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Getting Married
Marriage and divorce are both common experiences. In Western cultures, more than 90 percent of people marry by age 50. Healthy marriages are good for the couples’ mental and physical health. They are also good for children. Children benefit from growing within a legal marriage because a happy home protects children from mental, physical, educational and social problems. However, about 40 to 50 percent of married couples in the United States get divorced. The divorce rate for subsequent marriages is even higher. Today we are going to explore why some people choose never to get married.
Women’s rights activist Susan B. Anthony never wanted to get married or have children. She devoted her life to winning voting rights for women. Since she did not have children, Anthony was able to pick up and travel in order to speak or campaign for women’s suffrage (the right to vote) without having to deal with caring for a family of her own.
Susan B. Anthony co-author with Elizabeth Cady Stanton one of the most important documents in civil rights history: The Declaration of Sentiments and Resolutions.
Elizabeth was her best friend even when she had seven children. Their lifestyles were different, but together they created and published a newspaper for women called the Revolution and also founded the National Woman Suffrage Association.
Susan B. Anthony, along with four other women, entered a voter registration office in 1872 demanding that they be allowed to vote in the presidential election. When the officials denied them, Anthony threatened to get her lawyer and sue them all, so they allowed the women to vote. In 1979, Anthony was the first real-life woman to be represented on American money. The only other woman on American money before that was Lady Liberty, who is a fictional character.
In the late 1800 and early 1900s women were very much dependent on their husbands. Susan B. Anthony's efforts, combined with those of other activists, led to women earning the right to vote, to ride bicycles, to own land and property, and eventually to do things like drive their own cars and open their own bank accounts.
Susan B. Anthony is known for many things, including the battle cry, “Failure is impossible.” She said these famous words during the last suffrage speech she ever gave, one month before her death, at 86 years old. The motto became the rallying cry of suffragettes for years until the right to vote was finally won.