On August 26, 1920, the women of the United States finally gained the right to vote, more than 70 years after it’s first serious proposal. In July of 1848, the idea was first talked of at the Seneca Falls Woman’s Rights Convention. By the time women gained suffrage, only one woman from that convention was still alive to vote: Charlotte Woodward, at age 81, finally found herself able to speak her political voice.

In the early 20th century, women were starting to gain ground. Alice Paul and the National Women’s Party began using the radical tactics with which we are familiar with today: picket lines at the White House, loud demonstrations, mostly peaceful marches, and even chaining themselves to a Minneapolis courthouse door to prove their point.

A large, well-funded anti-suffrage movement was politically verbal at those times, claiming that most American women didn’t actually want to vote. Furthermore, they claimed, even if women did want to vote, they were not qualified to do so. In response, the Women’s Movement used sharp wit and humor to respond, such as this sample from writer Alice Duer Miller:

Why We Don’t Want Men to Vote

• Because man’s place is in the army.
• Because no really manly man wants to settle any question otherwise than by fighting about it.
• Because if men should adopt peaceable methods women will no longer look up to them.
• Because men will lose their charm if they step out of their natural sphere and interest themselves in other matters than feats of arms, uniforms, and drums.
• Because men are too emotional to vote. Their conduct at baseball games and political conventions shows this, while their innate tendency to appeal to force renders them unfit for government.

After World War I, when women had taken over many of the traditional men’s jobs, the push for women’s suffrage surged. Women had taken care of the country while the men were away fighting, and even the most docile groups didn’t stop from reminding the President and Congress that women were an integral and very important part of the country.

In 1919, the U.S. House of Representatives, endorsed by the U.S. Senate, passed an Amendment to the United States Constitution, passing the buck to the individual states. Wisconsin and Michigan were the first to pass the law; Georgia and Alabama the first to pass rejections. After thirty-five of the thirty-six necessary votes were passed in favor of the law, the vote came down to Tennessee. On August 18, 1920, Tennessee passed the law and thus, women were granted the right to vote.