The Nineteenth Amendment was ratified in 1920, extending constitutional voting protections to women in the United States.
Tennessee became the thirty-sixth state to ratify the amendment on August 18, 1920, providing the three-fourths majority then required. The amendment states that voting rights cannot be denied by the United States or any state on account of sex. Secretary of State Bainbridge Colby certified it on August 26, 1920.
The amendment followed decades of organizing, petitions, speeches, conventions, and civil disobedience. The movement included leaders such as Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Ida B. Wells, Carrie Chapman Catt, and Alice Paul. Anthony died in 1906 and therefore never voted under the amendment.
Ratification did not guarantee that every woman could vote immediately. Many Black women and other women still faced poll taxes, literacy tests, intimidation, discriminatory state laws, and citizenship restrictions. The Voting Rights Act of 1965 later strengthened federal protection against racial discrimination in voting.