United States
At the end of
the nineteenth century and at the beginning of the twentieth century, American
feminists began an active campaign for the achievement of suffrage.
They were led by Susan B. Anthony, Lucy Stone and
Elizabeth Cady Stanton and framed since 1890 in the National American Woman
Suffrage Association. They directed their efforts to get out the vote in various
states and forced a change in the US constitution.
Susan B. Anthony, Elisabeth C. Stanton and other
American suffragists.
The women's vote was being approved by referenda in
various states: Wyoming, Utah, Colorado, Idaho, Washington, California, Oregon,
Arizona, Kansas, Nevada and Montana.
In 1916, the first woman was elected to the US
Congress in Montana, Jeanette Rankin.Finally, in 1919, President Wilson, from the Democratic
Party, personally announced his support for women's suffrage.
In 1920, it was approved the 19th Amendment
to the Constitution granting the right to vote to women.
"The right of citizens of the United States to
vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on
account of sex." - president Wilson.
Thomas Woodrow Wilson, known
as Woodrow Wilson was
an American politician and academic who served as the 28th President of
the United States from 1913 to 1921.
Wilson worked as a professor and scholar at various
institutions before being chosen as President of Princeton University. In the
election of 1910, he was the gubernatorial candidate of New Jersey's Democratic
Party, and was elected the 34th Governor of New Jersey, serving from 1911 to
1913. He was the first Southerner elected as president since 1848,and Wilson
was a leading force in the Progressive Movement, bolstered by his Democratic
Party's winning control of both the White House and Congress in 1912.
Spain
In 1931, many people of Parliament feared that women,
who were accused of lack of critical thinking, endangered the Republic. But, on
October 1, it was approved one Article of the Constitution that established the
female right to vote for the first time in Spanish History.
In these courts, there were only three women and, two
of them, Clara Campoamor and Victoria Kent, were responsible for the
conflicting positions.
Clara Campoamor
was a politician in the Spanish Republic who fought for the rights and equality
of women. She was one of the main proponents of women's suffrage in Spain,
which was achieved in 1931, just 84 years ago.
Victoria Kent Siano was a Spanish lawyer and Republican
politics. She was the first woman to join the Madrid Bar Association in 1925,
during the dictatorship of Primo de Rivera and the first woman in the world who
practiced law before a military tribunal.
Suffragist proposal was achieved with 161 votes in
favor and 121 votes against after hearing the debate between Victoria Kent and
Clara Campoamor, in which the winner was Clara. As a result, women could vote
in the next elections in 1933.
However, just three years later, after the elections
of 1936, the Franco’s dictatorship in 1939, the democratic illusions were
completed not only for women but for all Spaniards. with the fall of the
dictatorial regime illusion of women's suffrage was again a reality in the
democratic elections of 1977.
As we can see behind the women's suffrage there have been many women who have fought very hard to get it.
A curiosity: table of countries with women's suffrage
