Sleepy History - Women’s Suffrage: How Women Fought for the Right to Vote

Episode Date: August 27, 2026

✨Sleepy History is written and narrated by humans. ✨ Narrated By: Heather Foster Written By: Alicia Steffann In this episode, follow the stories of the brave people who campaigned for women��s right to vote, both in the United States and around the globe. Includes mentions of: Violence against women, Politics, Slavery, WWI, Gender #History #Sleep #Women's #rights #suffrage About Sleepy History Explore history's most intriguing stories, people, places, events, and mysteries, delivered in a supremely calming atmosphere. If you struggle to fall asleep and you have a curious mind, Sleepy History is the perfect bedtime companion. Our stories will gently grasp your attention, pulling your mind away from any racing thoughts, making room for the soothing music and calming narration to guide you into a peaceful sleep. Want to enjoy Sleepy History ad-free? Start your 7-day free trial of Sleepy History Premium: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://sleepyhistory.supercast.com/⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Have feedback or an episode request? Let us know at: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠slumberstudios.com/contact⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Sleepy History is a production of Slumber Studios. To learn more, visit ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠www.slumberstudios.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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In the modern era, the concept of democracy is familiar, but its details are often complicated. Even in a society where leaders are elected, there are still disagreements over which people may cast votes and under what conditions. One of the most universal has been whether or not women should be included. Tonight we'll follow the footsteps of the activists who campaigned so bravely for women's suffrage and lived by the words of Susan B. Anthony who said, there shall never be another season of silence until women have the same rights men have on this green earth.

So just relax and let your mind drift as we explore the sleepy history of women's suffrage. Merriam Webster defines democracy as government by the people or a rule of the majority. To most people, that explanation rings true, but what we tend to gloss over is the question of who the people in that definition are, or were, at any given time. The truth is that the universal right to vote is surprisingly recent in history, with a handful of democracies only reaching that landmark as late as the turn of the 21st century. Historically, all democracies have gone through significant periods where only certain members of societies counted as voters.

These privileges have been restricted due to factors such as race, financial resources, and gender. At the end of the Industrial Revolution, women in many countries began to challenge the idea that only men could vote. Prior to that time, there were only a handful of exceptions to the rule that men and men alone had a say in elections. For example, looking back as far as ancient Greece, which is often cited as the birthplace of democracy, women led intensely private lives. They were not allowed to attend most public assemblies, let alone vote or hold office. The women of Sparta famously enjoyed a greater level of privileges than their sisters in other city-states, but even they were not allowed to participate in government or attend political meetings. Any influence they may have exerted in that sphere

would have been that of private persuasion. The women of Rome fared no better. The less wealthy among them did leave the home in order to work in public. However, no women were allowed to attend political meetings or vote. Modern culture is rife with movies and books that portray the wealthy women of Rome as crafty behind-the-scenes influencers who manipulated politics from the shadows.

Perhaps that is true, because they certainly weren't able to campaign openly. And what of the great women of Egypt? It's important to point out that their political structure didn't actually include voting. With that said, women did enjoy a much greater degree of autonomy in ancient Egyptian society than they did in Greece or Rome. Women were able to own property, for example, and conduct business. To select few women, such as Hetzephtzat and Cleopatra, actually became powerful pharaohs. Those positions were gained due to inheritance, and the rights of all Egyptian women were still more fragile than those of their male counterparts. For example, they could have their privileges limited over an adulterous affair.

However, they were definitely in a position of greater influence than women in countless other ancient society. There are many other cultures we could refer to in service of the point that women have long had the short end of the stick when it comes to governance. In fact, the exceptions are so few that it's worth simply pointing out some of these rare anomalies in history. There were a handful of notable times and places where women were briefly able to cast a ballot in the broad sense. In the Middle Ages, powerful Catholic and Protestant abysses were allowed to sit and vote in national assemblies. And those abyses were themselves elected by their own sisters. So in a way, the voices of the less powerful women were receiving representation at a higher level. But this is a rare exception for the rights of women in the era.

A French nun named Marie Guillard wrote of her experiences in Canada in 1654, marveling at the powerful role of the women in the Iroquois Society. She noted, female chieftains have a deciding vote in the councils. They make decisions there like their male counterparts. She was further impressed that these same women were even the first ambassadors to discuss peace when negotiations were required. But the first country to really introduce women's sons, suffrage was arguably Sweden.

