The 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment
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Today marks the 100th anniversary of Tennessee ratifying the 19th Amendment, giving women the right to vote. However.
In an interview with Time, historian Martha Jones goes deep into explaining that it would take another 50ish years for Black women to exercise that right.
In the case of the 19th Amendment, even as it’s ratified in August of 1920, all Americans are aware that many African-American women will remain disenfranchised. The 19th Amendment did not eliminate the state laws that operated to keep Black Americans from the polls via poll taxes and literacy tests—nor did the 19th Amendment address violence or lynching. Some African-American women will vote with the 19th Amendment. Some are already voting in California, New York and Illinois where state governments have authorized women’s votes. But many Black women faced the beginning of a new movement for voting rights in the summer of 1920, and it’s a struggle they will wage alone because now the organizations that had led the movement for women’s suffrage are disbanding.
In 1913, the New York Times editorial board wrote:
The benefits of woman suffrage are wholly imaginary. Its penalties will be real and hard to bear. Thus far, where women have voted, they have brought no societal or political change. They have gained nothing they did not possess before. Whether or not the woman voter will neglect her home duties will depend upon her character.
Two years later, the editorial board continued: “Without the counsel and guidance of men, no woman ever ruled a state wisely and well.”
Today, the editorial pages are run by Kathleen Kingsbury, after James Bennet resigned following the publication of Senator Tom Cotton’s editorial. And while opinion pages are vestiges of a media environment dominated by print and not pixels, Kingsbury, using the ratification of the 19th Amendment as a muse, gives a potential direction of where the section can go, writing:
As a woman now running our editorial page, I am not proud of all of my predecessors’ views. But I want to confront rather than paper over the times when our page has stood on the wrong side of a fight. By acknowledging our past failings, we can set a new course for our future. Our page’s history has always served as a guide — in some cases sharpening our sense of moral clarity, in others revealing our blind spots.
(The New York Times has a great interactive of the suffrage movement.)
This is a good motto for many aspects of our lives: acknowledge past failings to become better. We are at a moment when we don’t do much self-reflection, and our industry, if not our own selves, would be wise to look at our past bad decisions/behaviors and work on not repeating them. This was a message that came through loud and clear at last night’s Democratic National Convention.
The DNC kicked off last night and it was surreal (it was also the first time I watched a convention through a streaming app on my connected TV, as I cut the cable cord when I moved out of Brooklyn.
Without the glamour of a convention stage, many of the speeches felt flat. The major exception was Michelle Obama's speech, which stood out as the most compelling fifteen minutes of the night by far.
How it looked: The virtual event featured far more voices and faces of everyday Americans, but the videos made for less compelling TV.
The mostly-taped event left little little room for funny gaffes or inter-personal moments, like handshakes and hugs, although several tech issues during live shots provided some of that touch.
And while the DNC unfolds, the Trump campaign will be spending in the high seven-figures across various outlets and mediums, according to the New York Times.
The campaign will also blanket the home pages of The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post and FoxNews.com with Trump campaign ads. Even non-D.N.C. programming will be inundated with Trump ads, as the campaign has bought premium, or “unskippable,” ads on sites like Hulu.
Let’s also pause to reflect just how much Michelle Obama got under the president’s skin. The Washington Post writes:
President Trump unleashed a torrent of rage tweets about Michelle Obama’s speech at the Democratic convention that was spectacularly cringeworthy even by his standards — but it only underscored how effectively the former first lady made the case against him, in ways that are significant but not immediately apparent.
And while he’s in full campaign mode, the President is acknowledging the ratification of the 19th Amendment by pardoning Susan B. Anthony:
Finally, Poynter took a look at 10 newspapers on the day after ratification.
Here’s the Nashville Tennessean, August 19, 1920:
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Etta James, “Sufferin’ Till Suffrage”
Some interesting links:
Facebook Wanted to Be a Force for Good in Myanmar. Now It Is Rejecting a Request to Help With a Genocide Investigation (Time)
Keanu Reeves and Alex Winter Party On With Bill and Ted (New York Times)
An oral history of ‘steamed hams,’ the funniest Simpsons scene ever (Mel Magazine)
Why ‘Harry Potter,’ Other Big Movies Have Become Hot Commodities During COVID Pandemic (Variety)
Exclusive: Ex–Glossier employees describe a company that failed to support Black workers—even as it donated $1 million to racial justice causes (Fortune)
How Facebook and Other Sites Manipulate Your Privacy Choices (Wired)
One Twitter Account’s Quest to Proofread The New York Times (The Ringer)