Wyoming Almost Repealed Women Suffrage
The first Territorial Legislature in 1869 passed the suffrage bill, giving women the right to vote for the first time anywhere in America. But it almost didnt stay that way. Two years later, the second legislature nearly repealed the law. In fact, repeal failed by just one vote.
William Bright, the South Pass City Democrat who introduced the suffrage bill in 1869, didnt run for re-election, but Ben Sheeks, his South Pass City colleague who opposed the suffrage bill in 1869, did win another term. Sheeks was the only incumbent House member in the second legislature.
Just as soon as the second legislature convened, newly elected Uinta County House member C. E. Castle said he intended to get the suffrage law repealed.
Why did the 2nd legislature try to repeal women suffrage? Castle did not state a reason, but historian Dr. T. A. Larson claimed it was because of alcohol. Many men believed that women voters favored Sunday closing of saloons, a very unpopular move in the hard-drinking railroad towns in southern Wyoming.
Gov. John A. Campbell, the man who made history on Dec. 10, 1869, by signing the suffrage act into law, urged legislators not to repeal the law. women have voted in the territory, served on juries, and held office, Campbell pointed out. It is simple justice to say that the women entering, for the first time in the history of the country, upon these new and untried duties, have conducted themselves in every respect with as much tact, sound judgment, and good sense, as men.
Nonetheless, Castle introduced the repeal. The next day repeal passed the House by a vote of nine to three with one member absent and not voting. When the bill went to the Council, it passed there by a narrower vote of 5-4. It looked like Wyomings two-year experiment with women suffrage would be coming to an end.
But Gov. Campbell had other ideas. He vetoed the repeal attempt, returning the bill to the House. Both houses needed two-thirds votes to override and House Speaker Ben Sheets immediately sought to override the veto. On Dec. 9, just a day short of two years since Wyoming had become the first place to give women equal rights, nine legislators voted to override the governors veto–voting to repeal women suffrage. Just two voted no while two others were absent and not voting. The House had mustered the necessary two-thirds vote. The veto override went to the Council.
There, on the 32nd day of the session, the five Council members seeking to repeal suffrage voted to override the governors veto. The four who had voted against the bill when it first came before the Council again voted to keep women suffrage. The override effort failed, falling just one vote short of the necessary two-thirds.
The opponents of women suffrage had taken their best shot and narrowly lostby one vote. The four supporters of suffrage in the Council held firm and Campbells veto kept women suffrage part of the territorys laws.
In 1873, Campbell told the legislators in his joint message: . Two years more of observation of the practical working of the system have only served to deepen my conviction that what we, in this Territory, have done, has been well done, and that our system of impartial suffrage is an unqualified success. From that day on, no serious effort was ever mounted to repeal the suffrage law, granting women the vote and equal political rights. Wyoming entered the Union on July 10, 1890, and embedded in its Constitution was the suffrage bill in the form of Article 6, Section 1, guaranteeing equal political rights for all