Indiana
Indiana’s Fight for Suffrage
Women worked for over 70 years to get the vote. Divisions over race, tactics, and strategy did not stop suffrage efforts. Women kept their eyes on the prize . . . suffrage. Learn more about the fight for suffrage in Indiana in the timeline below, or download the timeline as a printable PDF.
Indiana’s Suffrage Timeline
1851
Amanda Way, a 23-year-old Quaker, organized the first Woman’s Rights Convention in Dublin, Indiana, where convention attendees discussed the need for social, financial, and political rights for women.* Following the convention, Way and other attendees founded the Indiana Women’s Rights Association (IWRA).
1859
IWRA president Dr. Mary Thomas became the first woman to speak before the Indiana Legislature, when she and two other suffragists presented the first suffrage petition. Thomas also co-edited The Lily and The Mayflower, two local suffrage newspapers.
1881
Indiana legislators passed an amendment granting women the right to vote, but Indiana’s Constitution required amendments to pass two successive legislative sessions. In 1883, the House Speaker refused to reintroduce the suffrage amendment for a second House vote, dooming the suffrage effort.
1913
At the start of the 20th century, new groups like the Woman’s Franchise League and the Indianapolis Equal Suffrage Society joined forces to petition and lobby legislators, give speeches, and attract suffrage advocates.
1917
The Indiana General Assembly passed three bills: one that gave women the right to vote in presidential elections, and the others that conveyed municipal and primary election voting rights to women. Suffragists immediately began registering women to vote, with 18,000 women registering in Vanderburgh County and 40,000 registering in Indianapolis. But the Indiana Supreme Court short-circuited the vote for women by striking down the new law, ruling that it violated the existing state constitution.
January 16, 1920
Before suffragists were able to convince Indiana legislators to amend the state constitution, the legislature voted to ratify the 19th Amendment.
* A temperance activist, in 1847, Way and 80 other women stormed saloons and drugstores in Winchester to drain liquor barrels.
References
Cooney, Robert. (2005). Winning the Vote: The Triumph of the American Woman Suffrage Movement. American Graphic Press.
Dr. Mary F. Thomas, 1816-1888. (n.d.). Indiana Historical Bureau. https://www.in.gov/history/state-historical-markers/find-a-marker/find-historical-markers-by-county/indiana-historical-markers-by-county/dr.-mary-thomas/
Heiman, R. (2019, November). History of Women’s Suffrage and “First” Women in Politics – the Southwest Indiana Experience. League of Women Voters. https://my.lwv.org/indiana/southwestern-indiana/event/history-women-suffrage-and-women-politics-southwest-indiana-experience
Indiana and the 19th Amendment. (2020, January 12). National Park Service. https://www.nps.gov/articles/indiana-and-the-19th-amendment.htm
Indiana’s First Woman’s Rights Convention. (n.d.). Indiana Historical Bureau. https://www.in.gov/history/state-historical-markers/find-a-marker/indianas-first-womans-rights-convention/
Indiana Women’s Suffrage Timeline. (2019). Indiana Women’s Suffrage Centennial. https://indianasuffrage100.org/indiana-womens-suffrage-timeline/
Mitchell, D. (n.d.). Amanda Way: Indiana’s Hard-Core Anti-Booze Baroness. Prohibitionists. http://www.prohibitionists.org/History/votes/Amanda_Way_bio.html
Morgan, A. (2019) “An Act of Tardy Justice”: The Story of Women’s Suffrage in Indiana. Indiana Women’s Suffrage Centennial. https://indianasuffrage100.org/indiana-womens-suffrage-history/