WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.020 So welcome to today's Deep Dive. It is Monday, 00:00:03.160 --> 00:00:07.219 March 23rd, 2026. And I am really excited about 00:00:07.219 --> 00:00:09.439 this one. Yeah, me too. We've got some wild source 00:00:09.439 --> 00:00:11.640 material to go through today. We really do. So 00:00:11.640 --> 00:00:14.919 for you listening, today's source is this incredibly 00:00:14.919 --> 00:00:18.579 comprehensive historical overview of the 19th 00:00:18.579 --> 00:00:21.780 Amendment to the US Constitution. Right. The 00:00:21.780 --> 00:00:24.339 women's right to vote. Exactly. And our mission 00:00:24.339 --> 00:00:26.940 today is basically to rescue this history from 00:00:26.940 --> 00:00:30.170 those dusty, you know, totally sanitized textbook 00:00:30.170 --> 00:00:32.429 summaries we all grew up with. Oh, absolutely. 00:00:32.829 --> 00:00:35.090 The textbooks make it seem so neat and tidy. 00:00:35.170 --> 00:00:37.369 They really do. Yeah. You picture this polite 00:00:37.369 --> 00:00:40.429 linear progression of progress, just women holding 00:00:40.429 --> 00:00:42.689 signs, and then boom, they get the vote. But 00:00:42.689 --> 00:00:44.770 the source reveals it was actually this grueling, 00:00:44.770 --> 00:00:46.990 chaotic battle. Yeah, I mean, we're talking about 00:00:46.990 --> 00:00:49.409 real political warfare here. Right. Hunger strikes, 00:00:49.729 --> 00:00:53.090 political hostage situations, Supreme Court showdowns, 00:00:53.109 --> 00:00:56.590 and some really bitter racial compromises. Okay, 00:00:56.630 --> 00:00:58.909 let's unpack this because this isn't just a history 00:00:58.909 --> 00:01:01.289 lesson. It's really a master class in political 00:01:01.289 --> 00:01:03.890 strategy It is it's about what it actually takes 00:01:03.890 --> 00:01:06.829 to force a massive system to change exactly. 00:01:06.849 --> 00:01:09.370 So where do we even start? Well, before we look 00:01:09.370 --> 00:01:11.250 at how the suffragists won the vote, we have 00:01:11.250 --> 00:01:13.469 to establish that they were actually trying to 00:01:13.469 --> 00:01:16.069 win it back. Wait, win it back? Yeah. See, the 00:01:16.069 --> 00:01:19.290 1789 Constitution basically punted on the issue. 00:01:19.510 --> 00:01:22.650 It left voting boundaries entirely undefined. 00:01:22.750 --> 00:01:24.150 Oh, right. So they just let the states figure 00:01:24.150 --> 00:01:27.010 it out. Exactly. And because of that, women actually 00:01:27.010 --> 00:01:29.829 did vote in several pre -revolutionary colonies. 00:01:30.430 --> 00:01:32.590 Like, New Jersey allowed single and married women 00:01:32.590 --> 00:01:35.269 to vote for years. OK, until they arbitrarily 00:01:35.269 --> 00:01:38.670 rescinded it in 1807. Oh, right. It's like a 00:01:38.670 --> 00:01:41.549 terrible soccer patch update that just rolled 00:01:41.549 --> 00:01:44.430 back a crucial feature. That is exactly what 00:01:44.430 --> 00:01:46.709 it was. And, you know, everyone points to the 00:01:46.709 --> 00:01:49.409 Seneca Falls Convention in 1848 as the starting 00:01:49.409 --> 00:01:52.129 line, but there's this surprising influence from 00:01:52.129 --> 00:01:54.290 the Seneca Nation, the Iroquois Confederacy. 00:01:54.409 --> 00:01:57.030 Oh, wow. I didn't know that. Yeah. Women there 00:01:57.030 --> 00:01:59.450 held immense political power. They could even 00:01:59.450 --> 00:02:03.099 veto acts of war. That is incredible. Just witnessing 00:02:03.099 --> 00:02:05.280 an actual government where women could veto a 00:02:05.280 --> 00:02:07.819 war must have totally shifted the paradigm for 00:02:07.819 --> 00:02:11.460 those early activists. Completely. But translating 00:02:11.460 --> 00:02:14.379 that into American law was a nightmare. Fast 00:02:14.379 --> 00:02:16.699 forward past the Civil War, they tried this thing 