Confrontations for Justice
Mr. Beverly Jones - Susan B. Anthony at the Voting Polls, 1872
Susan B. Anthony devoted more than fifty years of her life to the cause of woman suffrage. After casting her ballot in the 1872 Presidential election in her hometown of Rochester, New York, she was arrested, indicted, tried, and convicted for voting illegally. At her two-day trial in June 1873, which she later described as “the greatest judicial outrage history has ever recorded,” she was convicted and sentenced to pay a fine of $100 and court costs.
After Anthony’s arrest, which occurred two weeks after the November 5 election, there was a hearing to determine if she had, in fact, broken the law. The three young men who registered her as a voter on November 1, 1872, and accepted her ballot at the polls on Election Day were interviewed at the hearing.
Testimony of Mr. Beverly W. Jones, an election official in Rochester, New York, who was confronted by Susan B. Anthony on November 1, 1872, selected page
In this portion of Jones’s testimony, he relates his encounter with Susan B. Anthony on November 1, 1872, when she entered a barbershop that had been set up as an office of voter registration and demanded that her name be added to the list of voters.
National Archives–Northeast Region (New York City), Records of District Courts of the United States
Excerpt:
“. . . I made the remark that I didn’t think we could register her name. She asked me upon what grounds. I told her that the constitution of the State of New York only gave the right of franchise to male citizens. She asked me if I was acquainted with the 14th amendment to the constitution of the U.S. I told her I was.”
—From Beverly Jones’s testimony
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Testimony of Mr. Beverly W. Jones, an election official in Rochester, New York, who was confronted by Susan B. Anthony on November 1, 1872, selected page
In this portion of Jones’s testimony, he relates his encounter with Susan B. Anthony on November 1, 1872, when she entered a barbershop that had been set up as an office of voter registration and demanded that her name be added to the list of voters.
National Archives–Northeast Region (New York City), Records of District Courts of the United States
Excerpt:
“She wanted to know if under that she was a citizen and had a right to vote. At this time, Mr. Warner [the Supervisor of Elections] said, ‘young man, how are you going to get around that. I think you will have to register their names’—or something to that effect.”
—From Beverly Jones’s testimony
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Susan B. Anthony, 1870
Courtesy of the Nebraska State Historical Society Photographic Collections, Lincoln, Nebraska
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