“She’s so important. Without Susan B. Anthony, we would not have the right to vote today as women, and that’s so important considering we make up over half of the United States. And I think women around the world wouldn’t have the right to vote which is again, so important. And you think about all the amazing contributions that women over the last century have made, and have been able to make because of her. So really, her impact is completely enormous and unfounded I think”, says Summer Perritt, a student at Mercer University.

Susan B. Anthony was born on February 15th 1820, 199 years ago. Anthony was a women’s rights activists fighting for suffrage in the 1800s, but the struggle for gender equality continues. I talked to history major Summer Perritt about Anthony’s contribution to American politics and how modern women’s rights have been shaped by her influence.

“She’s really considered, by some people, the grandmother of the feminist movement, if you will. I know that she really campaigned for women’s suffrage and developed several women’s organizations for that right to vote. She used a test case as a means to try to fight for women’s suffrage. So she attempted to go vote and was arrested for it and it got brought to a higher court of appeals, I believe. It never went to the Supreme Court, as far as I know, but she did try to get it to go there. She tried to fight for women’s suffrage.Despite the fact that women obviously do have the right to vote, and have had the right to vote for some time now, we obviously are not equal in my opinion. I’m a really big feminist so this is a really big deal to me, to fight for equality,” says Perritt. “There are still so many ways and so many institutionalized areas that women are disadvantaged, unfairly. I think that that is something that Susan B. Anthony fought for in her time and would fight for if she were alive her today. So I think it’s important that we recognize that, and that we recognize the female leaders who have really paved the way for women today to be able to fight for their rights. I would definitely say that I celebrate her and pay homage to her every time I go out to vote. And more than that, because obviously voting doesn’t happen every day, more than that I like to think that I pay homage to her every time that I speak my voice and that I say my opinion and that I make sure it’s heard. That’s definitely something that she fought for and I think she would fight for today as well.”

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