HIST 490 Suffrage Seminar: Primary Sources

A project of the Library of Congress, Chronicling America contains many newspapers printed from 1789-1925 in digital format for online viewing.

Some digitized issues from 1858-present are available through the Internet Archive and HathiTrust.

The Lily, the first newspaper for women, was issued from 1849 until 1853 under the editorship of Amelia Bloomer (1818-1894).

The National Citizen and Ballot Box was a monthly journal deeply involved in the roots of the American feminist movement.

The National Standard: A Women’s Suffrage and Temperance Journal exploded onto the popular stage in 1870, supporting two of the major social movements in the late 19th Century – the Women’s Suffrage Movement and the Temperance Movement.

With the tag line “The magazine that won equal suffrage in Washington”, the New Citizen focused on the role of newly-enfranchised women in Washington. Established to serve all women voters throughout the western U.S., Western Woman Voter began publication following the passage of suffrage in Washington State.

The Remonstrance was the official publication of the Massachusetts Association Opposed to the Further Extension of Suffrage to Women. First published annually and later quarterly in Boston from February, 1890 until April 1919, it provided a forum for women who opposed the expansion of voting rights to women.

The Revolution, a weekly women’s rights newspaper, was the official publication of the National Woman Suffrage Association formed by feminists Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony to secure women’s enfranchisement through a federal constitutional amendment. Published between January 8, 1868 and February, 1872, it was edited by Stanton and Parker Pillsbury and initially funded by George Francis Train, a wealthy and eccentric Democrat, and David Melliss, financial editor of the New York World newspaper. Coincidentally, The Revolution was run out of a small office in the same building that housed the New York World.

The Woman’s Tribune, with its motto in the masthead: “Equality Before The Law”, was launched by Clara Bewick Colby, from her home in Beatrice, Nebraska, in August 1883. For the next year, it was the official publication of the Nebraska Woman Suffrage Association.