Susan B. Anthony
2020
Suffragette
Susan B. Anthony was born on February 15, 1820, in Adams, Massachusetts. Her father, Daniel, was a farmer and a Quaker. Her mother, Lucy, came from a family that fought in the American Revolution and served in the Massachusetts state government. From an early age, Anthony was inspired by the Quaker belief that everyone was equal under God.
“I distrust those people who know so well what God wants them to do, because I notice it always coincides with their own desires.”
After many years of teaching, Anthony returned to her family who had moved to New York State. There she met William Lloyd Garrison and Frederick Douglass, who were friends of her father. Listening to them moved Susan to want to do more to help end slavery. She became an abolitionist, although most people thought it improper for women to give speeches in public. Anthony made many passionate speeches against slavery.
In 1848, a group of women held a convention at Seneca Falls, New York. It was the first Women’s Rights Convention in the United States and began the Suffrage movement. Her mother and sister attended the convention but Susan did not. In 1851, she met Elizabeth Cady Stanton. The two women became good friends and worked together for over 50 years fighting for women’s rights. They traveled the country and gave speeches demanding that women be given the right to vote. At times, she risked being arrested for sharing her ideas in public.
Anthony was good at strategy. Her discipline, energy, and ability to organize made her a strong and successful leader. Anthony and Stanton co-founded the American Equal Rights Association. In 1868 they became editors of the Association’s newspaper, The Revolution, which helped to spread the ideas of equality and rights for women. Anthony began to lecture to raise money to publish the newspaper and support the suffrage movement. She became famous throughout the country and though many people admired her, others hated her ideas.
“I declare to you that woman must not depend upon the protection of man, but must be taught to protect herself, and there I take my stand.”
After casting her ballot in the 1872 Presidential election in her hometown of Rochester, New York, she was arrested, indicted, tried, and convicted for illegally voting. She was fined $100 for her crime. This infuriated many people, and helped publicize the suffrage movement on a national scale. In 1876, she led a protest at the 1876 Centennial of the nation’s independence.
“Independence is happiness.”
Anthony spent her life working for women’s rights. In 1888, she helped to merge the two largest suffrage associations into one, the National American Women’s Suffrage Association, which she led until 1900. She traveled around the country giving speeches, gathering thousands of signatures on petitions, and lobbying Congress every year for women.
Susan B. Anthony died in 1906 in Rochester, New York. It took another 14 years for her dream of women’s suffrage to become national law with the passage of the 19th Amendment in 1920.