Susan B. Anthony and the Women's Suffrage Movement

The year is 1868 and the tumultuous tide of change had recently flowed through the United States with the end of the Civil War. Through the years of her young adulthood, Susan B. Anthony, having worked to support anti-slavery measures,  would ride that wave of change to begin the Women's Suffrage Movement. Along with friend Elizabeth Cady Stanton, the two would, that year, publish "The Revolution", the first women's rights publication and the following year begin The National Women's Suffrage Association; a group that worked for women's right to hold elected office and vote in elections.  Later, that group would merge with another to become the National American Women's Suffrage Association. With the combination of the publication, the Association and the work of anti-slavery and temperance groups, the Women's Suffrage Movement in the U.S. was gaining speed.

Meanwhile throughout Europe and in Britain in particular, similar groups were established. By 1903 Emmeline Pankhurst and daughters established the Women's Social and Political Union with the original intent that it would be a peaceful organization, a common thread among all international groups. However, the peaceful protests had come to an end too soon turning the gatherings into violence, which garnered a public sentiment among men that if women turned to violence over voting rights, what would they do should they assume the power of a public office.

But the world was changing once more and with the start of World War I many of the European Suffrage groups postponed the movement in order to join the war effort. While in the United States, President Woodrow Wilson remained neutral in the war, his hand was forced, and in 1917 declared war against Germany, thus engaging the U.S. in the war.

It wasn't until 1919 with the signing of the Treaty of Versailles , which brought the war to an end that many countries agreed to women's right to vote legislation. On June 4, 1920, the U.S. enacted the 19th Amendment which prohibited the restriction of voting based on gender.

Though Susan B. Anthony and the many, many women (and men) who fought for the voting rights women possess today did not live to see the passage of the 19th Amendment, she knew the change would come. It did and we thank her and the Women's Suffrage movement for changing the world for the better.