Which U.S. Constitutional amendment granted women the right to vote in 1920?

The 19th Amendment granted women the constitutional right to vote in the United States in 1920.

Congress approved the amendment in 1919, and Tennessee became the 36th state to ratify it on August 18, 1920, providing the required three-fourths majority. Its adoption was certified on August 26, a date now commemorated in the United States as Women’s Equality Day.

The amendment was the result of a campaign that had lasted for decades. At the 1848 Seneca Falls Convention, activists such as Elizabeth Cady Stanton called for women’s suffrage. Susan B. Anthony, Stanton, Alice Paul, and many other organizers used petitions, demonstrations, legal challenges, and state-level campaigns to press for voting rights.

The amendment prohibited denying the vote on the basis of sex, but it did not immediately guarantee equal access for every woman. Black women, Native American women, Asian American women, and many Latina women still faced discriminatory laws, intimidation, citizenship restrictions, or local barriers. The 21st, 20th, and 18th Amendments addressed other subjects, not women’s suffrage.