As part of their 18th century Age of Liberty, during which the country shifted from a monarchical to a parliamentary system, some women were afforded the right to vote for a time. In 1718, the vote was extended to female taxpaying members of city guilds. That right was rescinded in the state. 1772. Later in 1734, taxpaying women were able to vote in countryside elections. People without property were excluded from voting and even lower class property owners had less influence than wealthy people. But it was a notable step for women's rights in politics. Meanwhile, across the continent in the short-lived Corsican Republic, women who were heads of their families were briefly allowed to vote as of 1755.

When the island was annexed by France in 1770, the privilege was summarily retracted. At about the same time in 1756, Lydia Taft seems to have had the honor of being the first woman in the American colonies to vote, albeit just in a town election. As the widow of a wealthy farmer, she was given the privilege by proxy because she was the largest landowner in Uxbridge, Massachusetts. Even so had her oldest living son been of age, it might never have happened. The state of New Jersey got in on the action in 1776.

Their first state constitution allowed women landowners to vote. Ironically, new and more progressive rules were established in 1807 that boosted the number of eligible voters by abolishing the property requirement. However, it also explicitly barred women and black people from voting at the same time. Unsurprisingly, many of the most influential abolitionists and women's suffrage activists who emerged hailed from New Jersey. As time progressed, there were isolated existence. examples of other places that allowed women to vote. One special note was the universal suffrage with no mention of sex

implemented by the Kingdom of Hawaii in 1840. This continued until 1852 when limitations were placed on voting for anyone who wasn't a male property owner. Other instances of the people of the people. of women's suffrage popped up during the 19th century, often this seemed to happen in territories or provinces, speaking perhaps to the necessity of allowing women to vote when populations were small.

For example, the tiny and remote UK territory of the Pitcairn Islands in the Pacific Ocean permitted women to vote beginning in 1838, The Colombian province of Veles included women in elections from 1853 to 1857. The United States territories of Utah, Washington, and Wyoming allowed some women to vote in the latter half of the 19th century. And the same was true for British dependencies, protectorate. and colonies, such as the Isle of Man, South Australia, and the Cook Islands during that time period. But while these small examples of women's suffrage were percolating around the globe,

something notably important started in the United States. Before exploring that development, it's crucial to recognize that organized women's sufferings, women's suffrage movements emerged from other important rights campaigns. In a narrow sense, the quest for women's voting rights grew organically from the efforts to improve all of women's rights, including issues like labor equality and property ownership. By the mid-19th century, numerous influential voices had emerged emerged in the women's rights arena, and several landmark publications had come out on the topic. Among them were a vindication of the rights of woman by the English writer Mary Wollstonecraft,

letters on the equality of the sexes and the condition of woman by the American abolitionist Sarah Grimke and Woman in the 19th Century. by the American journalist Margaret Fuller. Circulating publications was one thing, but a serious obstacle to progress was the fact that women were not even considered fit to be speaking publicly in mixed company. Before they could join existing rights movements,

they had to be allowed out of their private spaces. For some time, that in itself was very, regulating their activities to all female societies and meeting places. In fact, two of the most important figures of the suffrage movement met at a convention where the leadership refused to seek them in public. The event in question was the World Anti-Slavery Convention in London, a delegation of prominent male and female abolition. from the United States arrived there

to find that women could only attend the sessions by sitting behind a curtained partition. Further, women were forbidden to participate in any way. Behind that curtain, a woman named Elizabeth Cady Stanton became acquainted with a female Quaker minister named Lucretia Mott. they would later team up as major figures in the campaign for women's voting rights. In 1848, Stanton and Mott joined with three additional Quaker activists

to organize what is generally considered to be the first women's rights convention in Seneca Falls, New York. About 300 men and women attended, the key product of the convention, was a list of complaints called the Declaration of Sentiments. Authored by Stanton and signed by a third of the attendees, the document listed a variety of objections to the treatment of women. One of those was the inability to vote. Not all of the organizers wanted to include the voting objection on the list, but it made the final cut

partially thanks to the support of Frederick Douglas, who was the only African-American attendee at the event. Not long after, in 1850, abolitionists, Lucy Stone and Polina Wright-Davis organized the first in a series of national women's rights conventions. By then, thanks to the Senate of Falls, meeting, women's suffrage was becoming a more familiar topic. Stone and Davis featured the issue prominently and the conventions began to happen annually. Meanwhile, Stanton's efforts

