Women's Equality Day 2027 is on Thursday

About Women's Equality Day

The fight for women's voting rights in the United States lasted generations. A suffrage amendment was first introduced in Congress in 1878, and supporters spent the next four decades marching, petitioning, picketing and winning the vote state by state. Congress finally passed the 19th Amendment on June 4, 1919. When Tennessee became the 36th state to ratify it on August 18, 1920, the three-fourths threshold was met, and Secretary of State Bainbridge Colby certified the amendment on August 26, 1920.

Women's Equality Day commemorates that certification. Representative Bella Abzug of New York introduced House Joint Resolution 52 in January 1973, asking the president to proclaim August 26 as Women's Equality Day. It became Public Law 93-105 that August, and President Richard Nixon issued the first proclamation on August 16, 1973. Gerald Ford proclaimed the day again in 1974, and presidents have issued Women's Equality Day proclamations in the years since.

The day is also a reminder that the amendment did not open the ballot box to every woman at once. As the National Archives notes, discriminatory state voting laws kept many women, particularly African American women and other women of color, from voting long into the 20th century, and decades of further struggle followed.

Women's Equality Day is not a federal holiday. Libraries, museums, historic sites and civic groups often use it for talks, exhibits and voter registration events, and the date is a common occasion to discuss current questions such as equal pay and women's representation in public office.

Sources: National Archives: 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution: Women's Right to Vote (1920), Congress.gov: H.J.Res.52 (93rd Congress), Women's Equality Day, American Presidency Project: Nixon, Proclamation 4236, Women's Equality Day, 1973, Federal Register: Women's Equality Day, 2024. How we check dates.

How to mark Women's Equality Day

• Register to vote or check your registration, and help a friend or relative do the same.
• Read the text of the 19th Amendment and look at the original document in the National Archives' online catalog.
• Learn about a suffragist beyond the best-known names, such as Ida B. Wells, Mary Church Terrell or Zitkála-Šá, and share what you find.
• Visit a historic site connected to the women's rights movement, such as Women's Rights National Historical Park in Seneca Falls, New York.
• Attend a local talk, exhibit or candidate forum hosted by a library, museum or civic group.

Women's Equality Day dates