00:02:16.699 --> 00:02:19.099 called the New Departure Strategy. Right. Using 00:02:19.099 --> 00:02:21.300 the 14th and 15th Amendments, they basically 00:02:21.300 --> 00:02:24.180 argued that citizenship already guaranteed Shemin 00:02:24.180 --> 00:02:26.379 the right to vote. Exactly. They said, hey, we're 00:02:26.379 --> 00:02:28.400 citizens, so we get to vote. But the Supreme 00:02:28.400 --> 00:02:32.020 Court totally crushed that in 1874 with Minor 00:02:32.020 --> 00:02:34.639 v. Happersett. Right. But, I mean, let me push 00:02:34.639 --> 00:02:37.319 back on that strategy for a second. Wasn't trying 00:02:37.319 --> 00:02:39.919 to use the 14th Amendment a massive legal reach 00:02:39.919 --> 00:02:42.699 at the time? Considering Section 2 explicitly 00:02:42.699 --> 00:02:45.379 penalized states for depriving male citizens 00:02:45.379 --> 00:02:47.860 of the vote? Well, yeah, it was a reach. And 00:02:47.860 --> 00:02:50.199 the Supreme Court rolled exactly on those lines. 00:02:50.360 --> 00:02:52.840 They said citizenship did not automatically grant 00:02:52.840 --> 00:02:55.240 voting privileges. So the legal route is basically 00:02:55.240 --> 00:02:57.659 a dead end at the highest court. Totally dead, 00:02:57.800 --> 00:03:00.199 which meant they needed a brand new constitutional 00:03:00.199 --> 00:03:02.400 amendment. And that causes a huge fracture in 00:03:02.400 --> 00:03:04.080 the movement, right? Like, do they play nice 00:03:04.080 --> 00:03:06.199 or do they make a huge scene? Exactly. It's a 00:03:06.199 --> 00:03:08.419 massive split. You've got these two -pronged 00:03:08.419 --> 00:03:10.919 attacks that ultimately force... President Woodrow 00:03:10.919 --> 00:03:12.879 Wilson's hand. OK, break that down for us. Who 00:03:12.879 --> 00:03:15.819 is on which side? So on one side you have Carrie 00:03:15.819 --> 00:03:18.479 Chapman Catt and the NAW side. They had this 00:03:18.479 --> 00:03:21.199 winning plan. Right. And when World War One broke 00:03:21.199 --> 00:03:24.840 out, Catt made the controversial choice to support 00:03:24.840 --> 00:03:27.960 the war effort. She did. She argued that because 00:03:27.960 --> 00:03:30.060 women were sacrificing in the labor force and 00:03:30.060 --> 00:03:33.400 as nurses, they were proving they deserved enfranchisement. 00:03:33.460 --> 00:03:36.500 It's the polite patriotic route. Exactly. But 00:03:36.500 --> 00:03:38.580 then on the other side, you have Alice Paul, 00:03:38.740 --> 00:03:41.759 Lucy Burns, and the National Women's Party, the 00:03:41.759 --> 00:03:44.500 NWP. And they were not playing nice. Not at all. 00:03:44.680 --> 00:03:47.740 They used World War One to highlight the total 00:03:47.740 --> 00:03:51.120 hypocrisy of fighting for democracy abroad while 00:03:51.120 --> 00:03:53.620 denying it to 26 million women at home. There 00:03:53.620 --> 00:03:55.500 were the silent sentinels, right? Yeah. Beginning 00:03:55.500 --> 00:03:58.060 outside the White House. Yes. And the consequences 00:03:58.060 --> 00:04:01.780 were brutal. 168 protesters were arrested and 00:04:01.780 --> 00:04:04.099 sent to the Lorton prison in Virginia. Which 00:04:04.099 --> 00:04:07.120 is just It was horrific. They endured hunger 00:04:07.120 --> 00:04:09.699 strikes and forced feedings by the guards. Here's 00:04:09.699 --> 00:04:12.199 where it gets really interesting. This dynamic 00:04:12.199 --> 00:04:16.019 feels so much like a classic good cop, bad cop 00:04:16.019 --> 00:04:18.579 routine. Oh, totally. But I have to ask, did 00:04:18.579 --> 00:04:21.180 the militant tactics of Alice Paul actually help? 00:04:21.620 --> 00:04:24.579 Or did they risk alienating the public and sabotaging 00:04:24.579 --> 00:04:27.019 the political ground where Kat was laying? What's 00:04:27.019 --> 00:04:29.639 fascinating here is that both were actually necessary. 