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The day Massachusetts men voted to deny women the right to vote
By adamg on Mon, 11/02/2015 - 10:53am
Boston results: Men tell women, nah, we're good.
Today marks the 100th anniversary of a statewide referendum on women's suffrage. Men rejected the idea, aided in part by the nation's first organization of anti-suffrage women - many active progressives but also Brahmins who feared what would happen if their lessers got the vote.
In Boston, as the Boston City Archives show us, men in every single ward in the city rose to keep women away from the ballot box.
Ratification of the 19th Amendment in 1920 made the vote moot.
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Comments
Well we did wind up with
Well we did wind up with direct election of senators, an income tax, and prohibition, so maybe they were right.
You say that like it's a bad thing
And you might recall how Prohibition was repealed ...
Senators
I would argue direct election of Senators has not proven to be a good thing. Taking their election away from the state legislatures has reduced their tie to the state from which they come, allowing Senators to freelance according to their own interests rather than the widespread interest of the state that elected them. This has fueled the rise of special interest election financing and the role of lobbyists in Washington. Senate rules allow a minority of Senators to shut down deliberations and obstruct votes.
Now, normally I am against the Senate passing just about anything, believing the first sentence of the First Amendement should have ended at "Congress shall make no law." However, since they self-promoting directly elected money sluts in the Senate have passed self perpetuating entitlements and other laws that continue without requiring annual reauthorization, I acetually need the fat bastards to do something and actually repeal much of the crap they have passed.
That said, I am in favor of women voting. Just not directly for Senators.
[citation needed]
"Taking their election away from the state legislatures has reduced their tie to the state from which they come, allowing Senators to freelance according to their own interests rather than the widespread interest of the state that elected them. This has fueled the rise of special interest election financing and the role of lobbyists in Washington."
I don't know what history books you're reading - I'm assuming 'none of them' - but the direct election of senators was necessary because American policymakers realized that it's much harder to bribe a majority of the population than it is to bribe the majority of a state's legislature. State legislatures were extremely corrupt in the Gilded Age, and there were three senatorial elections that were voided because it was revealed that rich people had literally purchased votes from legislators. It's much easier to buy 50 votes than 500,000.
Given the shenanigans in Albany, I am 99.99% certain that New Yorkers are particularly thankful for the 17th Amendment...
Meh
State legislators are crooked, people are gullible, and benevolent-dictators-for-life are unamerican. I'm ambivalent about whether it's better or worse to put the state house in series with the federal senate. Before the 17th amendment the state house was crooked, and after the 17th amendment the state house is still crooked, except there's one less thing they're responsible for that people can get worked up enough about to vote them out and the senate loses a bit of its role as the less populist wing of the legislative branch.
Income tax and direct
Income tax and direct election of Senators both came before 1915.
for the historians
Are those wards the same now as they were then? I know very little of these things; curious to find out which parts of the city were slightly less anti-woman than others.
Historical Wards
Ward boundaries did change after 1915. This page has a helpful summary of Boston's ward boundaries and how they've changed: https://familysearch.org/learn/wiki/en/Boston_Massachusetts_genealogy#Hi...
Thank you!
Thank you!
votes for women?
In the statewide vote, only Tewksbury went "yes," by the narrowest of margins.
Well that figures...
Nice going, "progressives."
The women's suffrage movement
The women's suffrage movement was particularly strange in that it was the first time in history where a class of people gained full citizenship without first gaining the obligation to serve in the military. It marks the point in American history where the relationship between rights and responsibilities came off the moorings and rights became entitlements. It will be interesting to see how it ends.
Direct election of senators was sold on populist grounds as a way to break up the "millionaires' club" in the Senate. How is that working out?
New Yorkers have the Albany (and the Senators) they so richly deserve; that's how representative government works. Mencken said something like that in one of his cleverer moments.
Working out just fine
In case you haven't noticed, this isn't New York.
Interesting argument that women are to blame for everything wrong in American society. Do you blame women for everything wrong in life because of Eve as well?
I didn't blame women for
I didn't blame women for anything in that post -- obviously in the absence of women's suffrage men had to vote to change the rules. Society as a whole had already decided to separate rights and obligations before that vote occurred -- that is, if they gave it any thought at all.
The point about direct election was entirely separate, and I didn't bring up New York, I was just responding to something further up thread.
If you want to make this about MA though, name the last MA senator who was not a millionaire.
???