8961-17 Commemorate 100 Year Anniversary of Women's Suffrage

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RESOLUTION 8961 -17 BY: Anderson, Bullock, Litten, Marx, Nowlin, O'Leary, O'Malley. A RESOLUTION commemorating the 100 year anniversary of women's suffrage in Lakewood. WHEREAS, prior to women's suffrage, only men were recognized as having the right to vote and the right to hold political office in the United States, and WHEREAS, the anti - slavery and temperance movements of the 19th century fostered political involvement and political leadership among women like never before and had a significant impact on the women's suffrage movement, and; WHEREAS, hundreds of Lakewood men and women worked for many years to win women's suffrage locally, the best known being Bernice Pyke, the first woman to run for Mayor of Lakewood and Maude C. Waitt, Ohio's first woman Republican woman state senator, and; WHEREAS, on August 6th, 1917 the Lakewood City Council unanimously voted to place the following question on the ballot at the next municipal election: To amend Article XI of the Charter of the City of Lakewood ...to provide for Woman [sic] Suffrage, so that qualified women shall be deemed electors, and shall be entitled to vote for all municipal elective officers and on all questions of local self - government and be eligible to be appointed to, to be elected to, and to hold any municipal office. And; WHEREAS, exactly 100 years ago tonight on November 6th, 1917 the majority of the voters of the City of Lakewood voted in favor of the above ballot question thereby granting Lakewood women the right to vote on municipal issues and to run for local office, and; WHEREAS, all women across the United States were finally granted suffrage in August 1920 when Congress approved the passage of the 19th amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Now, therefore, BE IT RESOLVED BY THE CITY OF LAKEWOOD, STATE OF OHIO Section 1. That this Council and Administration hereby recognize and celebrate the centennial anniversary of women's suffrage in Lakewood. Section 2. That this Council and Administration applaud the Lakewood men and women of yesteryear whose progressive vision, hard work and organizing made this achievement possible, especially when similar efforts at the state and federal levels were unsuccessful. Section 3. It is found and determined that all formal actions of this Council concerning and relating to the passage of this resolution were adopted in an open meeting of this Council, and that all such deliberations of this Council and any of its committees that resulted in such formal action, were in meetings open to the public, in compliance with all legal requirements.