00:04:29.720 --> 00:04:32.920 Really? Both of them? Yeah. The NWP, you know, 00:04:33.019 --> 00:04:35.779 Alice Paul's group, they generated this urgent, 00:04:36.040 --> 00:04:38.160 unavoidable public pressure. They made it an 00:04:38.160 --> 00:04:40.759 emergency. While Kat was schmoozing the politicians. 00:04:41.139 --> 00:04:44.240 Exactly. NAWSOFI provided the acceptable political 00:04:44.240 --> 00:04:47.740 off -ramp. Politicians could cave to Kat to avoid 00:04:47.740 --> 00:04:50.300 dealing with Paul. Man, that is brilliant strategy. 00:04:50.660 --> 00:04:53.410 But that desperation. to pass the amendment, 00:04:53.509 --> 00:04:55.589 you know, to get those final votes, it required 00:04:55.589 --> 00:04:58.170 winning over Southern Democrats. Right. And this 00:04:58.170 --> 00:05:00.529 is where the history gets really dark. It does. 00:05:01.069 --> 00:05:02.670 We just have to look at the facts here objectively. 00:05:02.730 --> 00:05:06.089 The fight for suffrage became deeply, deeply 00:05:06.089 --> 00:05:09.129 entangled with race. It really did. White suffragists 00:05:09.129 --> 00:05:11.230 were desperate for Southern votes, so they adopted 00:05:11.230 --> 00:05:13.850 strategies that actively marginalized black women. 00:05:14.050 --> 00:05:15.970 Yeah, they basically argued that white women's 00:05:15.970 --> 00:05:18.319 votes could counter the black vote. Exactly. 00:05:18.379 --> 00:05:20.540 It was a calculated compromise. Like, during 00:05:20.540 --> 00:05:24.420 the massive 1913 Washington, D .C. parade, black 00:05:24.420 --> 00:05:27.480 women were literally instructed to march at the 00:05:27.480 --> 00:05:29.839 back. Just to avoid upsetting these southern 00:05:29.839 --> 00:05:32.639 delegates. Yeah. But the defiance from black 00:05:32.639 --> 00:05:35.740 suffragists was incredible. Ida B. Wells flatly 00:05:35.740 --> 00:05:37.740 refused to march in the back. She just joined 00:05:37.740 --> 00:05:40.000 the Illinois unit anyway. She did. She just stepped 00:05:40.000 --> 00:05:42.240 right into the crowd. And you had leaders like 00:05:42.240 --> 00:05:44.879 Mary Church Terrell leading the massive National 00:05:44.879 --> 00:05:47.629 Association of Colored Women. There's that quote 00:05:47.629 --> 00:05:50.889 from the source, from activist Nanny Helen Burroughs. 00:05:51.129 --> 00:05:53.050 Someone asked what a black woman could do with 00:05:53.050 --> 00:05:55.750 a ballot. And she just pointedly replied, what 00:05:55.750 --> 00:05:58.170 can she do without it? It's such a powerful quote. 00:05:58.410 --> 00:06:00.850 It really is. And for you listening, I mean, 00:06:00.990 --> 00:06:03.649 think about the ethics of this. This looks like 00:06:03.649 --> 00:06:05.949 ruthless ends justify the means political bargain. 00:06:06.569 --> 00:06:08.230 Did the white suffrage leadership believe they 00:06:08.230 --> 00:06:10.550 were making a necessary evil to pass the amendment? 00:06:10.949 --> 00:06:13.569 Or does this highlight a fundamental flaw in 00:06:13.569 --> 00:06:15.750 how single issue political movements operate? 00:06:15.980 --> 00:06:18.139 If we connect this to the bigger picture, it 00:06:18.139 --> 00:06:21.660 really shows how movements often fracture. Well, 00:06:21.779 --> 00:06:24.180 the broader definition of equality often clashes 00:06:24.180 --> 00:06:26.620 directly with the immediate mathematical goal 00:06:26.620 --> 00:06:28.779 of a legislative victory. Right. You need a certain 00:06:28.779 --> 00:06:30.620 number of votes, so you throw your most vulnerable 00:06:30.620 --> 00:06:32.939 members under the bus to get them. Exactly. It's 00:06:32.939 --> 00:06:35.819 harsh, but it's what happened. And all of this 00:06:35.819 --> 00:06:38.879 strategic plotting and racial maneuvering, it 00:06:38.879 --> 00:06:43.240 all comes down to one final, incredibly dramatic 00:06:43.240 --> 00:06:46.540 battleground. Oh, Tennessee. The War of the Roses. 