party after having been mentored by British suffragette Emmeline Pankhurst. 

1913 March 3

Paul and Burns organize the first national suffrage parade with over 8.000 women delegates from every state marching down Pennsylvania Avenue the day before President Woodrow Wilson’s inauguration. With an estimated 250,000 bystanders, angry mobs block and assault the suffragists while police watch but do not intervene.  Approximately 200 women are hospitalized; subsequent national publicity about the violence shocks America and creates sympathy for the suffragists. Congressional Hearings and investigations within the DC Police Commission are held, resulting in the firing of the Police Superintendent. The publicity renews interest and support for the suffrage movement.

1914

The National Federation of Women’s Clubs formally endorses the suffrage campaign. This is significant as the Federation is comprised of more that 2 million white and African American women throughout the US. 

1916

Jeannette Rankin of Montana becomes the first woman elected to a federal office, elected in 1916 to the House of Representatives.

"The Winning Plan” is unveiled by Carrie Chapman Catt, president of the National American Woman Suffrage Association. Catt’s plan for the final phase of the suffrage movement requires the strategic coordination of lobbying on the state and local level, avoiding states they considered hopeless (much of the South), financially supporting and personally endorsing the most promising state campaigns, and lastly, lobbying for a federal constitutional amendment.  

1917   

On November 14, 1917, during "The Night of Terror,” forty guards at Occoquan Workhouse Prison will beat, chain, choke, stab, and assault thirty-three Silent Sentinels who have been arrested for alleged obstructing the sidewalk. This brutality results in news stories across the US and angers the public, creating more sympathy for the suffragists. 

1918 to 1920

World War I and the Pandemic of 1918 intervenes with the suffragists’ momentum, forcing them to turn their efforts to nursing the wounded and sick soldiers and citizens stricken with influenza. The women also joined the American workforce for the first time, serving as ambulance drivers, journalists, office and factory workers, and more. These selfless actions will later help the suffragists in their argument that they are equal to men and good citizens and certainly worthy to vote. 

The Silent Sentinels continue to stand vigil at the White House six days a week in all types of weather as a constant reminder to President Wilson on his lack of support for suffrage as well as to protest the War. Wilson writes to his daughter June that the suffragists “seem bent on making their cause as obnoxious as possible.” During this two year period, approximately 2,000 Sentinels are arrested. An appellate court will later rule that all arrests were illegal. 

1918 May 21

The 19th Amendment passes in the House of Representatives with two-third votes; it was opened for debate by Montana Congresswoman and suffragist Jeannette Rankin, the first women elected to the Congress.

1918 October 1

The 19th Amendment fails by two votes short in the Senate after suffrage convert President Wilson pleads with Senators to immediately pass the amendment.

1919 February 10

 The 19th Amendment fails again in the Senate, this time it is short only one vote for the necessary two-thirds majority.

1919 June 4

The 19th Amendment finally passes in the Senate.

The battle for federal ratification of the 19th Amendment officially begins; the suffragists will need to secure a minimum of 36 of the 48 states for the amendment to become law.

1920 August 18

Harry Burns, a 24 year old legislator in Tennessee breaks the 48-48 tie on August 18th to honor his Mother’s request, and with that, the final vote needed for the 19th Amendment is cast. 

1920 August 26

The 19th Amendment is certified and officially becomes a part of the US Constitution, ending the 72 year battle for women’s right to vote. 

Charlotte Woodward is the only living suffragist who attended the 1848 Seneca Falls convention where the movement began to see their dream for equality finally realized. 

1920 - 1921

National American Women’s Suffrage Association ceases to exist but becomes the nucleus of the League of Women Voters. Maud Wood Park, who in 1900 had been the youngest suffragist, becomes the first president of the League.

1921 

The Lucy Stone League, one of the first groups to come out of the suffrage movement, was created by its namesake to fight for women to keep and legally use their maiden name. Lucy Stone was the first married woman in the US to use her birth name throughout her life.  The group’s motto was “A wife should no more take her husband’s name that he should hers. My name is my identity and must not be lost.”  Membership was also open to men and included many journalists who were a part the legendary Algonquin Round Table in New York. Noted members of the Lucy Stone League included Isadora Duncan, Amelia Earhart, Margaret Mead, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Georgia O’Keefe, and Zona Gale, the first woman to be awarded a Pulitzer in Drama.  Founder Ruth Hale said that “the only one in her household who answered by Mrs. Heywood Broun (her husband’s name) was the cat."

1923

National Woman’s Party proposes the Equal Rights Amendment to eliminate discrimination on the basis of gender. Passed in Congress in 1972 with final approval requiring 38 states (of which they had 35). At the time there was wide bipartisian support of the ERA until Phillis Schlafly of STOP ERA mobilized housewives with the fear that the ERA was a threat against family values and that women would be drafted into the military, lose alimony protections, child custody, and forced to use gender-neutral bathrooms. From 1973-1979, five states would rescind their votes for the ERA (Idaho, Kentucky, Tennessee, Nebraska, and South Dakota). Congress then extended the deadline to 1982 but the amendment has languished until renewed interest from fourth-wave feminists and the Me Too Movement resulted in new ratifications from Nevada, Illinois, and Virginia in 2017-2020. Currently there are 38 of the necessary three-fourths majority of 50 states to ratify, although the ERA’s future is uncertain due to the status and legality of the 1972 version.

1965 August 6

President Johnson signs into law the Voting Rights Act of 1965 to support the 15th and 19th Amendments and extend voting rights as some states continued to disenfranchise African American women and men into the 20th century. 

1984

Sixty-four years after the 19th Amendment is passed, Mississippi becomes the final state to vote for ratification.