Broadside : The Crowning Constitutional Argument. 1873

Broadside : The Crowning Constitutional Argument. 1873

Mary Walker was a physician and social reformer from Oswego, New York. She believed in a suffrage strategy known as the "New Departure." Proponents of this strategy argued that voting was a natural right of citizenship, guaranteed in by the Constitution through the Fourteenth Amendment. Since women were citizens, they already had the right to vote. She never accepted the idea that women needed another constitutional amendment to vote, and referred to this as her "crowning constitutional argument."

Her speech to Congress in 1873 affirms this belief and requests that they pass a law that would simply protect women and leave them free to exercise their rights at the polls on election days. The proposed bill is included on page two.

1873-01-20

Citizenship
Memorials (Legal)
United States. Constitution. 14th Amendment
Walker, Mary Edwards, 1832-1919
Women--Suffrage--New York

Walker, Mary Edwards, 1832-1919

United States. Congress (42nd, 3rd session : 1872-1873)

ALMS.1873.01 "A Memorial to Mary E. Walker"

1 sheet ([1] p.)

English

ALMS.1873.02a

Washington, D.C.

Broadsides (notices)

31 x 18 cm.