for women's suffrage were further focused when she met yet another Quaker abolitionist named Susan B. Anthony in 1851. the two became a highly influential force in the women's rights movement, authoring pamphlets and delivering speeches around the country. However, when the American Civil War began, many activists set aside the campaign for women's rights in order to focus on the abolition of slavery. Fortunately, when the war ended,

the pivotal figures of the women's movement were able to regain momentum and continue to work together in pursuit of their original cause. Having halted during the war, the National Women's Rights Convention came together for its 11th meeting. This time, it was decided

that the convention would transform into a new organization called the American Equal Rights Association, the purpose of which was to campaign for equal treatment for all Americans, and especially for women's suffrage. The new organization brought together many of the disparate voices from prior to the war, namely Stanton and Anthony, joined with Stone, Mott, and Even Friends. Frederick Douglass. Although it was a powerful group, conflicts remained. Some members,

including Lucy Stone, wanted to focus more on suffrage for black men than for women. Nevertheless, the women's suffrage supporters pressed on. In this effort, Stanton and Anthony were supported by legendary female African American activists. sojourner truth. As a result of these tensions, there was a fracture in the coalition. In 1869, Stanton, Anthony, and a few other women founded a female-only group

called the National Woman Suffrage Association with the goal of pursuing a national amendment to voting rights. Meanwhile, Stone joined with, activist Julia Ward Howe and others to form the American Woman Suffrage Association, which included men and women, but was set on pursuing women's voting state by state. Looking back, it's easy for the modern listener to think all these differences of opinion might have been resolved for the sake of a unified movement. But the push for the 15th Amendment of the Constitution, which stated that rights would not be withheld from Americans due to race, color or condition of previous enslavement, was forcing ideological priorities to the forefront.

It's important to recognize that many prejudices existed that stemmed from both racial and gender bias. For example, Frederick Douglass expressed a concern that African-American men would oppose women's suffrage. And Stanton felt that white-educated women were better prepared to vote than recently freed slaves and immigrant laborers. The movement for more voting equity was messy and, at times, fraught with prejudice. In the end, the 15th Amendment mandated that states couldn't deny the right to vote to anyone on the basis of race, color, or previous condition of servitude, and authorized Congress to pass any necessary enforcement legislation. As the Gilder-Lairman Institute notes, the amendment did not transfer the right to determine the electorate, to the federal government, but only specified particular kinds of state disenfranchisements, and sex was not one of them as unconstitutional. The two major women's suffrage groups

continued on their different paths. While the AWSA pushed for the vote state by state, the NWSA took a whole new approach. Basically, they contented that the wording in the 14th Amendment, which said that all native-born or naturalized persons or national citizens inherently gave women the right to vote, and that anyone not counting such a vote was in violation of the Constitution. This argument was called the New Departure, and it spurred hundreds of suffragists to attempt to cast votes at the polls in the 1872 presidential election.

Susan B. Anthony cast one of those ballots, and at first she actually succeeded for a short time. However, three weeks after the election, she was arrested for illegally voting and subsequently convicted by a jury that was, of course, all-male. A woman named Virginia Minor, who was in a similar quandary, brought her own case before the Supreme Court in 1874 and actually won. But the decision stated that, although women were persons and citizens, they were still not guaranteed a vote. Then to make matters worse, the Supreme Court made another damaging ruling in 1875.

In a case called Minor v. Haperset, they determined that the Constitution of the United States does not confer the right of suffrage upon anyone due to citizenship. In some ways, all the activists were back to square one. Meanwhile, suffragists in other countries were making progress by linking their cause with a different movement. Temperance is a movement associated with the reduction of or abstinence from consuming alcohol. The Women's Christian Temperance Union actually began in 1873 in Ohio in the United States. Its stated purpose was to create a pure and sober world, and the organization initially spurned the idea of women in politics.

