Program

National Votes for Women Trail

Subject

People, Site

Location

845 S 6th St, Louisville, KY 40203, USA

Lat/Long

38.2429783, -85.7620385

Grant Recipient

National Collaborative for Women's History Sites

Sisters Georgia, Alice, and Mollie Nugent advocated for voting rights for African American women during the women’s suffrage movement in the United States. The Nugent sisters advocated for equal rights at the local, state, and national level, working with the National Association of Colored Women, later named the National Association of Colored Women’s Clubs (NACWC). They were also leaders in the Kentucky Association of Colored Women’s Clubs and local African American women’s clubs in Louisville, Kentucky. The Nugent sisters lived at 845 South 6th Street in Louisville and their home often served as a meeting place for various social and civic African American women’s clubs.

On June 4, 1919, the United States Congress passed the Nineteenth Amendment. Once ratified by 36 states, it would ensure that the right to vote could not be denied on account of sex. At a meeting that July, Georgia Nugent was elected chair of the executive board the NACWC. At this same meeting, the NACWC adopted a resolution in anticipation of women obtaining the right to vote:

We recommend that the colored women give their close attention to the study of civics, to the laws of parliamentary usage and to the current political questions, both local and national, in order to fit themselves for the exercise of the franchise.

By August, the necessary 36 states had ratified the amendment, securing women’s right to vote across the United States.