Because of Vermont Women Like Her… highlights the role women played in shaping Vermont’s history prior to and following passage of the 19th Amendment. A companion piece, the digital Educator’s Guide, includes resources, activities, and discussion questions about the suffrage movement and equality, rights, and citizens’ responsibilities.

For teaching materials, modules, and resources, visit the traveling exhibit website for Because of Vermont Women Like Her…. This site includes an introduction to the materials, five modules associated with each panel of the exhibit, and additional resource materials to support further research and discovery.

Funded by a Local Heritage Grant from Champlain Valley National Heritage Partnership and Vermont Humanities.

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Because of Vermont Women Like Her…

February 8, 2021, marks the 100^th anniversary of Vermont’s ratification of the 19^th Amendment granting women the right to vote.

Contrary to its history of progressive change, Vermont lagged behind the nation on women’s suffrage.  Legislators resisted the reform for decades before 1920, when a groundswell of women faced off against Governor Percival Clement, a perennial opponent of suffrage and prohibition. Legislators finally passed presidential suffrage in the 1919 session, but Clement vetoed the bill, and they failed to override his action.

After Congress and 35 states approved the amendment, Vermont suffragists organized a massive campaign of letters and petitions urging Clement to call a special session of the legislature to make Vermont the “Perfect 36,” the last state required for ratification. Upon Clement’s refusal, Lillian Olzendam and Ann Batchelder of Woodstock, orchestrated the largest non-violent protest on April 21, 1920, when 400 women paraded silently through Montpelier and converged on the State House to demand equal justice.  

Clement’s stance notwithstanding, women’s suffrage became a reality on August 26, 1920, after Tennessee became the “Perfect 36.”  By November, over 28,000 Vermont women had registered to vote, helping elect a pro-suffrage governor and Vermont’s first woman legislator, Edna Louise Beard of Orange.  She helped approve both the 19^th Amendment and an adjustment to the Vermont Constitution that replaced “man” with “person” in the requirement for the Freeman’s Oath.  

Since then, women’s legislative representation has grown steadily over the last hundred years, outpacing national trends. Today it is approximately 42.2%, but Vermont is the only state that has not sent a woman to Congress. 

A message from the Vermont Suffrage Centennial Alliance. Please contact Sue Racanelli, lwvofvt@gmail.com or 802.225.6032.

View as PDF

100 YEARS AGO ON FEB 8 VERMONT RATIFIES 19TH AMENDMENT

Click for full article: The Light of Truth Upon Them, Artist Cynthia Cagle

Click for artist biography: Cynthia Cagle

On Display

March 9-31. Vermont State House, Card Room, Monday-Friday, 8 AM – 4 PM

April​. Vermont Historical Society Museum, 109 State Street, Montpelier.

The Vermont Suffrage Centennial Alliance commissioned The Light of Truth Upon Them, an oil painting by Xicana artist Cynthia Cagle of South Burlington, to commemorate voting and the 2020 centennial of the 19^th Amendment. 

Cynthia Cagle’s work explores the metaphysical relationship between identity and nature. Using her experiences as a biracial woman, Cynthia creates paintings, collages, and murals that investigate themes relating to biology, relationships, generational trauma, and the impact of colonialism.   

Combining the struggles of Indigenous, Black, Latina, and Asian people, the history of the fight for the vote stretches back before 1920 and is ongoing to this day. Cagle’s painting showcases the perseverance of those who stood up—who stand up—in the face of injustice in Vermont and across the country. 

As an artist with indigenous ancestry, Cynthia’s art confronts notions of progress. When one group moves forward towards independence and autonomy, often another is left behind, such as Native Americans. Her art is a fierce condemnation of staggered freedoms; peeling back the facade of more comfortable notions of equality to expose injustice. 

Six women are featured in Cagle’s painting.  

Zitkala-Ša, a member of the Yankton Dakota Sioux, argued for women’s rights in her graduation speech from White’s Indiana Manual Labor Institute in 1895. 

Before she became a force in the suffrage movement, Ida B. Wells—born into slavery in Mississippi—documented the horrors of lynching through courageous journalism.  Wells wrote, “The way to right wrongs is to turn the light of truth upon them.” She saw voting rights as inextricable from civil rights and the fight against racism. 

Her work was shared by Vermonter Lucy J.C. Daniels of Grafton, who picketed the White House in 1917 and was arrested, tried, sentenced, and incarcerated.  She also championed for Black and working-class women to gain the vote. 

Mabel Ping-Hua Lee, the first Chinese woman to earn a doctorate in economics, fought for the right to vote alongside white suffragists in the early 20th century. However, due to the Chinese Exclusion Act, she herself was unable to vote until 1943. 

These women paved the way for other activists and lawmakers, including Vermont’s own Louvenia Dorsey Bright, the first black female legislator elected in Vermont in 1988, and Stacey Abrams of Georgia, who continues the fight today to expand access to voting regardless of political party, and knock down voter suppression laws. 

The Light of Truth Upon Them tells the story of women’s crusade—Black, Indigenous, Asian, Latina, and white—to have an equal voice in American democracy. These women, though separated by time and circumstance, represent the unified front of freedom seekers intent on providing every person, regardless of race or sex or class, with the fundamental human right to vote. This chronicle is part of Vermont’s history, and the women on the shores of Lake Champlain, pictured against the background of sunflowers and the Adirondacks, remind us that the story of the fight to vote is both our legacy and our future.

The Light of Truth Upon Them