However, in 1879, a woman named Francis Willard took over. It was Willard's view that in order to advance the organization, women must be involved in women's political issues. Suffrage was one of those. Under her direction, the organization followed a campaign called Do Everything. It grew and expanded internationally. The women of New Zealand, especially, embraced this movement to powerful effect. Leading their groundbreaking campaign was a woman named Kate Shepard.

who had been raised in Scotland and immigrated to New Zealand in 1860. By the time she joined the Temperance Union in 1885, she had already been advocating for women's issues for years. She was soon the organization's president, and she'd tirelessly campaigned for suffrage, writing pamphlets, running meetings, and creating partitions to Parliament. It took a few tries, but in 1893,

New Zealand was the first self-governing country in the world that gave women the right to vote in parliamentary elections. Back in the United States, women were beginning to get a limited number of votes on the Western frontier. In 1869, the territory of Wyoming introduced voting for women, followed by Utah in 1870. Colorado became the first actual state to allow women to vote in 1893. This was followed by Idaho in 1896. Meanwhile, those in favor of a national amendment,

were making their own push with support from Senator Aaron Sargent, who was a friend of Susan B. Anthony. In 1879, he introduced a woman's suffrage amendment that would not actually pass for 40 years. Nonetheless, when the day did come, it was put through as the 19th Amendment, word for word, any changes. It was identical to the 15th Amendment in all ways but one. It prohibited denial of the

vote due to a person's sex. A long game had begun in earnest. Over time, the work of rival suffrage organizations in the United States had slowly drifted in a similar direction. Finally, In 1890, the two groups decided to join forces. The name of the new coalition was the National American Woman Suffrage Association, otherwise known as NASA. Elizabeth Cady Stanton was president of the new organization. Lucy Stone was chair of its executive committee, and Susan B. Anthony became vice president at first,

and later the president when Stanton retired in 1892. So by 1896, the woman's suffrage flag had four stars on it, representing Wyoming, Utah, Colorado, and Idaho. Its fifth star representing Washington State would not be added until 1910. In the meantime, the movement went through a period sometimes referred to as the doldrums. Activists were still petitioning and letter writing, two activities considered acceptable for women. But the effort to get women the vote had been defeated numerous times in the past few decades. And the original organizers were growing older.

Stanton passed away in 1902, followed by Anthony in 1906. While American women seemed to make little progress, there was a new energy growing in the United Kingdom. An activist named Emmeline Pankhurst started a new era in 1903 by founding an organization called the Women's Social and Political Union. The political union soon gained attention for its unapologetically disruptive tactics. Their motto was, deeds, not words, and it was there that the term suffragette was born. The public was riveted by the uproar of these bold activists, caused in the name of votes for women. This included demonstrations, the smashing of windows, and even arson and hunger strikes.

Pankhurst was arrested repeatedly. To combat the hunger strikes, England enacted a new law called Cat and Mouse that involved releasing striking prisoners to recover and then re-arresting them. When World War I began in 1914, Pankhurst abruptly turned her focus to the war effort, shelving her suffrage protests for the time being, but it's fair to say that she created a much-needed new model for women's resistance

that paved the way for others to continue her work. One of the people who learned from that example was an American woman named Alice Paul. Alice had been raised in New Jersey by Quaker parents who enthusiastically supported gender equality. She was very well educated, possessing a biology degree from Swarthmore College, an institution that had been co-founded by her grandfather and Lucretia Mott. She also had a master's in sociology from the New York School of Philanthropy, which would one day be able to be. come Columbia University. She had put her PhD from the University of Pennsylvania on hold when she traveled to England to take advantage of a fellowship at the Woodbrook School. While she was there, she was exposed to the women's social and political union,

and, as it happened, she also met Lucy Burns. The two Americans became supportive, of the new and militant suffragist techniques, and returned with them to the United States. Paul believed in the necessity of a national amendment. When she arrived stateside, she joined Nassah, the organization originally founded by Stanton and Anthony. In 1912, the same year she finished her Ph.D. at University of Pennsylvania, she was appointed chair of the organization.

Immediately she began planning an enormous march on Washington for March 3, 1913, the day before the inauguration of Woodrow Wilson. The march, called the Woman Suffrage Procession, spun out of control when onlookers attacked the protesters. Police did nothing to help the women, an order was not restored until the Fort Meyer Calvary came to restore order.

The uproar at the march and other disagreements created tension between Paul and the leadership at the organization. Two weeks after the march, Paul and her fellow suffragists met with Wilson, who told them it was not yet time for an amendment for women's voting. Undeterred, Paul organized a group called the Congressional Union for Women's Suffrage to directly target Congress.

