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  • This is the Tennessee House chamber on August 18, 1920.

  • The room is full of roses, yellow worn

  • by those supporting women's suffrage and red by those

  • against.

  • It's tense.

  • All eyes are on the clerk as he counts the votes.

  • After decades of tireless campaigning

  • and 144 years after Thomas Jefferson declared

  • all white, property-owning men equal,

  • the battle for women's suffrage

  • came down to a single vote, cast

  • by the youngest member of the legislature,

  • carrying a note from his mother.

  • This vote ratified the 19th Amendment and guaranteed

  • women the right to vote.

  • It's an incredible story and reminds us

  • of how even constitutional amendments, so

  • national in their scope, ultimately get decided

  • on a very local, human level.

  • It brings politics home.

  • We have one of the world's oldest and shortest

  • Constitutions.

  • And its authors recognized the need for it

  • to evolve with time.

  • The process is undoubtedly arduous.

  • It took 203 years to pass the 27th Amendment, which

  • revised congressional pay.

  • But it allows we, the people, to determine the law.

  • In 1923, three years after the 19th Amendment was ratified,

  • suffragist Alice Paul proposed a new amendment,

  • one that would declare men and women equal under the law,

  • not just at the polls.

  • It became known as the Equal Rights Amendment, the E.R.A.

  • Today, nearly 100 years later, its passage

  • still hangs in the balance.

  • This year, as we approach the 100th anniversary

  • of the 19th Amendment's ratification,

  • the E.R.A. will be a subject of local debate

  • as supporters will work to get the 38th and final state

  • to ratify.

  • Eyes will be on several of the state legislatures who

  • have yet to ratify, including Virginia,

  • North Carolina and Arizona.

  • Its history is fascinating.

  • After it was proposed in 1923, the E.R.A.

  • was presented in every session of Congress

  • for nearly 50 years.

  • In 1940, the Republican Party was

  • the first to include support for the amendment

  • in its platform.

  • When Congress eventually passed the E.R.A. in 1972,

  • it went to the states for ratification.

  • It was quickly approved by 33 states.

  • But the opposition, led by a woman,

  • ran a campaign so strong the amendment was still

  • three states short by the deadline.

  • "By coming here today, you have shown that that is not

  • what American women want."

  • In recent years, galvanized by the #MeToo movement

  • and the ratification of the 200-year-old 27th Amendment,

  • supporters have pushed for ratification

  • from three remaining states, hoping Congress

  • will adjust the deadline.

  • In 2017, Nevada voted to ratify,

  • followed a year later by Illinois.

  • History is being made.

  • And it's happening right in our backyards.

  • And that's why I want to show you this moment, from 1920,

  • in the Tennessee House chamber, when

  • the 19th Amendment hung in the balance.

  • "The Suffragists needed one more vote.

  • And as the fateful roll call began,

  • they had no idea where it might come from.

  • Harry Burn, from McMinn County,

  • the youngest man in the legislature, was cautious.

  • Most of his constituents were against votes for women.

  • And he had come into the chamber

  • that morning with a red rose in his buttonhole.

  • But he also carried, folded in his pocket,

  • a letter from his mother."

  • "Dear son, vote for suffrage

  • and don't keep them in doubt.

  • I noticed some of the speeches against.

  • They were very bitter.

  • I have been watching to see how you stood but have not

  • seen anything yet.

  • Don't forget to be a good boy.

  • With lots of love, mama."

  • "When the roll call reached him,

  • Harry Burn voted to ratify.

  • His single vote ended 72 years of painful struggle.

  • The 19th Amendment was now law.

  • Women's suffrage had, at last, been written

  • into the Constitution.

  • And the goal that had first been

  • proposed in Seneca Falls in 1848 had been reached.

  • Asked to explain himself later,

  • Harry Burn said simply, I know that a mother's advice is

  • always safest for a boy to follow."

  • I love that story on so many levels.

  • It's one of the great single deciding

  • votes in our history.

  • And it was cast by a 24-year-old who

  • changed his mind on the spot thanks

  • to a letter from his mother.

  • It's an interesting echo to the process

  • we're seeing unfold around the renewed efforts

  • to pass the E.R.A.

  • You know, the most recent vote to consider the E.R.A. was

  • in Virginia in February 2019.

  • Guess how many votes it fell short by?

This is the Tennessee House chamber on August 18, 1920.

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