FREE ESSAY ON WOMEN'S SUFFERAGE

WOMEN'S SUFFERAGE

WOMEN'S SUFFERAGE
The traditional view of women in society was to stay at home, clean, raise children , and
to help with the family farm. This view started to change around the late 19th century
and during the industrial revolution. Male domination kept women at home but in the early
19th century, legislatures and educators began expanding the opportunities of women in
education. Though there were exceptions and problems with women and education was women's
first step considering they could now get jobs in medicine and law. During the Civil War,
women took over their husbands jobs and temporarily stopped fighting for suffrage. They
started helping the black slaves achieve freedom. The anti-slavery movement, the 15th
amendment, pushed women further down the trail leading to suffrage. Although it took
three
amendments later and 90 solid years of hard fighting for women to obtain the 19th
amendment. They finally did achieve their goal.
In the 1820s men were in power. In their homes, in the workplace, and everywhere else.
The men philosophy included these ideas. First, it was
accepted that women are possessions of their husbands, and therefore they must agree with
everything they say. Second, it was believed that most women were uneducated, or stupid,
so women were automatically assumed to be incapable of voting for president. Also,
because women were unschooled 
and ignorant, their say was unimportant. And finally that they were superior and that
they should stay that way. This was a difficult philosophy for women to overturn. This is
one reason why women's suffrage took so 
long to obtain. (Dickey, 1995)
In addition to male domination, women hurt their own cause. The public believed that
suffragists were connected with scandal-mongerers such as the Claflin sisters.
Consequently, most suffragists limited their work to conventional topics and scorned
radical view points. For example, When Anthony Comstock of Boston and Josiah W. of
Philadelphia undertook crusades against obscenity, feminists applauded and approved the
formation in 1895 of the American Puritan Alliance.
Which was why women hurt their own cause. (pg151, Leonard Pitt, We Americans, 1987)
However, women helped their cause gathering up the Seneca Falls Convention. The Seneca
Falls Convention, in 1848, stated the injustices suffered by women. These injustices
included  the denial of the right to vote, the fact that a married woman gave control of
her property to her husband, the exclusion of women from the professions, and the nearly
absolute legal control of women by men. (pg.305, Conlin) In addition to their
conservative views, most suffragists were elitists, that is they were not common people.
For example, Pitt writes ...the leaders were white college educated, and middle class.
They were an elite and a minority within that elite. As a result, suffragists were taken
less seriously by the common people.
(pg 152, Leonard Pitt, We Americans, 1987)
It took an international crises, World War II, for the claims of the suffragists to be
taken seriously. Only when the labor of women was need in war time, did the federal
government act on considering national suffrage for women. Even though the suffragist
movement progressed slowly, their efforts did have an effect on the
government. The movement brought the inequality of voting restrictions to public
attention. This public attention combined with the heroic service of women in industry
during World War I resulted in the passage of the 19th amendment to the 
Constitution of the United States, in 1920. The 19th Amendment provides men and women
with equal voting rights. After 90 years, the goal of suffragists was achieved. (Grolier
encyclopedia, Electronic Publishing, Inc., 1995)
It may have taken women a long time to achieve the right of suffrage in spite of their
conservative views. Men were threatened by women who wanted to move forward. Since males
dominated the United States, they knew they had the power to keep women from getting the
vote. Certain states, such as Wyoming, gave women the right to vote in state elections as
early as 1869. Male domination played a big part in the whole concept of women getting
the right to vote. Now, women are considered to be equals with men. Even though women
were considered to be lesser than men, they never really were, were they?