The History of League of Women Voters

Since 1920, the League of Women Voters (national) have been an activist, grassroots organization whose leaders believed that voters should play a critical role in democracy. 

The League of Women Voters was founded by Carrie Chapman Catt in 1920 during the convention of the National American Woman Suffrage Association. The convention was held just six months before the 19th amendment to the U.S. Constitution was ratified, giving women the right to vote after a 72-year struggle.

The League began as a "mighty political experiment" designed to help 20 million women carry out their new responsibilities as voters. It encouraged them to use their new power to participate in shaping public policy. From the beginning, the League has been an activist, grassroots organization whose leaders believed that citizens should play a critical role in advocacy. It was then, and is now, a nonpartisan organization. League founders believed that maintaining a nonpartisan stance would protect the fledgling organization from becoming mired in the party politics of the day. However, League members were encouraged to be political themselves, by educating citizens about, and lobbying for, government and social reform legislation.
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This holds true today. The League is proud to be nonpartisan, neither supporting nor opposing candidates or political parties at any level of government, but always working on vital issues of concern to members and the public. The League has a long, rich history, that continues with each passing year.

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 Presidents of the LWV for Northern Portage County (League #OH034)

​2017-present April Secura
2010 -2017 Patricia Fitzgerald
2006-2010 DoreeneMcDonald
2004-2006 Jeanne Harkai
2000-2004 JoEllen Armstrong/Jean Hogan
1998-2000 Jean Hogan
1995-1998 JoEllen Armstrong
1993-1995 Alice Green
1991-1993 Carrol Hummel
1989-1991 Penny Showalter
1987-1989 Andrea Story/Joan Greig
1985-1987 Rozella Orosz

1983-1985 Kate Greenfield
1982-1983 Andrea Story
1981-1982 Alice McFarland
1979-1981 Linda Oster
1978-1979 Mitch Vance
1977-1978 Donna Nicholson
1975-1977 Lois Kylin
1972-1975 Phyllis Mazotta
1970-1972 Mimi Becker
1969-1970 Elizabeth Cornell
1967-1969 Mary Vine