Making Herstory: Women’s History Month
Every year in March we honor the contributions, innovations, and landmark achievements of women in the United States. We remember the work of Sojourner Truth, Dr. Mabel Lee, Rosie the Riveter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Zitkala-Ša, Fannie Lou Hamer and many others who have worked for the rights of women over the decades.
In celebration of Women’s History Month, here are some memorable moments and participants in Washington Herstory:
Voting Rights
Washington came within one vote of being the first state or territory in the U.S. to grant (some) women the right to vote in 1854. In 1910 Washington became just the fifth state to turn women’s suffrage into law. Susie Revels Cayton, Associate Editor of Seattle’s first successful Black newspaper, The Seattle Republican, played a role in Washington’s equal suffrage movement by publishing stories on the benefits of giving women the vote.
Property Rights
Married women were granted property rights in Washington Territory in 1869. Some legal scholars theorize that adopting the community property system was an attempt to “recruit” more women to the area. Indeed, extreme measures were taken to bring women to the largely male territory, including the famous transport of the Mercer Girls also known as the Mercer Expeditions.
Local Government
In 1926 Seattle’s Bertha Knight Landes was elected mayor — the first woman to serve as the leader of a major American city. According to the Secretary of State’s Office, “That historic election made big news. The New York Times reported on March, 1926: ‘She does not wear short skirts, bob her hair or smoke cigarettes.’ Therefore, the paper concluded, Landes did not represent the ‘new woman’ of the time period.”
Legislature
Marjorie Edwina Pitter King was the daughter of Seattle pioneers. In 1965 she became the first African American woman to serve in the Washington State Legislature. She was also one of the first African American businesswomen in the state, owning an accounting firm and tax service.
Farmworker Rights
Rosalinda Guillen has been organizing for farmworker rights for over thirty years. A 2020 James Beard Foundation Leadership Award winner, Guillen helped lead the successful fight in the 1990’s for the first-ever farmworkers’ collective bargaining agreement in Washington for Chateau Ste. Michelle winery farm workers. Guillen grew up on the migrant farmworker circuit, coming to Washington State in 1960. She continues her organizing work as executive director of Community to Community Development.
State Supreme Court
2013 marked the first year in state history that the Washington State Supreme Court took the bench with both a female majority and a female Chief Justice. One year later, Justice Mary Yu became the first Asian, the first Latina, and the first member of the LGBTQ community to serve on the court. In 2020 Justice Raquel Montoya-Lewis became the first enrolled member of a Native American tribe to sit on a state supreme court. When Justice G. Helen Whitener was appointed in 2020, she became the first Black woman to serve on the State Supreme Court.
More profiles of prominent Washington women can be found here.
Want to learn even more about women’s history in Washington and in the legal profession? Here are just a few of the titles available from the Washington State Law Library collection. Contact us for information on how to check them out or place a hold in our catalog for walk-up curbside pick-up:
First: Sandra Day O’Connor (2019) by Evan Thomas. Read our library staff review here.
Rebels in Law: Voices in History of Black Women Lawyers (1998) edited by J. Clay Smith Jr.
Sisters in Law: How Sandra Day O’Connor and Ruth Bader Ginsburg Went to the Supreme Court and Changed the World (2015) by Linda Hirshman.
Inside Olympia: Women of the Supreme Court (Video Recording) (December 02, 2004) by TCW (also available online)
Day of Jubilation — In Honor of [the] 100th Anniversary of WA Womens’ Suffrage [videorecording] : formal program with remarks by Secretary of State Sam Reed, State Supreme Court Chief Justice Barbara Madsen, State Senators Karen Fraser, Randi Becker, others (2009) by WA St. Historical Society, Office of the Secretary of State ; Washington State Supreme Court (also available online).
My Beloved World (2013) by Sonia Sotomayor.
My Own Words (20160 by Ruth Bader Ginsburg with Mary Hartnett and Wendy W. Williams.
Because of Sex: One Law, Ten Cases, and Fifty Years That Changed American Women’s Lives at Work (2016) by Gillian Thomas. Read our library staff review here.
Breaking Down Barriers: A Legal Guide to Title IX (2007) by National Women’s Law Center and DLA Piper. (LE)
