Jeannette Rankin

Jeannette Rankin was born on June 11, 1880, outside Missoula, Montana, where her parents established a successful ranch. She was the eldest of 11 children, though only seven of them survived into adulthood. 

[Image of Rankin’s family courtesy of Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe Institute, Harvard University]

In the 1880s, as railroads developed throughout Montana, as well as agriculture, Montana experienced a boom in population. From the time Rankin was born in 1880, to when she attended Montana State University in 1888, Montana’s population multiplied by five and Missoula’s population rose to 5,000 from 300.

[Image courtesy of helenahistory.org]

Jeanette Rankin graduated from Montana State University with a degree in biology

[Image courtesy of Archives and Special Collections, Mansfield Library, University of Montana]

When her brother in Cambridge, Massachusetts also became sick, Rankin left Montana for the East Coast to take care of him. She visited Boston and New York, where she was struck by the poor living conditions and exploitation experienced by immigrants. 

[Image courtesy of Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe Institute, Harvard University]

The New York School of Philanthropy was the first higher education program in the field of social work in the U.S. It was established in 1898, and in 1904, it expanded to a full-year program and later to a two-year program. In 1919, it changed its name to the New York School of Social Work, and is now the Columbia University School of Social Work.

[Image of course outline from the New York School of Philanthropy courtesy of University Archives, Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Columbia University Libraries]

While studying in New York, Rankin worked in  police night courts, assisting workers who had been exploited, such as sex workers, to help them find support and safer jobs. After graduating, Rankin spent two months visiting slums with experienced social workers. She wrote home to her mother saying, “I expect to enjoy the work very much” – which was in the “Jewish and Italian district” which she called “the happiest part of New York, despite the misery.”

[Image of social workers in New York City courtesy of Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, New York Public Library]

While living in New York, Rankin was a part of a women’s club of activists and reformers in Greenwich Village called the Heterodoxy Club, made up of suffragists, peace activists, artists and journalists. In this time, Rankin began a long relationship with the writer and biographer Katherine Anthony. Because Rankin never married and was friendly with Anthony and other avowed lesbians, some historians have speculated about Rankin’s own sexual orientation. But no solid evidence of any intimate relationships remains. (source: Jeannette Rankin: A Political Woman by James J. Lopach and Jean A. Luckowski)

[Image of Katherine Anthony courtesy of Tony and Suzanne Whedon]

Rankin worked for three years for the New York Woman Suffrage Party as a sidewalk campaigner, lobbyist, and field organizer. 

[Image courtesy of Gado Images / Alamy]

On March 25, 1911, The Triangle Shirtwaist Fire killed 146 garment workers. It is considered one of the worst industrial accidents in American industry. The factory was one that refused to sign the safety protocols recommended to improve conditions after the labor uprising of 200,000. The tragic incident proved the necessity of protective legislation, and was a catalyst for the suffrage movement. 

[Image courtesy of the Kheel Center]

On February 2, 1911, Rankin became the first woman to speak before an all-male Montana legislature, when she made a passionate speech urging them to grant women the right to vote, and proclaiming that women belong in public service, as well as in the home.

[Image courtesy of Paul Thompson/Hulton Archives/Getty Images]

Rankin became a field secretary for the National American Woman Suffrage Association, which was created in 1890, when two women’s rights organizations merged —the National Woman Suffrage Association and the American Woman Suffrage Association. NAWSA was led by Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Lucy Stone, and Susan B. Anthony.

As a field secretary for NAWSA, Rankin crusaded for the vote in 16 states. A talented and passionate public speaker, Rankin became known for her speeches on street corners, at fairs, farmers’ meetings, churches and other locations. Rankin would make over 6,000 speeches around the world about women’s suffrage, worker’s rights, and peace.

Jeannette Rankin helped to establish The Women’s Peace Party, which was formed as a result of a three-day peace meeting organized by Jane Addams, creator of Hull House and the settlement movement in Chicago, and other feminists in response to the beginning of World War I in Europe in 1914.  Women’s Peace Party members traveled to the Netherlands in April, 1915, to meet with other women at the first international women’s meeting  focused on peace.

