WOMEN'S RIGHT TO
VOTE IN TENNESSEE
IS UPHELD BY COURT
May Cast Ballots in Municipal and Presidential Elections
Without Payment of Poll Tax, Supreme Court Rules
in 4 to 1 Decision Declaring Act Constitutional—Sep-
arate Boxes Not Compulsory.
(By Wm. H. Swiggart, Jr.)
Nashville, Tenm, July 26.—The women
have won their right in Tennessee for
equal suffrage with men in all elections
for President and Vice-President of the
United States, and for all officers of
cities and towns throughout the state.
The supreme court today overruled all
objections to the statute of 1919 granting women the right to vote in such
elections in Tennessee, and declared the
new law valid and constitutional, overruling Chancellor James B. Newman, of
Nashville, who recently held the act unconstitutional.
Women may vote without payment of
poll taxes until further legislative enactment, the supreme court held.
While the law does not compel separate ballot boxes for women, the supreme court advised that separate boxes
be provided in elections where some of
the candidates are running for offices
for which women are not permitted by law to vote.
The statute which was upheld by the
court provides that "all women, citi-
zens of the United States and above the
age of twenty-one years, having resided
in the state for one year and in the
county for six months preceding any
election therein, and who shall be an
inhabitant of the election district or precinct in which they offer to vote, shall
be entitled and allowed to vote at such
elections for electors of President and
Vice-President of the United States, and
for all officers of cities, towns and tax-
ing districts, and upon all questions or
propositions submitted exclusively to a
vote of the electors of such municipal-
ities."
The constitutionality of the law was attacked in a suit brought by John J.
Vertrees and other prominent citizens
of Nashville, in which it was claimed
that since women were given the right
to vote without the payment of poll tax,
it was an unjust and unreasonable discrimination against men who are re-
quired to exhibit a poll-tax receipt before they can vote. It was also claimed
that the statute could not be put into
effect without destroying the purity and
fairness of all elections because it did
not provide for a separate ballot-box for
the women in elections for officers in-
cluding some for whom the women could
not vote, so that there would be no way
to ascertain which ballots were cast by
women and which were cast by men,
and no way to determine whether the
women had voted for officers for whom
[they] were not entitled to vote. These
[were] the principal grounds of attack,
which were overruled.
Justice Bachman Dissents.
The opinion of the supreme court was
prepared and delivered by Justice Grafton
and concurred in by three
members of the court. Justice
Bachman dissented from the majority
opinion, holding that the statute is unconstitutional because unreasonably discriminating -against the men in permit-
ting women to vote without the payment
of poll-tax, while men are required to
pay the poll tax before exercising the
same Voting privilege.
The opinion of the court indicates
that the court exercised care in determining the constitutional questions involved in the case without regard to
questions of policy, such questions being
exclusively for legislative determination.
In the concluding portion of the opinion
the court said: "Chapter 139 of the acts
of 1919 was passed after long discussion
and after the failure of similar acts in
previous legislatures. It embodies a
policy deliberately adopted by the legislature of the state after much agitation. All bias as to such policy must
be scrupulously laid aside in the consideration of the constitutionality of the
act.
'The objections to this act have been
presented with all the learning and force
possible. These arguments harmonize
with what were pre-conceived notions of
many of the profession. When the matter is probed, however, nothing is to he
found in the premises, except in the one
particular noted."
Only One Exception.
The "one particular" in which the
statute was declared to be ineffective
consists of elections held for the purpose of determining whether "the credit
of any county, city or town shall be
given or loaned to or in aid of any
person, company, association or corporation." In such elections it was held
that the constitution confines the right
to vote to male voters.
As a result of the opinion of the supreme court, women will have the right
to vote in municipal elections, and for
President and Vice-President , without
paying poll-tax; but the court holds that
the legislature has the power to levy a
poll tax against women, and whether
the tax will be levied will be a question
for the next legislature, as it is not probable a special session will be called for
that purpose.
The opinion upholds the right of election officers to provide separate ballot-
boxes for women voters, but it is held
that separate ballots need not be provided for the women. On this question,
the opinion concludes as follow: "We
accept as correct the opinion of the legislature expressed as indicated, (by the
resolution adopted when the statute
was passed) that the election officers
have the power to provide separate ballot-boxes, and we take it as a matter of
course that the election officers will
adopt the advice of the legislature and
duly provide separate ballot-boxes for
elections in which candidates are run-
ning for only part of whom women are
entitled to vote."
Women's Suffrage
