Women's Suffrage

Floor Speech

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Mrs. BLACKBURN. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Maine for her leadership in today's activity as we commemorate the Senate's action in passing the 19th Amendment and sending that to the States for ratification.

It is amazing to think that it was 100 years ago today--today--that women in this country still did not have the right to vote. When we think about Nashville, TN, today, we are thinking about country music, bachelorette parties, pro-sports; in the summer of 1920, Nashville, TN, was the focus of individuals on both sides of the debate over women's suffrage because that summer was the final push to get the 19th Amendment ratified so that women would forever have the right to vote. Suffragists from all across the country looked to Tennessee in that last-ditch effort to pass an amendment before the 1920 Presidential elections.

As it all came together and as everybody was coming into Nashville-- you had the red roses on one side and the yellow roses on the other side--the battle was heating up. The Tennessee House of Representatives had been called back into a special session so that they could debate this issue: Would women receive the right to vote? Would Tennessee agree to vote for ratification of the 19th Amendment?

The pro and anti suffragists flooded that city. Those who opposed enfranchisement, wearing those red roses, went to extreme lengths to prevent a vote. At one point, legislators actually fled the State to prevent a quorum. They left the State so they would not have to say where they stood on the issue of women having the right to vote. But let me tell you, against those Tennessee women, against suffragists from across the country, all wearing their yellow roses, those legislators never stood a chance.

You have all heard of Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, but let me introduce you to a few more of those fierce female fighters from the summer of 1920. There was Anne Dallas Dudley from Nashville, who was really quite an organizer; Abby Crawford Milton; Sue Shelton White from West Tennessee; and, as has been mentioned, Ida B. Wells, who was from Memphis. They are all Tennesseans who fought tirelessly on behalf of suffrage and brought the State's house of representatives to that fateful vote on August 18, 1920.

The Senator from Maine talked a moment earlier about a young legislator, the youngest member of the House of Representatives in the State of Tennessee. His name was Harry T. Burn. Harry was from Niota, TN. He was a freshman house of representatives member. He switched his vote from nay to yea, broke a tie, and made history. As the Senator from Maine said, he did it because of a letter written to him by his mother, who reminded him that he should be a good boy and help Ms. Catt--Carrie Chapman Catt--put the ``rat'' in ``ratification.'' He did, and so it was official: Tennessee had become the 36th and final State needed for ratification of the 19th Amendment.

That journey from Seneca Falls, NY, to Nashville, TN, was hard- fought. Sometimes we don't think about how long it took. It was a 72- year journey--72 years--from the Seneca Falls Convention to that final vote in Nashville, TN.

Think about this: The women who started this push for women's suffrage were not alive to see it become the law of the land and become a constitutionally guaranteed right. And the women who voted in that 1920 Presidential election, many--most of them were not even alive when the fight began. But the women who started the fight did it because they knew that women receiving the right to vote was a worthy fight. Today, we owe them so much gratitude for the work they did 100 years ago today in pushing this through the U.S. Senate.

My colleague, Senator Kirsten Gillibrand of New York, has joined me in working to pass the Women's Suffrage Centennial Commemorative Coin Act. We are doing that here in the Senate, and in the House, two of our colleagues--Representative Elise Stefanik from New York and Brenda Lawrence--have introduced a companion bill.

The legislation authorizes the Treasury to mint silver coins honoring the work of women suffrage activists. The coins will be issued in 2020, which also marks the centennial anniversary of the passage, the ratification of the 19th Amendment. Proceeds from sales of the coin will support the important work of the Smithsonian Institution's American Women's History Initiative.

It is my hope that because of this, more young women will look to history for guidance and feel very proud of what they learn about the women suffragists, that the little girl who is following her mom into the voting booth will begin to understand and appreciate why so many women are standing in line at the polls to cast their vote, and that women who want to change things in their community or their State or their country will stop waiting for someone else to take the lead and will realize they are empowered to do this because of actions that were taken over 100 years ago.

In 1916, famed suffragist Carrie Chapman Catt stood before the National American Woman Suffrage Association, and she declared:

The time has come to shout aloud in every city, village, and hamlet, and in tones so clear and jubilant that they will reverberate from every mountain peak and echo from shore to shore: The Woman's Hour has struck.

Indeed, the woman's hour did strike and shout, these ladies did.

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