In 1806, Virginia's General Assembly passed a law that required enslaved people who had been freed after that date to leave the state within one year's time. Those who remained in the Commonwealth more than a year could be re-enslaved and sold. Often, however, the law did not always operate to full effect. Some people petitioned the General Assembly to remain in Virginia, some received permission from the local court where they lived, and sometimes the local community simply looked the other way.
Clara Robinson was 60 years old when she petitioned the General Assembly in 1848. She asked to remain in Richmond after she was emancipated by Elizabeth Gibson. Clara Robinson was an established and successful midwife, who had been trained to assist women in childbirth. Richmond lawyer James A. Seddon and several prominent white physicians who had relied on her services signed a statement supporting her request. The House of Delegates referred the petition to the committee on the Courts of Justice, which recommended approving her petition. The bill allowing her to remain failed in the state senate, but it was introduced again in the next session and was approved in March 1850. There is no further information about Clara Robinson afterwards.
Petitions to the General Assembly were the primary catalyst for legislation in the Commonwealth from 1776 until 1865. Public improvements, military claims, divorce, manumission of slaves, division of counties, incorporation of towns, religious freedom, and taxation were just some of the concerns expressed in these petitions. Learn more about legislative petitions and search for other examples here.
Learn more about petitions to remain in The UncommonWealth blog.
Between 1877 and the mid-1960s, authorities enforced racial segregation throughout Virginia. In 1902, the Virginia State Constitution, authorized by the Virginia General Assembly, instituted a poll tax in which all Black and persons of color would have to pay as prerequisite to being able to vote. Virginia was among the last five states to remove the poll tax. However, after the 24th Amendment to the US Constitution was passed in 1964, Virginia still allowed for the collection of poll taxes and literacy tests prior to being able to vote in a federal election. In this era, the state also mandated segregation in schools.
Virginia's poll taxes remained in effect until the 1960s and ended, in part, due to the efforts of Evelyn Thomas Butts a 41 year old Black community activist, mother of three and grandmother who was married to a disabled veteran and worked as a seamstress. In November 1963, Evelyn Thomas Butts and her attorney Joseph A. Jordan Jr. filed the first suit in a federal court seeking to have the poll tax declared unconstitutional. She argued that the poll tax put an unfair financial burden on citizens in the exercise of their constitutional rights of citizenship, which violated the Fourteenth Amendment's Equal Protection Clause. In March 1964, Annie E. Harper and a group of people from Fairfax County filed another federal suit against the poll tax. The two cases were later combined. On March 24, 1966, the United States Supreme Court ruled in the combined cases called Harper v. Virginia State Board of Elections that the use of a poll tax in all elections was a violation of the U.S. Constitution. The decision ended the use of the poll tax in Virginia and a provision of the Virginia Constitution was added 1971 which explicitly prohibits requiring payment of a poll tax as a prerequisite to be able to vote.
Read the full transcript.
Citation: Evelyn Butts Challenged the Poll Tax, 1966.
Virginian-Pilot (Norfolk) 25 March 1966. Library of Virginia.
Preview Activity
Using Context Clues: Quickly look through the article, what word or phrases stand out to you? List five. What do those words or phrases tell you about the subject of the document?
Post Activities
Current Connections: What challenges and changes are being made today that may impact voting rights?
Social Media Spin: If reporters had been on social media in 1966, how might this article and issue have been presented? Create a social media post reflecting how you would have presented it at that time.
Virginia Validation: Why do you think it took a legal case that reached the Supreme Court to change the law requiring a poll tax? How did the changes to the state law reflect the Supreme Court decision and the US Constitution?
Preview Activity
Scan and Look: Scan the information in the transcribed broadside, if you were interested in joining a women’s organization in 1804, what words or phrases would appeal to you? Why?
Post activities
Analyze: What was the goal of the Female Charitable Society of Portsmouth, Virginia and who was it intended to help? Who was excluded?
Take a stand: Josiah Fox took a risk in allowing women the to meet at his home. If you were in his position, what arguments would you make to defend your choice? How might being a Quaker be used to justify the choice?
Another Perspective: Why might some people be opposed to women organizing associations or philanthropic groups? How might they perceive women taking on roles outside of the home?
Art Connection: The broadside sets forth the rules for the organization but does not include an image. Create a broadside poster which depicts the work of the Female Charitable Society of Portsmouth, Virginia that could be used to increase interest and membership.
World War I brought about great shifts in American society. As the war began, women were not allowed to vote or serve in military combat roles. As the nation was gripped by war, the entire population was mobilized to produce weapons and supplies for the troops. The outbreak of war sent many men off to fight overseas which opened opportunities for women to enter the workforce.