00:06:46.759 --> 00:06:50.939 Yes. By August 1920, they had 35 states. They 00:06:50.939 --> 00:06:54.860 needed 36. Tennessee was the tiebreaker. So both 00:06:54.860 --> 00:06:57.040 sides just totally descend on Nashville. It was 00:06:57.040 --> 00:06:59.579 chaos. Supporters wore yellow roses on their 00:06:59.579 --> 00:07:02.740 lapels. And the anti -suffragists, the antis, 00:07:02.899 --> 00:07:04.899 wore red roses. And the vote in the Tennessee 00:07:04.899 --> 00:07:07.660 House was completely deadlocked, 48 to 48. Right 00:07:07.660 --> 00:07:09.920 down to the wire. And there was this 24 -year 00:07:09.920 --> 00:07:12.199 -old representative named Harry Byrne. He had 00:07:12.199 --> 00:07:14.300 initially voted to table the resolution wearing 00:07:14.300 --> 00:07:17.160 a red robe. He did. But in the final minutes, 00:07:17.399 --> 00:07:19.360 before the binding vote, he received a note. 00:07:19.519 --> 00:07:22.480 From his mom? Yes. A handwritten note from his 00:07:22.480 --> 00:07:25.360 mother urging him to be a good boy and vote yes. 00:07:25.680 --> 00:07:28.600 That is just unbelievable. I know. He shocked 00:07:28.600 --> 00:07:30.920 everyone, changed his vote, and the amendment 00:07:30.920 --> 00:07:33.600 passed. But the antis didn't just give up, did 00:07:33.600 --> 00:07:37.000 they? Nope. In a final act of desperation, 37 00:07:37.000 --> 00:07:40.240 anti -suffrage legislators literally fled the 00:07:40.240 --> 00:07:42.480 state. They got on a train to Decatur, Alabama. 00:07:42.649 --> 00:07:44.769 Yeah, just to prevent a quorum so the vote can 00:07:44.769 --> 00:07:47.129 be certified. It's literally like a sports team 00:07:47.129 --> 00:07:49.410 walking off the field to avoid losing the game. 00:07:49.829 --> 00:07:52.310 It completely is. I just I have to marvel at 00:07:52.310 --> 00:07:55.670 the irony here. After decades of Supreme Court 00:07:55.670 --> 00:07:58.550 battles, hunger strikes and all these intense 00:07:58.550 --> 00:08:02.889 political machinations, the fate of 26 million 00:08:02.889 --> 00:08:06.110 women came down to a 24 year old listening to 00:08:06.110 --> 00:08:08.829 a text message or rather a handwritten note from 00:08:08.829 --> 00:08:11.089 his mom. It's one of the craziest turning points 00:08:11.089 --> 00:08:13.250 in American history. But, you know, the ploy 00:08:13.250 --> 00:08:16.410 to flee the state failed. On August 18, 1920, 00:08:16.649 --> 00:08:19.509 the amendment officially passed. Victory. But 00:08:19.509 --> 00:08:21.850 as the source shows, the dramatic victory in 00:08:21.850 --> 00:08:24.430 Tennessee wasn't a magic wand. Not at all. The 00:08:24.430 --> 00:08:27.089 very next day, the system fought back. Opponents 00:08:27.089 --> 00:08:29.370 immediately sued. But the Supreme Court upheld 00:08:29.370 --> 00:08:33.169 it, right? In Lizarie v. Garnet in 1922. They 00:08:33.169 --> 00:08:36.350 did, unanimously. Which finally allowed women 00:08:36.350 --> 00:08:39.230 in places like Maryland to register. But the 00:08:39.230 --> 00:08:41.169 politicians themselves were terrified. Oh yeah, 00:08:41.269 --> 00:08:43.769 they were terrified of this massive new women's 00:08:43.769 --> 00:08:45.750 voting block, right? Exactly. They thought all 00:08:45.750 --> 00:08:48.029 women would vote exactly the same way. So they 00:08:48.029 --> 00:08:50.210 rushed to pass the Shepherd -Towner Maternity 00:08:50.210 --> 00:08:53.490 Act in 1921 just to appease them. But they quickly 00:08:53.490 --> 00:08:56.129 realized that block didn't actually exist. Women 00:08:56.129 --> 00:08:59.769 didn't vote as a single monolith. Nope. In 1920, 00:09:00.169 --> 00:09:03.889 only 36 % of eligible women actually voted. Compared 00:09:03.889 --> 00:09:06.950 to, what, 68 % of men? Yeah. They were deterred 00:09:06.950 --> 