Women and The Vote – Onward!

Voting Rights, Inspiration, Success Strategies for Women, Women Entrepreneurs, Female Business Owners 

It was the third time I drove close to the firehouse to see how long the line was for early voting. Once again, the line snaked out of the doors, down the long, twisting hill and almost onto the busy road below where cars had lined up bumper to bumper. With the temperature a raw 46 degrees with small rain drops falling, I would have bet money there would be a short line. I was used to biking and running in inclement weather so standing outside wasn’t going to bother me like it might others. Well, I was wrong.

The enthusiasm of the 2020 Presidential Election is pouring out on all sides of the aisle whether you bleed blue democratic or red republican blood. The surge in early voting is reported every day on the news but to see it in person, during every attempt to vote, is purely inspirational. It’s not possible to be mad needing to return time and again because that show of democracy warms the heart.

Since March, I have volunteered for “Women and the Vote New York State” a group of genius women I met through member Jill Bates. This group and their project are providing a growing online suffragist directory and grave site map to help anyone explore New York’s rich and influential suffragist history. Their website helps find famous individuals and even those women never heard of whose grassroots efforts resulted in the passage of the 19^th Amendment in 1920, the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Searching for suffragists who died in New York State and contributed to the major feminist movements is fascinating and painstaking work.

I am proud every time I research a woman who has made a small or large contribution to women’s rights today because without their dedication – big or small – we might not be where we are in 2020. Before November 3^rd, I invite every women reading this editorial to go to www.womenandthevotenys.com  and join women around the state wearing their “I Voted” sticker on their jacket visiting graves of suffragists where you can film and talk about the significance of that female’s work. I will be in Syracuse going to a few graves in Oakwood Cemetery and would love some company so we can capture some film for the final film project.

I hope this post before the Presidential Election inspires you to continue the foundation work so many women before us have done to help women gain equality, not only with voting rights, but other rights as well. We have come far, but we still have so much work ahead. Join an organization or cause that supports women’s rights and get involved. Remember to VOTE on November 3^rd, especially for candidates who support passage of the Equal Rights Amendment, which would be a major step forward in women’s equality under law.

If the women of yesterday could lay the foundation work for us today, we owe it to the next generation and also to the foremothers, to do the work needed to progress women’s rights higher faster. Vote with WOMEN in your mind on November 3^rd. We can do this. We should do this. We must do this!