Program

National Votes for Women Trail

Subject

People

Location

1050 W 500 S, Salt Lake City, UT 84104, USA

Lat/Long

40.75869, -111.92161

Grant Recipient

National Collaborative for Women's History Sites

Emma J. McVicker (1846-1916), educator and founder of the Free Kindergarten Association, which became the Neighborhood House in 1911, fought to get back Utah women’s right to vote after women in the Utah Territory were disenfranchised in 1887.

The Utah Territory had made history in 1870 when it became one of the few places in the United States where women had the right to vote. However, in 1887, Utah women lost the right to vote under the Edmunds-Tucker Anti-Polygamy Act, passed by the United States Congress. The act targeted Mormon communities that practiced polygamy in the Utah Territory, placing restrictions on the practice. It also took away voting rights from all women in the Utah Territory, affecting both Mormon and non-Mormon women.

When the Utah Territory applied for statehood in 1895, suffragists advocated that women’s right to vote be included in the new state constitution. In March of that year, McVicker, while serving on a committee of the Utah Woman Suffrage Association, worked to draft a resolution urging members of the state constitutional convention to include a women’s suffrage clause in the constitution. Thanks to the ceaseless efforts of suffragists like McVicker, when Utah achieved statehood the following year, Utah women once again had the right to vote.

McVicker continued to remain politically involved even after Utah women had achieved the right to vote. She was active in the Utah Republican Party, and in 1900, McVicker was appointed the State Superintendent of Public Instruction by Governor Heber M. Wells.

As of 2022, the Neighborhood House, founded by McVicker in 1894 as the Free Kindergarten Association, continued to serve the Salt Lake Valley of Utah, providing preschool, youth programs, and adult care for members of the community.