Which Wyoming territory became the first U.S. territory to grant women the right to vote in 1869?

Wyoming Territory became the first U.S. territory to grant women the right to vote, doing so in 1869.

The territorial legislature approved the measure on December 10, 1869. Wyoming’s government later defended the policy when some officials considered repealing it, helping the territory gain the nickname “The Equality State.”

Women in Wyoming voted in territorial elections and served on juries during the following years. In 1870, Esther Hobart Morris became the first woman justice of the peace in the United States after being appointed in South Pass City.

The 1869 law did not immediately establish nationwide women’s suffrage. Women’s voting rights remained a state and territorial issue until the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920, which prohibited denying the vote on the basis of sex.