On this day in 1920--95 years ago--my home state of Tennessee became the 36th state to ratify the 19th Amendment to the United States Constitution, giving the 19th Amendment the 3/4ths majority of the states it needed to enshrine women's suffrage in the Constitution. It's a legacy I liked to remember every time the Tea Party-controlled Tennessee legislature did something to become the butt of jokes on the Daily Show or Colbert.
But it almost didn't happen--the 19th Amendment passed the Tennessee General Assembly by one vote. And how that vote happened is an incredible story that deserves to be retold...
Harry T. Burn, a Republican from McMinn County in southeast Tennessee, was the youngest member of the Tennessee General Assembly, only 24 in 1920 after having been elected at 22. Tennessee had agreed to call a special session in the summer of 1920 to consider the 19th Amendment after 35 other states had ratified it. It passed the state Senate, but the vote appeared to be tied in the House, which would have meant failure.
Up to that point, Harry Burn had been firmly in the "no" column. But on the morning of the vote, he received a letter from his mother:
Dear Son:
Hurrah, and vote for suffrage! Don’t keep them in doubt. I notice some of the speeches against. They were bitter. I have been watching to see how you stood, but have not noticed anything yet.
Don’t forget to be a good boy and help Mrs. Catt [Carrie Chapman Catt] put the “rat” in ratification.
Your Mother.
And what does a Southern boy do
when his mama tells him what to do?
Still sporting his red boutonniere but clutching his mother’s letter, Burn said “aye” so quickly that it took his fellow legislators a few moments to register his unexpected response. With that single syllable he extended the vote to the women of America and ended half a century of tireless campaigning by generations of suffragists, including Susan B. Anthony, Alice Paul, Lucy Burns and, of course, Mrs. Catt.
Supposedly, he either had to hide in the attic of the Capitol or was chased out a window onto a ledge by angry anti-suffragists after the vote. But the next morning, he gave a speech
defending his vote:
I believe in full suffrage as a right. I believe we had a moral and legal right to ratify.
I know a mother’s advice is always safest for her boy to follow, and my mother wanted me to vote for ratification.
The moral of this story? You do not mess with an opinionated Tennessee woman. The 19th Amendment passed because of that simple fact!