Existing comment:
Am I not a citizen?
Some suffragists, like Victoria Woodhull and Susan B. Anthony, argued that the 14th Amendment gave women the right to vote. The amendment defined a citizen as anyone born in the United States, and Woodhull argued before the House Judiciary Committee in 1871 that voting was the right of all citizens, including women. The committee dismissed her petition.
"When we shall have our amendment [for woman suffrage] . . . everybody will think it was always so . . . They have no idea of how every single inch of ground that she stands upon today has been gained by the hard work of some little handful of women of the past."
-- Woman suffragist Susan B. Anthony, speech at the National-American Convention, 1894 |