Women who were able to work outside of their homes contributed to the war efforts and gained a sense of independence. They also saw a pathway to having greater rights. Women filled traditional men’s roles in agriculture and manufacturing positions. Other women provided support for the war effort in the front lines as nurses, ambulance drivers, translators, and in a few cases on the battlefield. Black women also found opportunities to improve their lives as they were able to leave domestic positions for jobs in offices and factories. It was the first major shift in the workforce in which all women were able to move beyond the boundaries of the traditional roles of caretakers and homemakers.
Some women chose to remain at home, but they also found ways to support the war effort. Housewives were asked to pledge that they would follow instructions from the food administrator to can food for future use, grow gardens to provide their families with fresh vegetables, limit their eating of meat, wheat, and fats in an effort to reduce demand on food manufacturing plants which might need to be converted to make supplies needed for troops fighting overseas. Regardless of their roles during the war, women were expected to provide positive morale for their families and those fighting on the battlefield. Posters like the one here encouraged all Americans, but especially women to support the national war effort.
Citation: For Every Fighter a Woman Worker, World War I Poster, 1918, Prints & Photographs, Special Collections, Library of Virginia.
Preview Activity
Take a Look: Take a look at the poster, what do you notice about the image? What does the image tell you about what is happening at that point in time?
Post Activities
Take a Stand: You are woman who wants to take advantage of the opportunity to work outside of the home during WWl. What arguments would you make for why you should be afforded the right to work?
Social Media Spin: Create a social media post, tweet, or short video in which you depict the changing roles of women during WWI. Include a brief explanation of how it relates to the original image.
Artistic Exploration: Create your own campaign poster to support the war effort during World War I. Be ready to explain to your classmates what message you are conveying and your intended audience.
During World War II booklets were published to assist homemakers, who were mostly women at that time, provide for their families and meet the requirements of the wartime ration system created after the U.S. entered the war in December 1941. President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s executive order 8875 established the Office of Price Administration (OPA) on August 28, 1942. The OPA regulated the prices of most goods and limited the amount available for purchase across the country.
Goods such as gasoline, tires, coal, sugar, coffee, meat, dairy, silk, and shoes were rationed as they were needed for the war effort and because trade was disrupted by the war, making some items less available. The government allotted “points” to each person, including infants, in the form of stamps that could be used along with money to purchase rationed items. By the end of 1945, sugar was the only remaining product still rationed. The wartime rationing program ended in June 1947 as products became more readily available.
Many companies, like the Kelvinator Appliance Company, printed materials to help homemakers make the most of what was available within the wartime ration point system. As this image depicts, meat was in short supply and rabbit could be used as a substitute in a variety of recipes. Other suggestions in these publications might offer tips on stretching sugar rations, including substituting corn syrup or honey, and how to make one-crust pies rather than two-crust pies. Publications like those put out by Kelvinator would have been available in Virginia and homemakers across the state could have used them to find solutions to provide for their families.
Citation: A suggested means of saving ration points—using rabbit for the meat dish. From a “Helps for Homemakers” booklet produced by Kelvinator ca. 1943–1945. Jessee Family Papers, Accession 50402, Library of Virginia.
Preview Activity
Take a Look: Look at the image. What stands out to you? What do you think the image represents?
Post Activities
Current Connections: During the coronavirus pandemic many household items such as cleaning products and toilet paper were in short supply. What are some ways people saved resources while providing necessary items for themselves or their families?
Up for Debate: How do you think women of today's generation would feel about a booklet such as this one? Would it be considered helpful? Insulting? Prepare an opening argument in which you state your position and be prepared to share it with the class or in small groups.
Art Exploration: Design a similar handbook page that might be used today if a rationing system were to become needed. Select a food product to be used as the basis for your design.
In 1919, at the National American Woman Suffrage Association’s (NAWSA) convention, President Carrie Chapman Catt proposed in her address the creation of a “league of women voters to finish the fight and aid in the reconstruction of the nation.” In 1920, just six months prior to the ratification of the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, the National League of Women Voters (NLWV) was established in Chicago. Catt described its purpose: “The League of Women Voters is not to dissolve any present organization but to unite all existing organizations of women who believe in its principles. It is not to lure women from partisanship but to combine them in an effort for legislation which will protect coming movements, which we cannot even foretell, from suffering the untoward conditions which have hindered for so long the coming of equal suffrage. Are the women of the United States big enough to see their opportunity?” The Virginia League of Women Voters was part of the national organization and worked within the state to support the suffrage movement, advance legislative goals, and provide citizen education for all those who had the right to vote.
The League of Women Voters in Virginia is still an active organization which promotes active participation in government, educating the public on policy issues, and advocating for voter empowerment.
