Reasoning Behind The 19th Amendment

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When the constitution was written, the idea of universal suffrage was too radical for our founding fathers to address. They decided to leave the states with the authority to decide the requirements for voting. (Janda) By allowing the states to decide who voted, the authors had not intended for each state's discriminations to prevent the country from maintaining true democracy. However, by not setting up a nationwide regulation, the authors launched the country into a century and a half long fight for freedom and equality for all. White males over the age of 21 were the first to be able to participate in American democracy. Besides some taxpaying or property owning laws, the majority of all working class white males were eligible to vote by 1850. During this time, the nation was on the brink of a civil war. One of the underlying issues of the Civil War was slavery. Blacks were beginning to cry for equality, and their right to vote was not far off. The 15th amendment was quick to follow the Civil War, making it illegal to deny the right to vote to anyone on account of their race. Blacks did not actually gain the right to vote in all states until The Voting Rights Act in the 1960s. The government gave blacks the right to vote because they saw it could produce an immediate political gain. Nothing could be gained from allowing women to vote, so the government refrained from amending the constitution for women. (Flexner) Once blacks gained their right to vote, women began to cry for equality. "The beginning of the fight for women suffrage is usually traced to the ‘Declaration of Sentiments' produced at the first woman's rights convention in Seneca Falls, N. Y. in 1848." (Linder) A few years before this convention, Elizabeth Cady St... ... middle of paper ... ...to change it. There is no longer a line dividing men's rights and women's rights. I, by the law of the 19th amendment of the Constitution, am a United States Citizen equal to each and every one of my fellow citizens, whether male or female. References Flexner, Eleanor (n.d). The History of Woman's Suffrage in America. October 8, 2007, from http://www.history.com/exhibits/woman/herstory.html. Janda, Kenneth. Berry, Jeffrey. Goldman, Jerry (2008). The Challenge of Democracy (9th ed.). Boston; New York: Houghton Mifflin Company. Linder, Doug (2007). Women's Fight for the Vote: The Nineteenth Amendment. October 8, 2007, from http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/conlaw/nineteentham.htm. Rochester Regional Library Council (2000). Western New York Suffragists: Winning the Vote. October 8,2007, from http://www.winningthevote.org/glossary.html.

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