African-American Movements & Milestones: Suffrage

Passed by Congress February 26, 1869, and ratified February 3, 1870, the 15th amendment granted African American men the right to vote.

The Black Women’s Suffrage Digital Collection is a collaborative project to provide digital access to materials documenting the roles and experiences of Black Women in the Women’s Suffrage Movement and, more broadly, women’s rights, voting rights, and civic activism between the 1850s and 1960.

In the "inventory" section, click on "view digitized document"

The papers of educator, lecturer, suffragist, and civil rights activist Mary Church Terrell (1863-1954) consist of approximately 13,000 documents, comprising 25,323 images, all of which were digitized from 34 reels of previously produced microfilm. Spanning the years 1851 to 1962, with the bulk of the material concentrated in the period 1886-1954, the collection contains diaries, correspondence, printed matter, clippings, and speeches and writings, primarily focusing on Terrell's career as an advocate of women's rights and equal treatment of African Americans.

An exhibition from the Library of Congress on Women from the Suffrage Movement.

Exhibit provided by the National Women's History Museum.

An exhibit of primary sources on New York Heritage.

This act was signed into law on August 6, 1965, by President Lyndon Johnson. It outlawed the discriminatory voting practices adopted in many southern states after the Civil War, including literacy tests as a prerequisite to voting.

Materials on voting rights provided by the Library of Congress.