The Tennessee heat was palpable. It was so thick that it somehow managed to slow down even the most brisk of walkers. Any southerner could tell you that August was hardly the most pleasant time of year; in fact, it was almost unbearable. To make matters worse, Nashville was absolutely bustling with people today, which only added to the mounting summer heat. I rounded a corner on Broadway en route to the capitol building and found my path obstructed by a sea of petticoats.
I had been to Nashville many times before, but I’d never seen it like this. The city was usually a quiet one; people flitted about without any real sense of urgency. Today was different, though. Today, it seemed as though everyone in the capitol had an agenda, and they weren’t about to be interrupted. The men seemed more stately than usual; their Sunday best had been impressively starched, and their shoes had been polished to a shine. The women, too, seemed to be motivated by an invisible force. Even the most proper of southern ladies walked a little too quickly and spoke a little too loudly. It was clear that something was afoot in the capitol, something for which the city was trying to prepare itself.
Out of the corner of my eye, I caught a flash of red. My eyes focused upon it, and I noticed it was a rose. For some reason, it seemed slightly out of place. I had noted the aroma of the flowers earlier, but I hadn’t given much thought to where the smell was coming from. The flower was pinned to the lapel of a remarkably well-dressed gentleman who was walking with broad strides in the direction of the capitol building. I made up my mind to follow behind him in the hope that he would help me navigate the crowd a little more quickly. As I trekked on, I began to notice more and more roses. All the women I passed on the street appeared to have flowers pinned to their bodices. However, I was struck by the realization that these ladies were all wearing yellow roses instead of the blood-red flower worn by my unassuming navigator. Every once in a while, I would pass someone with a particularly pungent flower, and I would briefly be treated to the fresh, dainty scent.
Distracted by the roses, I eventually found I had lost track of the gentleman I had been following. I gathered my skirts in a relatively ladylike fashion and tried to quicken my pace. I rounded a corner and found myself on Sixth Avenue. The crowd was even denser here. And, interestingly enough, this particular conglomeration seemed to be made up almost entirely of women. I looked up at the words on an awning over my head: Hermitage Hotel. That would explain it. From what I had heard, this hotel served as a sort of command center for the suffragists in Nashville. The ladies seemed to be on red-alert today, as the hour of judgment drew ever nearer.
The concentration of yellow roses here was particularly high. I found myself completely surrounded by women sporting the bright little buds. As I made my way through the crowd, my eyes fell upon a woman with a small table near the entrance of the hotel. She was snipping yellow rose buds and handing them out to the eager women by whom she was completely engulfed. I shouldered my way through the swarms of women and promptly found myself eye to eye with the lady on the other side of the table. She was the first to speak:
“Good morning, dear! Do you need a rose to pin on that lovely dress of yours?” she asked with a smile.
“If you don’t mind my asking: What are they for?”
She raised an eyebrow and gestured toward a dapper gentleman in a well-pressed suit. “Do you see that man over there?” she asked, “You see that red rose on his jacket?”
Indeed I did.
She continued, “That rose tells us that that gentleman is an anti-suffragist. My rose,” she
tapped her yellow flower, “tells the world that I’m a suffragist.”
That would explain why I had seen so many women sporting yellow roses this morning. I
lifted a rosebud to my nose and indulged in its sweet smell.
“Would you like one? They’re free!” she smiled again.
As a journalist, I knew it was my job to stay objective, but I just couldn’t say no. I elected to take a flower and keep it concealed until after the vote. I said goodbye to the jovial woman and resumed my journey to the capitol building. I knew it couldn’t be far off. I walked to the end of the block and turned in the direction of my destination. Eventually, I looked up and saw the clean, white dome of the capitol. With the end in sight, I fell in with the rest of the large crowd headed up the hill.
I introduced myself as a journalist to a man at the door, and I was quickly ushered into the marbled lobby. I was directed to a staircase down the hall which led to a balcony full of other reporters, as well as a great number of suffragists sporting yellow sashes. I had barely taken out my pen and paper when the speaker asked for motions and a man in the assembly stood to speak.
“I would like to move to ratify the 19th amendment to the Constitution of the United States of America.”
The room fell silent. The tension was almost tangible. I started to tally up the numbers of yellow and red roses on the lapels of the congressmen on the ground floor in an effort to predict the outcome of this vote. To my chagrin, it was almost impossible to tell which side had the advantage, as there appeared to be an equal distribution of both types of roses.
