After casting their ballots in the midterm elections on Tuesday, women flocked to Susan B. Anthony’s grave in Rochester, New York, to show their gratitude for her service to the women’s suffrage movement.
The proud female voters placed their “I Voted” stickers on Anthony’s headstone in a practice that has become something of an Election Day tradition. Dozens of the stickers adorned her gravestone after the 2016 presidential election.
Anthony helped propel the women’s voting rights movement forward in 1872, when she was arrested for illegally voting on Election Day. Nearly 50 years later, the states ratified the 19th Amendment granting women the right to vote nationwide.
“There never will be complete equality until women themselves help to make laws and elect lawmakers,” Anthony famously said.
She likely would have been thrilled to know that women are running for elected office in record numbers in 2018 and that women voters will be a major factor in Tuesday’s midterm elections.
Despite the ratification of the 19th Amendment, many women of color were still barred from voting in some states until the Voting Rights Act was passed in 1965.
Some Twitter users posted emotional tributes to Anthony, while others called out her commitment to white women’s voting rights over the rights of people of color.
“Thank you, #SusanBAnthony,” one woman tweeted. “I cannot even imagine a world in which I would not have the right to vote. Your legacy ― women voting, running for office, and more!”
Another woman wrote, “I know we’re all feeling great about voting & thanking our girl Susan B Anthony for getting us here but remember that she was great & all but she was a racist and only lobbied for white women to get the privilege to vote, not [women of color].”
This story has been updated with additional details about Anthony and voting rights.