To mark the 100th anniversary of the 19th amendment’s ratification officially letting women exercise their right to vote, USA TODAY named Governor Janet Mills one of Maine’s “Women of the Century” in a series spotlighting women who’ve made “significant contributions” to their state and the country. In addition to highlighting many historic firsts, including becoming the state’s first female Attorney General and first female Governor, Governor Mills was praised for “immediately setting to work to expand the state’s Medicaid program,” a move that has allowed nearly 60,000 Maine people to access health coverage.

Governor Mills joined a list of Maine women with extraordinary achievements, including Frances Perkins, former U.S. Secretary of Labor and the first woman appointed to a presidential Cabinet; Margaret Chase Smith, the first woman to represent Maine in the U.S House or Senate and praised for her political courage; and Former U.S. Senator Olympia Snowe, a Republican senator known for her bipartisan efforts.

USA Today: Maine Governor Janet Mills, women's rights activists among state's most influential women

By: Katie Landeck, Jane Murphy and Eryn Dion

August 13, 2020

Key Points:

 

  • In 1917, women in Maine were on the cusp of getting the right to vote. It was all anyone could talk about. In the decades since Susan B. Anthony had galvanized women in Bangor to want more from their government, the women of Maine had founded suffrage groups, demonstrated in the streets, handed out leaflets at social gatherings, hosted debates, and started an annual suffrage day at Old Orchard Beach to get the right to vote. By 1917, they had won the support of the Maine legislature, which passed a constitutional amendment that needed only to pass a statewide vote to become law. 

 

  • It was the closest Maine’s suffragettes had ever been, but when it went out to a vote –one they couldn’t participate in – it failed. Two years later, a new opportunity came – the 19th Amendment, which promised the right to vote not just for Maine women. This time, it didn’t require a referendum. Instead, Gov. Carl E. Milliken, who was pro-suffrage, brought the legislature together for a special session, and they ratified the amendment in 1919. They were the 19th state to do so. One year later – and 100 years ago –  two-thirds of the states ratified the amendment, and American women officially had the right to vote. 

 

  • To mark this centennial, the USA TODAY Network is naming 10 American women from each of the 50 states and the District of Columbia who’ve made significant contributions to their respective state and to the country, as Women of the Century.

 

  • Gov. Janet Mills broke several barriers for women in her home state of Maine, becoming both the state’s first female attorney general and the state’s first female governor.

 

  • Her career includes many firsts for women, even at the start of her law career, when she became the state’s first female criminal prosecutor and assistant attorney general from 1976 to 1980. 

 

  • Upon her election as district attorney in 1980, she became the first female district attorney in all of New England. 

 

  • After being elected in 2018 as Maine’s first female governor, she immediately set to work expanding the state’s Medicaid program, dropping the work requirement for Maine residents to apply for Medicaid, and bringing back Martin Luther King Jr. Day events. 

 

  • She also worked to replace Columbus Day with Indigenous People’s Day as a way to acknowledge the state’s Native American communities.

 

###