By Kathy Groob, Publisher

Suffrage:  The right to vote.

Born in 1911, my Grandmother Blanche Liston did not have the right to vote.  As a little girl, she did not see her mother vote and as she grew into adulthood, did not ever exercise her right to vote because she feared being called for jury duty.  Her own daughters, my mother Joan Shockey and my Aunt Joyce Hubbell, both are women who have always voted and participated fully in political campaigns for women.

Today is the 91^st anniversary of the ratification of the 19^th Amendment to the Constitution giving women the right to vote.  After 100 years of struggle, organization, and activism, our foremothers finally realized the fruit of their hard work on August 26, 1920. Although Susan B. Anthony and Cady Stanton, the founding mothers of the suffrage movement, devoted 50 years of their lives to the cause, neither lived to see the result of their efforts.

When Congress passed the 19^th amendment in June of 1919, it was up to each state to ratify the amendment in order to secure the support of three-fourths of the states.  The votes were split in the Tennessee General Assembly until a 24-year-old legislator voted the way his mother wanted him to vote, therefore passing the amendment.  Tennessee became the 36^th and final state needed to ratify and the 19^th Amendment.

On August 26, 1920, the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution became law, and women could vote in the fall elections, including in the Presidential election.

Thank you to those brave women for whom we owe so much.  Through their efforts a candle was lit.  It is up to us to keep the flame of equality burning for women around the globe.