What is the 19th Amendment?

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Exactly 100 years ago today, American women were officially guaranteed the right to vote with the ratification of the 19th Amendment.

The bill's passing was a victory for the Women's Suffrage Movement, which officially gained nationwide prominence with the Seneca Falls Convention in 1848.

An amendment was drafted by leading figures of the women's rights movement, Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and first introduced to Congress in 1878 by Sen. Aaron Sargent of California. By then, it had been roughly three decades since the convention took place in upstate New York.

Congress passed the measure in 1919, and the amendment was ratified 100 years ago on Aug. 18, 1920. It effectively prohibited anyone from denying someone the right to vote based on their sex.

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Suffragettes - U.S.: Audre Osborne and Mrs. James S. Stevens, with several others in background, 1917[?, holding signs. (Library of Congress) 

The 19th Amendment states that “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.”

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However, the amendment benefited mostly White women, while many women of color were prevented from casting ballots for decades afterward because of poll taxes, literacy tests, overt racism, intimidation, and laws that prevented the grandchildren of slaves from voting. Much of that didn’t change until the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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