Ohio Women's Suffrage Amendment (September 1912)
| Ohio Women's Suffrage Amendment | |
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| Election date |
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| Topic Sex and gender issues and Women's suffrage |
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| Status |
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| Type Constitutional convention referral |
Origin |
Ohio Women's Suffrage Amendment was on the ballot as a constitutional convention referral in Ohio on September 3, 1912. It was defeated.
A "yes" vote supported this state constitutional amendment to provide women with the right to vote. |
A "no" vote opposed this state constitutional amendment to provide women with the right to vote. |
Overview
The ballot measure was a proposed amendment to Article V, Section 1 of the Ohio Constitution. The ballot measure was one of 42 proposed constitutional amendments on the September 3, 1912 ballot; all of the proposals were the result of a state constitutional convention held because Ohio voters approved the Ohio Constitutional Convention Question of 1910.[1][2][3]
Also in 1912, Wisconsin male voters rejected Question 4, the Wisconsin Women's Suffrage Referendum. However, male voters in Arizona approved Questions 300 and 301, giving women in Arizona the right to vote. Male voters in Oregon also approved Measure 1 to grant suffrage to women in 1912.
Election results
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Ohio Women's Suffrage Amendment |
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| Result | Votes | Percentage | ||
| Yes | 249,420 | 42.54% | ||
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336,875 | 57.46% | ||
Text of measure
Ballot title
The ballot title for Women's Suffrage Amendment was as follows:
| “ | ARTICLE V, SECTION 1.
Woman's Suffrage. | ” |
Constitutional changes
The measure would have amended Article V, Section 1 of the Ohio Constitution.
Background
State women's suffrage ballot measures
- See also: State women's suffrage ballot measures
The 19th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution was ratified on August 18, 1920. The 19th Amendment prohibited the government from denying or abridging the right to vote on account of sex. Therefore, women were guaranteed the right to vote in the U.S. Constitution.
Before the 19th Amendment, the women's suffrage movement also campaigned for changes to state constitutions to provide women with a right to vote. Suffragists Carrie Chapman Catt and Nettie Rogers Shuler, in their book Woman Suffrage and Politics (1923), wrote that state ballot measures "spun the main thread of suffrage activity" in the movement's earlier years and were seen as stepping stones to national suffrage. "I don't know the exact number of States we shall have to have," said Susan B. Anthony, "but I do know that there will come a day when that number will automatically and resistlessly act on the Congress of the United States to compel the submission of a federal suffrage amendment." When asked about federal support for women's suffrage in 1908, President Theodore Roosevelt advised the suffrage movement to "Go, get another State."[4]
Between 1867 and August 18, 1920, 54 ballot measures to grant women's suffrage were on the ballot in 30 states. Fifteen (15) of the ballot measures were approved, giving women the right to vote in 15 states. Since women did not have suffrage until after the ballot measures were approved, male voters decided the outcome of suffrage ballot measures.
Map of states that voted on suffrage ballot measures
The following is a map of which states approved and which states rejected women's suffrage ballot measures before the 19th Amendment. Suffrage was on the ballot at least once in 30 of 48 states (Alaska and Hawaii were not states until 1959). Of the 15 states that passed suffrage ballot measures, eight failed to pass measures on their first attempts. In Oregon and South Dakota, for example, suffrage measures were placed before voters at six elections before one was passed. In Utah and Wyoming, voters decided and approved women's suffrage as one provision of a ballot measure to adopt a state constitution. You can click on a state to learn more about the number of women's suffrage ballot measures that were voted on and in what years in that state.
Path to the ballot
- See also: State constitutional conventions
A state constitutional convention referred the measure to the ballot.
See also
See also
- Ohio 1912 ballot measures
- 1912 ballot measures
- List of Ohio ballot measures
- History of Initiative & Referendum in Ohio
External links
Footnotes
- ↑ Cleveland-Marshall College of Law, "Ohio Constitution: Table of Proposed Amendments," accessed February 3, 2015
- ↑ Supreme Court of Ohio, "Amendments to the Constitution of Ohio," accessed February 3, 2015
- ↑ Supreme Court of Ohio, "Vote on Amendments Submitted to the People by the Convention," accessed February 3, 2015
- ↑ Catt, Carrie Chapman and Nettie Rogers Shuler. (1923). Woman Suffrage and Politics: The Inner Story of the Suffrage Movement. New York, New York: Charles Scribner's Sons. (pages 149-150)
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