A Woman’s Right to Vote in New Jersey
04 Nov 2010
With the 2010 elections over, and a powerful change sweeping Washington once again, I realized anew what a privilege it is to be able to vote. I am a female blogger, and it amazes me to think that there was a time when women were not allowed to vote…that in fact, once given the privilege, in some states that privilege was taken away for a time. This made me curious about the history of the Women’s Suffrage movement and how it affected our State of New Jersey. It should be noted that a woman’s right to vote and the suffrage movement was not limited to the United States…but this is a NJ blog, so here the focus will remain.
Here is a time-line, so to speak, of the movement here in New Jersey:
1776 – It was Abagail Adams that wrote to her husband, John Adams, asking that woman not be forgotten in the new laws of our new Nation. In the constitution, all “inhabitants” of the land, without distinction of sex or race were given the right to vote…but in New Jersey (and perhaps elsewhere) the voters were to be property owners. If a woman was married, her husband was the property owner, so if my history is correct, only woman who were single and widows were permitted to vote.
Another source states that woman who possessed $250 were permitted to vote.
1787 – Women in all states except New Jersey lost their right to vote when the US Constitutional Convention gave States the right to set their own qualifications.
1807 – New Jersey joined the other States by revoking the right of women to vote – as well as aliens, and persons of color (Negros). Only white males were permitted to vote, the claim being that it would simplify things and help to eliminate fraud.
It was in 1920 that women throughout the United States won the right to vote through an amendment to the Constitution…ratified in 1920. You can find complete Women’s Suffrage time-lines at the following links:
Votes for Women State by State
Womens Suffrage Events Timeline
