I Shall Never Pay a Dollar...

On November 1, 1872. Susan B. Anthony, a fierce advocate for women’s rights, walked into a polling station in Rochester, New York, and cast a ballot—an act that would lead to her arrest, a high-profile trial, and a bold stand on her right to vote as a U.S. citizen. Today, we’re looking at what motivated Anthony to vote, the events of that day, her trial, and the legacy her actions left behind. By the time of the 1872 election, Susan B. Anthony was well-known for her decades of work advocating for abolition, temperance, and especially women’s rights. In her view, recent changes in the Constitution, namely the 14th and 15th Amendments, granted women the right to vote. These amendments, intended to extend citizenship and voting rights, mainly applied to African American men. But Anthony believed that if citizenship meant equality, it applied to women just as much as to men. With this legal reasoning, Anthony encouraged other women to join her in testing the boundaries of these new laws by voting. Her act wasn’t a whim; it was a calculated challenge. She intended to expose the injustice of denying women the right to vote and force the nation to confront it head-on. On the morning of November 1, 1872, she and fourteen other women went to the polls to exercise their rights as Americans.