Petition from the Citizens of Massachusetts in Support of Woman's Suffrage

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Description

Petitions like this one were widely used in the campaign for women’s voting rights. Congress received thousands from citizens in support of – and against – allowing women to vote.

With this petition, men and women from Salem, Massachusetts, asked Congress to pass an amendment giving all citizens the right to vote, regardless of their sex. On May 26, 1880, it was forwarded to the committee on the Judiciary.

Congress responded to these types of petitions, sort of. Beginning in the 1860s, dozens of woman suffrage amendments were proposed. In 1888, one lawmaker proposed that widows and spinsters should be allowed to vote, suggesting that married women were “represented” by their husbands.

Transcript

To the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States.
In Congress Assembled.

The undersigned, Citizens of the United States, Residents of the State of Massachusetts, County of Essex City of Salem earnestly pray your Honorable Body to submit to the several States the following Amendment to the National Constitution, now pending in Congress (Senate Resolution No. 55. House Resolution No. 175)

Article 15

Sec. 1. The right of Suffrage in the United States shall be based on citizenship, and the right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States, or by any state on account of sex, or for any reason not equally applicable to all citizens of the United States.

Sec. 2. Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

Men Women

[Signatures]

Citation

This primary source comes from the Records of the U.S. Senate.

National Archives Identifier: 595454

Full Citation: Petition from the Citizens of Massachusetts in Support of Woman’s Suffrage; 5/26/1880; Petitions and Memorials, Resolutions of State Legislatures, and Related Documents which were Referred to the Committee on the Judiciary during the 46th Congress; (SEN46A-H11.2); Committee Papers, 1816 – 2011; Records of the U.S. Senate, Record Group 46; National Archives Building, Washington, DC. [Online Version, https://docsteach.org/document/petition-massachusetts-suffrage/, April 7, 2026]

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