A Simple Justice: Kentucky Women Fight for the Vote

by Melanie Beals Goan

When the Declaration of Independence was signed by a group of wealthy white men in 1776, poor white men, African Americans, and women quickly discovered that the unalienable rights it promised were not truly for all. The Nineteenth Amendment eventually gave women the right to vote in 1920, but the change was not welcomed by people of all genders in politically and religiously conservative Kentucky. As a result, the suffrage movement in the Commonwealth involved a tangled web of stakeholders, entrenched interest groups, unyielding constitutional barriers, and activists with competing strategies.

In A Simple Justice , Melanie Beals Goan offers a new and deeper understanding of the women's suffrage movement in Kentucky by following the people who labored long and hard to see the battle won. Women's suffrage was not simply a question of whether women could and should vote; it carried more serious implications for white supremacy and for the balance of federal and state powers―especially in a border state. Shocking racial hostility surfaced even as activists attempted to make America more equitable.

Goan looks beyond iconic women such as Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton to reveal figures whose names have been lost to history. Laura Clay and Madeline McDowell Breckinridge led the Kentucky movement, but they did not do it alone. This timely study introduces readers to individuals across the Bluegrass State who did their part to move the nation closer to achieving its founding ideals.

296 pages, Hardcover

Published November 12, 2020

About the author

Melanie Beals Goan is an Associate Professor of History at the University of Kentucky. She is originally from Erie, Pennsylvania,. She earned a B. A. in history from Slippery Rock University and a M. A. and Ph. D. from the University of Kentucky. Her research interests and teaching focus include twentieth century U. S. history, Kentucky history, gender, and the history of health care. She lives in Lexington, Kentucky with her husband, Brad, and her three children.

Reviews

[Cheyenne · Rating 5 out of 5]

Kentucky. Wow. Women. Wow. Kentucky women. Wow.

Great book, the G in Dr. Goan stands for GOAT

[Rachel · Rating 5 out of 5]

A well written, well researched history of the suffrage movement in Kentucky. You will learn about Kentucky leaders, Mary Clay, Laura Clay, Josephine Henry, Madeline Breckenridge, and several others and the decades it took before women were able to fully vote in Kentucky and the nation.

This book would primarily be of interest to those interested in women’s rights in Kentucky and the south. However, it would also be interesting to those interested in suffrage movement and how it varied in different states.

[Mackenzie Scarlott · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an exceptional account of Kentucky women’s continuous fight for the vote, highlighting extraordinary women like Josephine Henry and others you might not find in your everyday history book. Melanie Goan may very well have written the most distinguished scholarly work dedicated to Kentucky women’s history.

[Gabby Beckman · Rating 3 out of 5]

It’s a good book, just not the type of book I like to read. I had to read it for class. Sometimes I got confused on the whole story line but overall learned a lot. And it’s a good book if you are interested in Woman’s Suffrage and Secondary Sources.

[Rebecca Frodge · Rating 4 out of 5]

A thorough and well written account of the decades long battle Kentucky women fought to gain the vote.

As with many fights for justice the process wasn’t easy. Many backwards steps were taken during the course of slowly trudging forward. For instance; In 1895 women in Lexington, Covington, and Newport were granted the right to vote in school board elections. Black women voted in large numbers as soon as they were able. By 1902 Kentucky lawmakers (men) were worried about “black control of schools” and passed a bill repealing the right of women’s school board suffrage.

Meanwhile even though they couldn’t vote, Kentucky women used any means within their power to sway elections. When W.C.P. Breckinridge was running for re-election in 1894, despite the recent public revolution of his philandering, Kentucky women, “lacking the power to punish him at the polls… creatively used the power they did possess. They refused to shop at stores run by Breckinridge supporters or seek medical treatment from family physicians who were backing him. Young “maidens” even monitored possible suitors; when a young man wearing a Breckinridge campaign button called on a debutante, she instructed him to leave and never come back.” Breckinridge’s opponent, William C. Owens, won by 255 votes.

Though Kentucky lawmakers declined again and again to grant women the right to vote, they still expected Kentucky women to serve in their government. In 1915 Governor James B. McCreary appointed 85 women to serve on a war (WWI) preparation committee. Prompting the head of the Kentucky suffrage movement, Madeline McDowell Breckinridge, to write in rejection of McCreary’s appointments that “Kentucky women are not idiots - even though they are closely related to Kentucky men…You can’t ignore them and treat them as if they were kindergarten children, and then when work is needed expect them to do a man’s share.”

It finally took a national amendment to give Kentucky women the right they had been fighting so relentlessly for on a state level.

This book is full of Kentucky history and the stories of powerful Kentucky women. I highly recommend it.