Paying tribute. People covered Susan B. Anthony’s gravestone with “I Voted” stickers on Election Day, Tuesday, November 8, in honor of Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton’s bid to become the first female president.
Voters gathered at Rochester, New York’s Mount Hope Cemetery, where the late feminist activist (who died of pneumonia at age 86 in 1906) is buried, where they covered her tombstone in the stickers they received after casting their ballots. People also left notes of thanks to Anthony, who contributed to the passage of the 19th Amendment, which gave women nationwide the right to vote in 1920.
Rochester mayor Lovely Warren — the first woman elected to that position — spoke with The New York Times, explaining the importance of Anthony’s legacy and push for women’s rights and what it means for female politicians such as herself.
“I was elected 141 years to the day that Susan B. Anthony cast that illegal vote,” Warren told the outlet. “To me that means, as a woman, there are no shackles and no chains to what we can accomplish. If I could do backflips, I would be doing backflips.”
According to The New York Times, the cemetery opened early at 7:30 a.m. and was to stay open later than usual so people could pay their respects. The publication reports that the line to place an “I Voted” sticker on Anthony’s gravestone “snaked and doubled back on itself” by noon.
Many Twitter users took to the social platform to express their admiration for the historical figure and her efforts toward the women’s suffrage movement.
“Not gonna lie, seeing people who lined up to put their stickers on Susan B. Anthony’s grave is dope,” one enthused, while another shared: “Watched the livestream of Susan B. Anthony’s grave and honestly bawled.”
Despite the support, others were unimpressed with the tributes because of Anthony’s fractured — and well-documented — relationship with African Americans. As The Los Angeles Times points out, she is quoted as once saying, “I will cut off this right arm of mine before I will ever work or demand the ballot for the Negro and not the woman.”
“Susan B. Anthony advocated for white women’s rights by stating blacks shouldn’t have the right to vote before white women,” an angry Twitter user fumed, while another wrote: “I dislike history revisionists. Stop referring to Susan B. Anthony as some advocate for women’s rights when black women weren’t included.”