00:09:10.210 by literacy tests, residency requirements, and 00:09:10.210 --> 00:09:12.929 just general inexperience with the system. And 00:09:12.929 --> 00:09:15.789 the limitations were incredibly severe for minority 00:09:15.789 --> 00:09:18.929 women. The amendment totally failed to enfranchise 00:09:18.929 --> 00:09:21.129 millions of them. It really did. Black women 00:09:21.129 --> 00:09:23.649 in the South faced outright fraud, poll taxes, 00:09:23.789 --> 00:09:26.190 and severe, severe violence. Like the beatings 00:09:26.190 --> 00:09:29.409 in Birmingham in 1926. Exactly. And that violence 00:09:29.409 --> 00:09:31.850 and suppression continued all the way until the 00:09:31.850 --> 00:09:35.600 1965 Voting Rights Act. Decades later. And it 00:09:35.600 --> 00:09:39.039 wasn't just black women either. Right. No. Native 00:09:39.039 --> 00:09:41.720 Americans and Asian Americans faced their own 00:09:41.720 --> 00:09:44.659 distinct federal and state barriers for decades 00:09:44.659 --> 00:09:47.909 more. So what does this all mean? I mean, it's 00:09:47.909 --> 00:09:50.669 like being handed the keys to a car only to realize 00:09:50.669 --> 00:09:52.730 the engine has been removed. That's a great way 00:09:52.730 --> 00:09:54.889 to put it. Why do we teach the 19th Amendment 00:09:54.889 --> 00:09:57.470 as the end of the story when the source material 00:09:57.470 --> 00:09:59.769 clearly shows it was just the closing of one 00:09:59.769 --> 00:10:02.350 chapter and the opening of an even harder one 00:10:02.350 --> 00:10:04.389 for minority women? Because it's a comfortable 00:10:04.389 --> 00:10:07.470 narrative, but it's just not the whole truth. 00:10:07.649 --> 00:10:10.429 Right. So for you listening, I think what this 00:10:10.429 --> 00:10:13.490 deep dive really reveals is that achieving a 00:10:13.490 --> 00:10:16.480 monumental shift in society is never clean. It 00:10:16.480 --> 00:10:19.159 requires a really messy blend of radical disruption, 00:10:19.519 --> 00:10:21.940 polite lobbying, and unfortunately, some really 00:10:21.940 --> 00:10:24.399 harsh compromises. It's a stark reminder that 00:10:24.399 --> 00:10:27.139 progress is rarely a straight line. This raises 00:10:27.139 --> 00:10:30.100 an important question, though. Alice Paul, you 00:10:30.100 --> 00:10:32.500 know, the radical organizer, she knew the 19th 00:10:32.500 --> 00:10:34.679 Amendment wasn't enough. She did. Just months 00:10:34.679 --> 00:10:38.340 after its passage in 1921, she drafted the Equal 00:10:38.340 --> 00:10:40.980 Rights Amendment, the ERA, to eliminate all legal 00:10:40.980 --> 00:10:43.970 inequalities based on sex. But the source notes 00:10:43.970 --> 00:10:46.110 that despite actually passing Congress in the 00:10:46.110 --> 00:10:49.429 1970s, it never met the ratification deadline. 00:10:49.669 --> 00:10:52.629 Right. It remains entirely disputed and unpassed 00:10:52.629 --> 00:10:55.409 today over a century later. Which is wild. Yeah. 00:10:55.529 --> 00:10:58.809 And brings up a huge point. What happens to a 00:10:58.809 --> 00:11:01.730 movement's momentum when it achieves its primary 00:11:01.730 --> 00:11:04.230 singular goal? It's a tough question. Does the 00:11:04.230 --> 00:11:06.309 victory of the 19th Amendment show us that when 00:11:06.309 --> 00:11:08.750 a society checks a box and says we fixed it? 00:11:08.799 --> 00:11:12.159 the machinery of inequality just quietly adapts, 00:11:12.340 --> 00:11:14.799 making the next phase of the fight like the ERA 00:11:14.799 --> 00:11:16.980 infinitely harder to win. That is definitely 00:11:16.980 --> 00:11:18.580 something to think about. Something for you to 00:11:18.580 --> 00:11:21.100 mull over as we wrap up today. Thank you so much 00:11:21.100 --> 00:11:22.840 for taking this deep dive into the source material 00:11:22.840 --> 00:11:24.200 with us. We'll see you next time.