Program

National Votes for Women Trail

Subject

People

Location

1313 10th St, Columbus, IN 47201, USA

Lat/Long

39.2083939, -85.9098275

Grant Recipient

National Collaborative for Women's History Sites

In 1917 the Indiana General Assembly amended the State Constitution, passing a partial women’s suffrage law in a move that immediately reshaped the political landscape of Indiana. The amendment rallied suffragists and hopeful voters across the state, and an estimated 40,000 woman registered to vote for the first time. Amidst that mobilization, Fannie Davis Johnson and Elizabeth “Lizzie” Hubbard, two African American women and members of the African American Second Baptist Church, became the first women registered to vote in Bartholomew County following the partial suffrage act.

On June 14^th, 1917 The Columbus Republican reported:

The first woman voter to register in Bartholomew County, when the registration board organized for business was Fannie Davis, colored, and a resident of the fifth ward. Elizabeth Hubbard, also colored, was the second woman who registered.

Unfortunately, the victory was short-lived. The Indiana Supreme Court later struck down the amendment, retracting the right advocates in Indiana had fought so passionately to establish. One such advocate, the President of the Woman’s Franchise League of Indiana, Marie Stuart Edwards, was quoted by The Indianapolis News on October 26^th, 1917 shortly after the surprise ruling:

I have become so thoroughly convinced that the trend of public opinion in this state is favorable to the woman suffrage law that I was quite unprepared for this three-to-one decision…It means just one thing for Indiana suffragists, redoubling our efforts toward securing the woman suffrage amendment to the federal Constitution.

Those renewed efforts were rewarded when, on January 16^th, 1920, Indiana voted to ratify the 19^th Amendment to the Federal Constitution. Later that year the required threshold of 36 states voting in favor of ratification was met, and the 19^th Amendment–which secured the right to vote for women–went into effect on August 18^th, 1920.

Despite the disappointing State Supreme Court ruling in 1917, the excitement demonstrated by early voter registers such as Lizzie Hubburd and Fannie Davis exemplified the wide-spread fervor and support for the equal suffrage movement. Both Lizzie and Fannie remained involved in civic organizations throughout their lives. When Hubbard passed away in 1931 her obituary in the Columbus, Indiana paper, The Republic, read:

For 40 years she had been an active member of the Second Baptist church and was especially active in the work of the auxiliary and missionary society. She was a well-known woman and had many friends.

Like Hubbard, Davis remained involved with the Second Baptist Church throughout her life, which, as of 2022, remained in operation and served as the site of this historic marker.