First Ladies of the United States: Margaret W. Wilson

American women did not yet possess the right to vote when Woodrow Wilson was elected to his first term in office as President of the United States on November 5, 1912. Despite the efforts of , there was little reason to hope that they would attain that right anytime soon. Although he was an intellectual and a man of high ideals, Wilson opposed women’s suffrage. It was doubly ironic, then, that during his two terms as president women would attain degrees of prominence and influence in the White House that they had never known before—and that by the Nineteenth Amendment to the Constitution, ratified on August 18, 1920, while Wilson was still president, women did indeed achieve the right to vote...

Photograph showing Margaret Wilson, head and shoulders portrait, facing left.