The girls in this photograph were living in an exciting time. Just over five years after this photo was snapped, these young ladies could cast a vote in a national election. Let’s look at the final few years of the suffrage movement. 

Baby Steps Forward toward Women’s Suffrage

The organized effort of women’s suffragists in the latter half of the 1800s and early years of the 1900s consisted mainly of speeches, parades, pamphlets, and public meetings. As women asserted themselves into places outside the home, their collective voices were beginning to be heard. By the time World War I broke out in 1914, there were eight states in the west that had granted women the right to vote at the state level. Eastern states were following suit. In 1915, a referendum was put forward by the Pennsylvania Woman Suffrage Association to allow women to vote in that state. Unfortunately, the referendum did not pass. A similar referendum in Massachusetts a few months later also failed. 

Women’s Suffrage and World War I

With the onset of World War I, the women’s suffrage movement gained new traction. As American men were being shipped overseas to join the war effort, American women had to step up to fill the void in the workforce. Thanks to the contributions of female workers, the U.S. could continue to produce the products needed to support the war effort. To many, this served to highlight the inequities in American society as the nation relied on the help of a marginalized segment of the population. The war provided a new, fresh rallying point for women’s suffrage groups. 

The Role of Young Suffragists

For many years, the American public had an image of a women’s suffragist as a middle-aged, well-to-do, white woman, but all that changed when Nina Allender published her first political cartoon on June 6, 1914. In this cartoon, and Allender’s subsequent ones, she depicted a suffragist as a young, confident, stylish, and attractive woman. The popularity of Allender’s political cartoons helped to change the public’s perception of suffragists as angry, older women. The “Allender girl” inspired a generation of young women to take up the cause of suffrage and may have even motivated the young girls painting the equality posters in the colorized photo. 

Looking to Other Countries

The cause of women’s suffrage in the United States was bolstered by the success of their counterparts in other nations. In this area, the U.S. lagged far behind. Denmark, England, Italy, France, Canada, and Russia, to name a few, had already passed legislation granting women the right to vote. In the early years of World War I, even before the U.S. officially entered the war, American suffragists were participating in international events with the goal of ending the war. One such event took place in 1915, the same year the schoolgirls in this colorized photograph worked on their equality posters. It was the International Congress of Women, held in the Netherlands. During this event, the Congress of Women called for the enfranchisement of women everywhere, citing the “combines influence of the women of all countries” as one of the biggest factors for the prevention of war. 

Woodrow Wilson

The president at the time, Woodrow Wilson, had previously stated that he believed suffrage should be left to the individual states. But World War I had proven that women were a vital part of society. Wilson had a change of heart, buckling under the pressures from suffrage groups, female workers, and foreign countries. On September 30, 1918, Wilson said, “I regard the concurrence of the Senate in the constitutional amendment proposing the extension of the suffrage of women as vitally essential to the successful prosecution of the great war of humanity in which we are engaged.” 

Ramping Up Efforts

The schoolgirls in the opening colorized photograph were painting equality posters for a contest held by their fine arts club in 1915. Contests like this were commonplace in schools around the country and helped to put added focus on the issues of women’s equality and suffrage. A few years later, with the collective efforts of numerous groups, clubs, and organizations and with the support of President Wilson, Congress passed the 19th Amendment to the Constitution on June 4, 1919. The 19th Amendment was ratified on August 18, 1920. The schoolgirls in this colorized photograph from 1915 were most likely graduated from high school by the time the 19th Amendment was ratified, meaning that they could have joined their fellow American women in casting their votes in the first election with women voters. Perhaps they thought back at the equality posters they painted a half decade earlier and felt pride that their messages contributed to the historic passage of the 19th Amendment.