Celebrating the 90th Anniversary of a Woman's Right to Vote

Statement

Ninety years ago last week, women across our nation were finally guaranteed their fundamental and inalienable right to vote.

From the Civil War to World War I, women suffragists in Ohio overcame
decades of fierce opposition by organizing campaigns and marches in rural
towns and big cities. The Ohio Woman's Suffrage Association, led by Harriet
Taylor Upton, took to the pages of newspapers and the halls of the
Statehouse to make Ohio the fifth state to ratify the 19th Amendment to the
Constitution.

Yet passage of the 19th Amendment marked not the end of a hard fought movement, but a significant step in the march toward gender equality in America that continues today.

While more than half of our college students are women, they remain under-represented in the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics fields that fuel our nation's economic competiveness.

Women practice medicine in our hospitals and clinics, yet women face unique barriers to health care access. Our small businesses and large corporations
are led by female CEOs, yet female employees earn, on average, only 77 cents for every dollar earned by a male.

In the last two years, Congress has taken decisive action to advance the rights of, and opportunities for, American women. Health care reform bans insurance company discrimination based on gender and medical conditions such as pregnancy and injuries from domestic abuse. One of the first bills this Congress passed and President Obama signed into law was the
Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act to ensure equal pay for an equal day's work.

Despite our nation's progress toward women's equality, I know there is more we can do.

In December 1851, as suffragists and abolitionists marched, in snow and storm, Sojourner Truth stood on a hillside in Akron, Ohio and, by asking the simple question, "Ain't I a Woman?," challenged our nation to do more to make real the promise of America. Ninety years ago this week our nation helped answer that question by empowering a woman's voice at the polls. But the march continues to empower her voice in every part of American
life.

Sincerely,
Sherrod Brown

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