Birthplace of Georgia's Woman Suffrage Movement

Birthplace of Georgia's Woman Suffrage Movement. . , In 1890, Augusta Howard founded the Georgia Woman Suffrage Association in Columbus at her family's antebellum mansion. It was Georgia's first organized effort to gain the vote for women. In 1894, Howard persuaded the National American Woman Suffrage Association to hold its 1895 meeting in Atlanta. After the convention's rousing success, NAWSA president Susan B. Anthony visited the Howard family in Columbus. But Howard faced bitter opposition from her brothers, who forced her withdrawal from the suffrage movement., Industrialist G. Gundy Jordan, an early woman suffrage supporter, inspired other elite women and men to form the Muscogee County Equal Franchise League in November 1913. The movement was dominated by upper-class whites who made no effort to enlist working-class or African-American women. Persistent lobbying led Congress to pass the 19th Amendment in 1919. Despite the Georgia legislature's rejection, other states ratified it in 1920. Georgia was one of two states barring women from the 1920 elections because the registration deadline had passed. Columbus women finally could register to vote in 1921 and soon became a major political force.