Senator Samuel Young of Pocahontas County Was For Women Voting

 

 In 1867 and again in 1869, West Virginia State Senator Samuel Young of Pocahontas County introduced resolutions supporting suffrage for women. In his 1869 resolution, Young proposed

“That we respectfully recommend that while the Constitution of the United States is being amended, extending the right of suffrage to all men over twenty-one years of age [giving African American men the right to vote], that the same right be granted, at least, to all women over twenty-one years of age, who can read the ‘Declaration of Independence’ intelligibly, write a legible hand and have actually paid tax the year previous to their proposing to vote.”

The resolution was defeated by a vote of 8 to 12 on February 9.