Review by Booklist Review
The Nineteenth Amendment to the Constitution, ratified by Congress on August 18, 1920, reads in its entirety: 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. Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation. These 39 words reversed a grave injustice by granting America's women, half the population, the right to vote and participate in their democracy. This succinct, straight-forward declaration was the result of 75 years of fervent, grueling, contentious, and courageous advocacy and activism.DuBois, a history professor and woman suffrage scholar, meticulously and vibrantly chronicles every phase of this arduous, complicated, cross-country battle, profiling its leaders, tracking their evolving strategies, charting fissures within the movement, and documenting the vehement, often underhanded opposition. The story of suffrage in the United States is dramatic, infuriating, paradoxical, and saturated with sexism and racism.DuBois breaks through the dull casings that have calcified around the best-known suffragists, including Susan B. Anthony, and brings them forward as complex and compelling individuals. DuBois also vividly, if briskly, profiles many activists who will be new to readers as she chronicles with agile exactitude and fluent analysis how the suffragist movement generated an ever-morphing network of fiercely competitive organizations. Suffragists traveled the country giving lectures and meeting with politicians, published newspapers, marched, and endured insult and injury as the battle raged on through the Civil War, the creation of new states in the West, economic crises, a presidential impeachment, and the injustices and horrors of Reconstruction.A majority of suffragists initially called for universal suffrage, aligning themselves with Frederick Douglass and other African Americans fighting for their right to vote. But the Fifteenth Amendment, granting men of color the right to vote, struck like an earthquake. While Lucy Stone and other suffragists supported this advance, Cady Stanton and her followers, in their rage and frustration, and with an eye to winning over states in the deeply sexist and racist South, betrayed the movement's moral center by suggesting that suffrage be limited to females who were white and educated. Other painful schisms opened over immigrants and more daring advocacy strategies.A new generation of young, independent career women stepped up, as well as such inspiring leaders as political strategist Carrie Chapman Catt, journalist and reformer Ida B. Wells, and educator and activist Mary Church Terrell, one of the first African American women to earn a college degree. Alice Paul, who held a PhD in political science, instigated daily picketing at the White House before and during WWI. Harassed, attacked, arrested, and brutally mistreated, Paul and her Silent Sentinels turned the tide.The anti-suffrage forces included a disconcerting number of women, and politicians who restored to lies, mockery, and myriad dirty tricks. DuBois' detailing of the sordid attempts to thwart the Nineteenth Amendment confirms the malignancy of misogyny, which is rampant still, just as our democratic system remains vulnerable to corruption. DuBois's account of the pitched endgame skirmishes that finally brought the amendment to ratification on August 18, 1920 leaves us in awe and dismay.Suffrage is one of many recent and forthcoming books appearing in recognition of the hundredth anniversary of the Nineteenth Amendment, a landmark to celebrate, to be sure, yet there is still much to be done. Women, especially women of color, must still fight for equality. Voter suppression is still a serious concern, and the security of our elections is in jeopardy. Booklist's Women in Focus project will highlight books about women throughout the year in the hope that this special coverage will inspire reading recommendations, book discussions, exhibits, and events. The more we know about our past and our present, the more progress we can make toward achieving true equality and a strong, just democracy.--Donna Seaman Copyright 2020 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
UCLA history professor DuBois (coeditor, Unequal Sisters) delivers a comprehensive and well-paced account of the 75-year campaign for women's voting rights in the U.S. Disputing claims that women's suffrage was a "single issue" crusade marred by the "fatal flaw" of racism, DuBois details the movement's roots in the temperance and abolitionist causes; highlights suffragists' advocacy for trade unions, birth control, and other social justice issues; and contextualizes the exclusion of black women from the mainstream suffrage movement in the Jim Crow era. She documents Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony's leadership of the first national universal suffrage campaign in the 1850s and details the schism within the movement that developed during debates over the enfranchisement of free black men after the Civil War. At the turn of the 20th century, suffragist leaders focused on changing state voting laws, while antilynching activist Ida B. Wells and others fought to desegregate the movement. In 1912, Quaker reformer Alice Paul launched the constitutional campaign that led to the ratification of the 19th amendment in 1920. DuBois rightly focuses on the colorful personalities that defined the distinct eras of suffragism, and effectively marshals a wealth of source material. This thorough, evenhanded presentation offers valuable lessons for readers interested in women's rights and the history of progressive activism in America. (Feb.)
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Review by Library Journal Review
DuBois (Feminism and Suffrage) provides a digestible overview of the history of women's suffrage in America, making this book a good choice for those who are familiar with the basics of the movement but who want a deeper understanding of the ways the pieces fit together. Beginning with the 1848 Seneca Falls Convention--the first women's rights meeting in the country--DuBois explores major leaders in the movement, notably Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Ida B. Wells, and Alice Paul. DuBois concludes with the ratification of the 19th amendment, explaining the many national and local organizing tactics women used to advocate for the vote and the barriers they encountered along the way. While the information gathered here is not new, the writing is easy to follow and helps readers develop a comprehensive picture of the movement as a whole and a better understanding of why it progressed the way it did. VERDICT This book will be a strong addition to a variety of nonfiction collections, and is appropriate for hobbyists with an interest in women's activism and for those who are newer to American history.--Sarah Schroeder, Univ. of Washington Bothell
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Review by Kirkus Book Review
Commemorating the 100th anniversary of the ratification of the 19th Amendment, which finally recognized women as participants in democracy, historian DuBois (History/UCLA; co-author: Through Women's Eyes: An American History With Documents, 2018, etc.) offers a lively, deeply researched history of the struggle for suffrage.From 1848, when Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott convened a women's meeting in Seneca Falls, New York, to Aug. 26, 1920, the official date of ratification, the political and social climate of the nation changed, as did the suffragists' leadership, membership, and strategies. "The Declaration of Sentiments," issued at Seneca Falls, modeled after the Declaration of Independence, attested to women's "social and religious degradation" and deprivation of legal, civil, and economic rights. Nearly 30 years later, at the nation's centennial celebration, Susan B. Anthony, Stanton, and Matilda Joslyn Gage, representing the National Women's Suffrage Association, issued an even stronger statement, the "Declaration of the Rights of the Women of the United States," enumerating the "Articles of Impeachment," the major injusticessuch as the right of trial by a jury of one's peersresulting from disenfranchisement. By 1876, suffragists had been so thwarted in achieving a constitutional amendment that they decided to work state by state, succeeding first in Colorado, Wyoming, and Utah; by 1911 in Nevada and Arizona; and by 1914 in Oregon and Montana. In 1917, Montana voters made Jeannette Rankin the first woman seated in Congress. DuBois animates her well-populated history with vivid portraits: Victoria Woodhull, "the most scandalous, disruptive, and transformative figure to enter the suffrage ranks"; "society queen" Alva Belmont, whose largesse funded much suffrage work in the early 1900s; beautiful young pacifist Inez Milholland Boissevain, whose death, at age 30, elevated her to martyrdom; and the defiant Alice Paul, whose prison hunger strike brought wide attention to the suffragists' tenacious fight against virulent opposition from "conservative clergy, stubborn congressmen, nasty newspaper coverage, and the many women who feared venturing beyond their homes."An authoritative, brisk, and sharply drawn history. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