[Image courtesy of Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe Institute, Harvard University]

After helping Montana women win the vote in 1914, Rankin ran for a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives as a Republican. Central to her campaign was women’s suffrage, and promoting policies and legislation that would help women, such as programs of support for mothers and children and establishing an eight hour work day.

[Image courtesy of FPG/Getty Images]

On her very first day in office, President Woodrow Wilson asked Congress to vote for a declaration of war against Germany, and she broke a 140-year precedent when she rose to make a speech and announce her vote against the war, stating, “ I want to stand by my country, but I cannot vote for war. I vote no.”

Though 49 other members of Congress also voted against U.S. entry into World War I, Rankin faced great criticism for her pacifist stance. Many suffragists, including Carrie Chapman Catt of the National American Woman Suffrage Association, said that Rankin’s vote would be a step backwards for the suffrage movement, making women appear weak. 

[Image courtesy of Bettmann/Getty Images]

In April, 1919, Rankin went to Europe with Jane Addams, Florence Kelley, Mary Church Terrell, and other suffragists, to the second International Congress of Women for Permanent Peace, which took place at the same time as official peace talks in Paris were called by the allies. There, the Congress of Women for Permanent Peace urged the allied governments to accept amendments to support peace.

After decades of protest and activism for suffrage rights, on August 18, 1920, the 19th Amendment was ratified, giving women the right to vote. That fall, millions of American women cast their ballots. However, this right was only guaranteed for white women — African American women and other women of color were restricted from voting through racist tactics such as poll taxes and literacy tests, as well as violence. Native American women and women who were immigrants also faced great barriers to citizenship. Native American women wouldn’t be considered citizens until 1924. 

Like many other white members of the suffrage movement, Rankin succumbed to the racism of the day, suggesting that African American women could be restricted in their voting rights the same way that African American men were — through racist tactics.

It wasn’t until the 1965 Voting Rights Act was passed that the law prohibited states from using literacy tests and other methods of excluding African Americans and others, such as American Indians from voting.

[Image courtesy of the Boston Globe]

In 1925, Rankin moved near Watkinsville, Georgia, a rural area outside of Athens, and focused on anti-war activism as a founding member of numerous peace organizations, including the Georgia Peace Society. She also worked as a lobbyist for peace with the National Council for the Prevention of War, and to develop legislation that would require Congress to secure the approval of a majority of states before declaring war.  

[Image courtesy of Montana Historical Society Research Center]

In 1939, with the U.S. on the brink of another world war, Rankin returned to Montana and ran for Congress again, this time, promoting an anti-war agenda and policies, and emphasizing  domestic issues. 

[Image courtesy of Maureen and Mike Mansfield Library, University of Montana]

While in office for her second Congressional term representing Montana from 1941 to 1943, Rankin took a firm stance that the country’s enemies were not foreign countries but the domestic issues of poverty, unemployment, and disease. 

[Image courtesy of Everett Collection Historical / Alamy Stock Photo]

The day after the attack on Pearl Harbor, on December 2, 1941, Rankin was the only member of Congress to vote against U.S. entry into World War II, making her the only person in history to vote against U.S. participation in both world wars. 

[Image courtesy of Bettmann/Getty Images]

After casting her vote against war, she was mobbed by journalists on her way out of chambers and had to hide in a phone booth. Capitol policemen were called to escort her to her office. 

[Image courtesy of Bettmann / Getty Images]

Rankin continued to be a leader in the peace movement after retiring from politics, and in 1968, at the age of 87, led 5,000 women in the “Jeannette Rankin Brigade” at an anti-Vietnam War demonstration in Washington, D.C.

[Image courtesy of Bettmann/Getty Images]

Rankin died, at the age of 92

[Image courtesy of Hargrett Rare Book and Manuscript Library, University of Georgia Libraries]