She and her supporters split from Nassah and also formed the new National Woman's Party and began another chapter in demonstrations. The motto of the new party was inspired by the Pankhurst rally cry to hold the party in power responsible. As such, the NWP refused to support the existing political parties until such a time as women were given the right to vote. Further, beginning in 1917, Paul and about a thousand other women,

known as the Silent Sentinels, unnerved Washington, by constantly picketing the White House. They wore coordinated purple and gold clothing and held protest signs. But they didn't speak in order to demonstrate the silencing of women in political discourse. They were hassled and attacked by spectators,

and the animosity grew worse when World War I started as they were considered unpaste. Patriotic. Eventually, Paul and 33 other protesters were arrested for obstructing traffic. She was sentenced to seven months in the nearby Acaquan Workhouse, where she was jailed with the others. Their suffering did not end there. Hunger strikes were met with force feeding, and the women endured one night of particular violence, including beatings and torturing. it became known as the night of terror. However, their fortitude was not in vain.

News of their ill treatment was leaked to the press, and sympathy for their movement grew among the public. Even as the onset of World War I had caused the public to criticize the suffragettes, it also provided fuel for their fire. Thanks to the more prominent public roles women played during the war, the leaders of the movement argued that they also deserved to vote. Luckily, there was new leadership taking charge of the effort at Nasa. A long-standing member and previous Nassau president named Carrie Chapman Kat

stepped back to the forefront, determined to galvanize their efforts. Kat had been away for some years, working on international suffrage, but she returned to take the helm. Her strategy was to campaign simultaneously for suffrage at both state and federal levels, which was a combination of the strategies of the previous suffrage organizations. As a necessary concession, she also pushed for partial suffrage in the state's most low. likely to resist. Her approach came at the right time. In 1917, New York passed a state woman suffrage referendum. And by 1918, President Woodrow Wilson got on board, eventually ordering the release of the women held at Occoquan Workhouse. Another bill for women's suffrage was introduced and this

time, Wilson gave it his support. The bill passed the House by a single vote, but failed by two votes in the Senate. But public support for women's right to vote was growing, and some lawmakers from both parties wanted to see the amendment passed before the 1920 election. Wilson called a special session of Congress in the spring of 19. The Susan B. Anthony Amendment finally passed both chambers and was sent to the states for ratification. But the fight was not over. Several states ratified the amendment immediately, but 36 were needed to reach the required three-fourths total. The ratifications slowly mounted until the spring of 1920.

At that point, the effort got stuck at 35 states and sat there for five long months. In the end, it was an ordinary woman who subtly influenced the passage of the amendment. The Tennessee State Senate voted to ratify it, but with the state house of representatives hanging in the balance, nothing was certain. a particular representative named Harry Byrne voted against it in the first round, which ended in a tie. But he must have been torn on the issue because he wrote to his mother for her advice. She wrote back, and her letter was delivered to him in the chambers right before the revote. She told him to be a good boy and pass the amendment.

He gave the tie-breaking vote and the 19th Amendment was ratified. Meanwhile, during the previous decade, other countries had also been stepping up to the plate. For example, Norway had given women the vote in 1913, Denmark and Iceland in 1915, Canada in 1917, and Germany in 1918. By the time the 19th Amendment was making its way to the states, a cascade of European countries or giving suffrage to their own female citizens. Pancur's dream finally came true for the UK in 1988. And in 1929, Ecuador became the first Latin American country to do the same on the national level.

Other countries took longer. For example, France and Japan finally implemented women's suffrage in 1945 and India in 1949. And after finally shedding colonial rule in the 1950s and 60s, numerous countries in Africa gave women the vote as well. But if the history of suffrage has taught us anything, it's that each step forward reveals further inequities. After the 19th Amendment passed, there were still real-world practices that prevented certain groups of people from accessing the vote, including African Americans and Native Americans. While the events of the early 20th century represented a massive step forward, there was still much work to be done for women in the United States and around the world. Although it's hard to believe, there were countries such as Kuwait, Bahrain, and Saudi Arabia

that only passed women's suffrage in the early 2000s. And in Afghanistan, the right has been alternately revoked and restored due to regime changes. Every year, democracies around the world continue to grapple with issues of voting access and voting rights. The fight to cast a ballot, it seems, will never truly be over. But to quote Alice Paul, who gave so much for democracy, There will never be a new world order until women are part of it. Thanks to the brave pioneers of suffrage, we're that much closer.