TIL: Tennessee State Representative Harry Burn was the deciding vote that led to the ratification of the 19th amendment, granting women the right to vote in the U.S. He said: “I know that a mother’s advice is always safest for her boy to follow and my mother wanted me to vote for ratification.”

This comment was posted to reddit on May 23, 2019 at 2:42 pm and was deleted within 6 minutes.

TIL: Tennessee State Representative Harry Burn was the deciding vote that led to the ratification of the 19th amendment, granting women the right to vote in the U.S. He said: “I know that a mother’s advice is always safest for her boy to follow and my mother wanted me to vote for ratification.”

This is only true when the voting is hidden, which it usually isn’t.

They all have the same amount of power, that’s correct. Imagine one of the earlier voters doesn’t think it will pass, and doesn’t think it’s a good idea, but will vote for it because he wants the support, the optics, of being in favor of the amendment.

There’s a fundamental although subtle difference between saying “well, if 49 of my colleagues support this, then it should become law” for the first voter, and “this should directly become law”

I get why this seems confusing, because from an objective standpoint they should be the same, but human psychology and the ordering of the voting really does matter.

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