Citation: League of Women Voters. 1920. Erie: Erie Litho & Ptg Co. Poster. Equal Suffrage League of Virginia Papers, Acc. 22002. Library of Virginia
Preview Activity
Look at It: Look at the poster; who might have the target audience? What do you think is the message being sent to the audience? Why do you think this image was chosen to represent the message?
Post Activities
Form an Opinion: In your opinion, to what extent is this poster effective in its advocacy for voting? Would it be effective for a modern audience? Provide details and examples using your knowledge of this period in American history.
Social Media Spin: Create a post, tweet, or short video for a modern audience in which you encourage women and others to vote. Be sure to include relevant information about the importance of voting from a historical and modern perspective.
Maggie Lena Walker was an African American woman who became a banker, business leader, and social reformer. She was the first woman to establish and become the president of a bank in the United States. Walker was born in 1864 in Richmond, Virginia. Maggie’s mother, Elizabeth Draper, was a former enslaved person who worked as an assistant cook for Elizabeth Van Lew, a wealthy white woman, abolitionist, and spy for the Union during the Civil War. While at the Van Lew estate, Draper met an Irish American abolitionist writer, Eccles Cuthbert, who was Maggie’s biological father. Draper later married William Mitchell, a butler at the Van Lew estate. The two had a son together in 1870, Maggie’s half-brother, Johnnie. Maggie went to school in Richmond at the Lancaster School and later graduated from the "Richmond Colored Normal School" in 1883. Following graduation, she returned to the Lancaster School as a trained teacher and taught for three years until she married Armstead Walker Jr. in 1886. Due to a school policy, as was standard for the time, Maggie Walker retired from teaching once she was married.
In 1881, Walker joined the Independent Order of Saint Luke, a fraternal organization which identified and provided for the needs of African Americans. After she left the Lancaster School, she rose through the ranks of the organization while using her position to encourage young Black students to continue their education and serve the community. When she became president of the organization, it was debt-ridden and on the verge of bankruptcy, but Walker transformed it to a well-resourced entity, and within five years the Saint Luke Penny Savings Bank opened for business after a successful letter writing campaign for donations and working as a community to furnish the building.
After the economic downturn during the Great Depression, Walker and the other bank leaders were forced to merge with two other banks to become Consolidated Bank and Trust. In her later years, Walker was faced with health issues that confined her to a wheelchair. Walker remained president of her bank until December 15, 1934 when she died from diabetic gangrene. Today Maggie Walker's former home at 110 ½ East Leigh Street is a National Historic Landmark (designated in 1979) and is maintained by the National Park Service.
Citation: Walker, Maggie L. Read every word carefully: act at once. Richmond, Va., 192-. Broadside 192- .W3 BOX, Special Collections, Library of Virginia.
Preview Activity
Scan It: Scan the letter. Identify and list any word which stand out to you and explain what you think they may indicated about the subject of the letter.
Post Activities
Analyze: Re-read Maggie Walker's letter asking for donations to the Saint Luke Furniture Fund. What is the tone of the letter? What language does Walker use to make her appeal direct and powerful?
Art Exploration: Create an advertising poster for the Saint Luke Penny Savings Bank that would encourage members of Maggie's community to save and invest in her banking venture.
Maggie Lena Walker was an African American woman, a banker, a business leader, and a civic leader. In 1903, she was the first woman to establish a bank in the United States, the Saint Luke Penny Savings Bank in Richmond. She was also the first African American woman to become the president of a bank in the United States. Maggie Walker was born in 1864 in Richmond, Virginia.
Maggie’s mother, Elizabeth Draper, was a former enslaved person who worked as an assistant cook for Elizabeth Van Lew, a wealthy white woman who freed some of her family's enslaved laborers and who ran a Union spy network around Richmond during the Civil War. While at the Van Lew estate, Draper met an Irish American abolitionist writer named Eccles Cuthbert, who was Maggie’s biological father. There is no record suggesting that Cuthbert and Draper ever married. Draper later married William Mitchell, a butler at the Van Lew home. Together they had a son in 1870, Maggie’s half-brother Johnnie Mitchell. In February 1876, William Mitchell’s body was found drowned in the James River under suspicious circumstances. After his death, the family fell into poverty and Draper started a laundry business to support her family. In 1904, Maggie described how she felt about working in her mother’s business and witnessing the differences between socio-economic classes. She said “I was not born with a silver spoon in my mouth, but with a laundry basket practically on my head.”
