6,000 years of recorded world history reveal the most common form of government is monarchy.
The
most powerful monarch ever was the British King, whose vast empire, at
it peak, controlled 13 million square miles - almost a quarter of the
Earth's land, and nearly half billion people - one-fifth of the world's
population at the time.
The
Revolutionary War separated America from Britain and soon other
countries began rejecting their monarchs and replacing them with elected
representative governments called republics.
America's
Civil War and the 13th Amendment ended slavery, followed by a
Republican Congress pushing through the 14th Amendment - giving rights
to freed slaves, and the 15th Amendment - assuring freed slaves the
right to vote.
The
momentum of the anti-slavery movement was channeled into the women's
suffrage movement to allow women to vote, and the temperance movement to
prohibit alcohol.
The
women's suffrage movement spread in the late 1800's thru many
countries, including Sweden, Finland, Britain, New Zealand, Australia,
and in America.
After World War I, American men voted for women to vote with the passage of the 19th Amendment, AUGUST 26, 1920:
"The
right of citizens of the U.S. to vote shall not be denied or abridged
by the United States or by any State on account of sex."
After
World War II, war-torn and post-colonial countries adopted new
governments which allowed women to vote, joined by other emerging
nations, such as:
France 1944
Italy 1946
Venezuela 1946
Japan 1947
Taiwan 1947
India 1947
Kenya 1963
Islamic countries followed later, such as:
Iraq 1980
Qatar 1997
Bahrain 2002
Oman 2003
Kuwait 2005
Nations practicing Sharia Law, such as Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates and Brunei still limit a woman's right to vote.
With
the expansion of voting came techniques to influence voters through
manipulating public opinion, race-baiting, fear-mongering, government
handouts, and voter fraud.
A leader in the women's suffrage movement was Susan B. Anthony, praised by President Gerald Ford, February 13, 1976:
"Susan
B. Anthony...with other dedicated women...took the cause of women's
suffrage to State capitals across our growing Nation...
The irreversible change she wrought...led to the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment."
Susan B. Anthony also fought to prohibit alcohol, addressing the Daughters of Temperance, March 1, 1849:
"Ladies!
There is no Neutral position for us...If we sustain not this noble
enterprise...then is our influence on the side of Intemperance.
If we say we love the Cause and then sit down at our ease, surely does our action speak the lie.
And now permit me once more to beg of you to lend your aid to this great Cause, the Cause of God and all Mankind."
Get your own copy of the best-selling America's God and Country Encyclopedia of Quotations
The League of Women Voters was addressed on their 50th Anniversary by President Richard Nixon, April 17, 1969:
"A
year before the 19th amendment was adopted the League of Women Voters
was founded, and that organization, in the past 50 years, has played a
major role in this Nation on a nonpartisan basis...
Since about 1947, a tremendously escalating role of women in politics in the United States...
I often say that men do the talking and women do the working in campaigns..."
Nixon continued:
"As we look at the past 50 years we wonder what could happen in the next 50 years...
As
I look around the world and as I find that India has a woman Prime
Minister, Ceylon has a woman Prime Minister, Israel has a woman Prime
Minister..."
Women's suffrage leader Julia Ward Howe, the first woman member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, had written
The Battle Hymn of the Republic, stating in the 3rd verse:
"I have read a fiery gospel
writ in burnished rows of steel;
'As ye deal with my contemners,
so with you my grace shall deal;
LET THE HERO, BORN OF WOMAN,
crush the serpent with his heel,
Since God is marching on."
To the Daughters of the American Revolution, President Calvin Coolidge remarked April 19, 1926:
"Who
has not heard of Molly Pitcher, whose heroic services at the Battle of
Monmouth helped the sorely tried army of George Washington!
We
have been told of the unselfish devotion of the women who gave their
own warm garments to fashion clothing for the suffering Continental
Army during that bitter winter at Valley Forge.
The burdens of the war were not all borne by the men..."
Coolidge continued:
Since
1880 there has been a marked increase in the tendency to remain away
from the polls on the part of those entitled to vote...
Election
day in the olden times was generally considered more or less sacred -
one to be devoted to the discharge of the obligations of citizenship...
If the people fail to vote, a government will be developed which is not their government...
Such a system of government is doomed to failure."
Get the book, American Minute - Notable Events of American Significance Remembered on the Date They Occurred
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