Rock Your Rights (including the vote)

Since the District of Columbia isn’t a state, my election ballot is limited. However, I never miss the opportunity to vote. In August 2020,  we observed the 100th anniversary of the 19th amendment to the US Constitution, which recognized women’s right to vote. Women campaigned for 72 years to realize this important milestone.

This anniversary inspired me to research other achievements by American women. Below are some highlights:

1862: The US Homestead Act makes it easier for single, widowed and divorced women to claim land in their own names.

1880: A stock exchange for women is established by Mary Gage for investors who want to use their own money to speculate on railroad stocks.

1919: First Women’s Bank of Tennessee opens for women only. While the bank employees and directors were women, its shareholders were all men.

1922: Suffragette Rebecca Felton of Georgia becomes the first woman US senator. (At 87, she only serves for one day.)

1924: Wyoming’s Nellie Tayloe Ross becomes the nation’s first female governor.

1970: With Schultz v Wheaton Glass, a federal appeals court deems it illegal for a company to change a job’s title so that women who held the position earn less than male counterparts.

1974: Equal Credit Opportunity Act passes. Until then, banks required single, widowed or divorced women to bring a man along to the bank to cosign any credit application, regardless of their income. Bankers were permitted to discount the value women’s wages when considering how much credit to grant, by as much as 50%. (Hard to imagine that a woman couldn’t independently secure a credit card without a man prior to 1974!)

1978: The Pregnancy Discrimination Act makes it illegal to dismiss a woman from a job if she became pregnant.

1981: Thanks to Kirchberg v Feenstra, a husband could no longer unilaterally take out a second mortgage on property held jointly with his wife without her consent. 

It’s important to appreciate everything women before us accomplished. In addition to voting rights, our predecessors fought hard for women to take out a mortgage, secure a credit card, buy a car, and solely own property. This timeline affirms that the road has been long, and more work is required to better secure our positions in America. I look forward to the advances the next decade will bring.

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