Maggie went to school in Richmond at the Lancasterian School, a newly created public school for African American children in Richmond. She later graduated from the "Richmond Colored Normal School" in 1883 after she completed training to become a teacher. Following graduation she taught school for three years until she married Armstead Walker Jr., in 1886. Due to a school policy, as was standard for the time, Maggie retired from teaching once she was married.
In 1881, Walker joined the Independent Order of Saint Luke, a fraternal association. She rose through the ranks of the organization and became Right Worthy Grand Secretary in 1899. When she became its leader, the order was debt-ridden and on the verge of bankruptcy, but Walker transformed it to a well-resourced entity, and within five years the Saint Luke Penny Savings Bank opened for business. She used her position to encourage young Black students to continue their education and serve the community.
During the Great Depression, Walker's bank was survived the national wave of bank failures and merged with two other banks to become Consolidated Bank and Trust. In the later years of her life, Walker faced health issues that confined her to a wheelchair. Walker remained president of her bank until December 15, 1934, when she died from diabetic gangrene. Today Maggie Walker's former home at 110 ½ East Leigh Street is a National Historic Landmark (designated in 1979) and is maintained by the National Park Service. In her honor, a statue and plaza were also placed on Richmond's Broad Street.
Citation: Maggie Walker Photographic Potrait, Visual Studies Collection, Library of Virginia.
Preview Activities
Artistic Exploration: Examine the photograph of Maggie Lena Walker as well as the legend at the bottom of the image. From your perspective, what can you conclude about Walker from her posture, dress, and facial expression? What also does the legend at the bottom of her photograph imply?
Think About it: The year of the photograph was 1898, list 5 things you know about that period in American History. These items may reflect events prior to or after 1898. Think about the role of women and how the African American community in a city like Richmond, might be different from today.
Post Activities
Analyze: Maggie Walker achieved a level of success that was considered to be unusual for an African- American woman of her period. What events stand out to you as being most relevant to who she would become? Why? Write a paragraph explaining your thought process.
Be the Journalist: Imagine you could meet Maggie Walker now and interview her. What would you ask her? Why
After the Battle of Great Bridge on December 9, 1775, Lord Dunmore and his fleet abandoned the city of Norfolk. Patriot soldiers from North Carolina and Virginia took control of the city. They refused to provide food and supplies to the British fleet. Patriot sharpshooters were used to prevent British ships from approaching Norfolk. On January 1, 1776, British naval vessels in the Elizabeth River fired shots into the city, which the Americans let burn to prevent the British from retaking Norfolk and possibly reestablishing it as a naval base.
Some residents escaped to safer locations before the attack. The resulting destruction of homes in the region left many families homeless or in need of shelter. At the time, there were no social services programs or organizations to assist families in need. While some families could take refuge in the homes of others and the wealthier families could escape to their plantations or country homes in other areas, others were not as fortunate. Many families had no choice but to remain in Norfolk during and following the siege.
Such was the case of Mary Webley, a Norfolk woman with three young children and a husband who had lost an arm in an accident years before the attack on Norfolk. As her husband could not easily find work, the family struggled financially. Mary was nursing her youngest child during the attack and her leg was broken when a cannon ball was shot into her home. Mary Webley's family lost their home, as many did that day,
In October 1776, under the newly formed state legislature, Mary Webley petitioned for and received the sum of £10 (possibly worth about $2,000 in the 21st century) as a one-time compensation. It was unusual for a woman to make this request, as women were not considered to be the head of the family, but Mary Webley made every effort to ensure that her family had a chance to recover from their losses. There are no known records available that provide information about what happened to the Webley family.
The right to petition the legislature played a vital role in Virginia politics from the American Revolution to the Civil War. It was not restricted by class, race, or sex, which meant that even Virginians who couldn't vote could address the General Assembly on a wide variety of issues such as repairing turnpikes, filing claims for public assistance, asking for a divorce, or requesting freedom for an enslaved person, among many other concerns.
Citation: Petition of Mary Webley, City of Norfolk, 1776, Legislative Petitions Digital Collections, Library of Virginia.
VS.1, VS.9, USII.1, USII.4, VUS.1, VUS.8
Preview Activity
Scan it: Scan the document and the transcription. What happened to Mary Webley that led her to petition for support from the state legislature?
Post Activities
Analyze: The events in Norfolk occurred less than a month after the Battle of Great Bridge. How were these two events related? Why might have the decision to let Norfolk burn been considered controversial at the time?
Be the Journalist: You are a reporter working on a historical account of the events of January 1, 1776, in Norfolk with emphasis on telling Mary Webley’s story. Write a short narrative description of the events of the day and how it impacted the lives of those who remined in Norfolk and witnessed the destruction.
Social Media Spin: Create a post for social media commemorating the events in which you provide a brief historical account of the event.