Instead of putting the motion to a vote, the speaker of the assembly went to the podium and raised his own motion: A motion to table the resolution. In my opinion, tabling the amendment was only delaying the inevitable. Tennessee was the last state needed to ratify the 19th amendment, and the suffragists were not going down without a fight.
The motion to table received a second, and the motion was put to a vote. I could tell it was going to be a close run. The crowd waited patiently while the votes were tallied. Everyone was suffering from the unspoken fear that the resolution would be tabled, and women would have to wait even longer to gain their vote.
Moments later, the results were in.
It was a tie.
My suspicions appeared to be correct: The assembly was equally divided. With the motion to table indeterminate, the next course of action was to vote on the original matter of ratification. This was the suffragists’ last chance to see the resolution passed today. They were moments away from receiving a verdict on their rights.
I suddenly became aware of the sweltering heat in the assembly room. I had become so invested in the situation that I had forgotten how hot it was. I began fanning myself with my notepad, as I gazed down at the representatives. My eyes fell upon a man who appeared much too young to be in the House of Representatives. He, too, had become aware of the heat and seemed to be looking around his desk for some sort of relief. His fingers brushed past the red rose on his lapel as he unbuttoned his coat and reached into his inner pocket to retrieve a handkerchief, which he used to wipe his brow. However, as he went to replace the cloth, a small piece of paper fell out from within its folds. He looked at it quizzically and began to unfold it. It appeared as though he had no idea the note was in his pocket, and whatever was on the page was equally surprising to him.
At this point, the vote on the motion for ratification was well underway. The vote was proceeding as expected; the assembly remained equally divided. I was beginning to doubt the success of today’s vote. It seemed the anti-suffragists were determined to keep this amendment from being ratified, even if it meant dragging out the process with ties and tabling.
“Mr. Burn?” someone shouted.
I suddenly became aware that it was the speaker. He seemed confused, if not slightly irritated. I looked over the crowd below to see who had elicited this questioning. No one responded to the speaker, and I remained uncertain of to whom he was speaking.
“Mr. Burn?” he repeated.
Suddenly, the young representative I had noticed earlier looked up. He was still mulling over the note he had found in his pocket.
“Yes?” the young man replied.
“Would you care to cast your vote?” he droned, this time without concealing his annoyance, “Do you vote ‘aye’ or ‘no’ to ratification of the 19th Amendment?”
The young man slowly stood up. He folded the note with shaking hands and returned it to the pocket in which he found it. He looked up at the speaker slowly and deliberately. The red of his rose was piercingly bright.
“Aye.”
The room erupted in hushed murmurs. If he was wearing a red rose, why would he vote in favor of ratification? I began furiously scrawling notes onto my pad of paper. Something powerful had just happened; I just wasn’t sure what it was yet.
The rest of the vote seemed to fly by and was over before I knew it. Once the votes were in, we were forced to wait for the final tally, yet again. If the tension had been tangible before, it was almost concrete now. Suffragists and anti-suffragists alike were fanning themselves profusely and twiddling their thumbs in anticipation. Finally, the speaker was given the tally and went to the podium to announce it.
49 to 47 in favor of ratification.
The suffragists had done it! Mr. Burn’s last minute change of heart broke the tie and made Tennessee the newest state to ratify the 19th Amendment to the Constitution. With this victory, the amendment had garnered the 36 states needed to be officially added to the Constitution and the right to vote would no longer be “denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.”
I rushed from the balcony to position myself closer to the representatives so I could track down Mr. Burn after the session ended. Eventually, I spotted him among some other representatives, and I pushed my way through the jubilant crowd to reach him.
“Excuse me, Mr. Burn? I couldn’t help but notice you reading something right before your vote. Can you tell me what that was?”
“That,” he said with a grin, “was a letter from my mother. She told me to be a good boy and give women the right to vote. I’ve always been a good boy, and good boys listen to their mothers.”
I smiled back at him, “Thank you, Mr. Burn. I’ll be sure to mention your mother in my article.”
I began to walk away to leave him to the host of reporters who were now targeting him. But at the last minute I remembered something and turned back.
“Mr. Burn,” I began, fumbling at the pockets in my dress, “I thought you might want to trade that rose for this one.”
I handed him the yellow rose the woman gave me this morning. He looked down at the red rose on his lapel and unpinned it from the material with a smile. Yellow suited him much better.
“Thank you,” he said with a wink, “but you didn’t have to give me anything.”
“Of course I did,” I replied, “You gave me my right to vote.”
