It’s 1872, and America, still stumbling through the wreckage of the Civil War, is definitely not ready for Victoria Woodhull. Oh, but she didn't care. She was ready for America. Ready to shake things up. Ready to call out hypocrisy. Ready to lay claim to the Oval Office; or at least, the dusty shack it resembled back in the 19th century. She was, after all, the first woman in American history to do something so audacious, so mind-boggling, that it would take over a century for another woman to even sniff the White House in the same capacity.
Early Life: Chaos and Resilience
Victoria Woodhull, born Victoria Claflin, emerged from a childhood that can only be described as chaotic. Her family moved town-to-town peddling "miracle cures" that were little more than bottled booze. She married her first husband, Canning Woodhull, at 15 — not exactly a prize catch, considering he was a violent drunk. They had two kids. One had developmental disabilities, which Victoria blamed squarely on Canning's endless boozing. Ever the resourceful survivor, she divorced him in 1864. Let me tell you, divorcing a man back then wasn’t like posting an announcement on Instagram about a “clean break”. It came with social exile, judgment, and whispers. But Victoria had her sights set beyond her contemporaries' small-town minds. Divorce? She was just warming up.
This lady built a brokerage firm from the ground up. She and her sister Tennessee (yeah, that’s her name) marched into Wall Street, backed by none other than Cornelius Vanderbilt, the widowed millionaire they claimed to have helped "contact" his dead wife. Say what you will, but the man appreciated a good ghost story, and even better financial advice. Woodhull, Claflin & Company catered to female clients, while a bold sign in the window ordered male visitors to state their business and then beat it. Bold. Rude. And beautiful. Wall Street didn’t see it coming.
Then came the newspapers. Oh, the newspapers. She and Tennessee started Woodhull & Claflin’s Weekly using profits from their brokerage. This was no puff piece rag—these sisters were ready to tackle everything taboo. Spiritualism, free love, women’s rights, sex education, Marx; yes, Karl Marx’s Communist Manifesto saw its first English printing courtesy of Victoria’s rag. Because why not? If they were in for a penny, they were in for a pounding.
The Presidential Bid: Defying All Odds
Victoria took her spotlight and used it to launch herself straight into a presidential bid. The Equal Rights Party nominated her, with a nod to Frederick Douglass as her running mate (though Douglass clearly wanted nothing to do with the nomination. Victoria had nerve) she was 31 years old, too young even by constitutional standards, and couldn’t legally vote, but why let details get in the way of a story that’s meant to provoke?
Her platform? Equal rights, fair wages, abolition of land grants for greedy railroad companies, and, of course, free love. That phrase, "free love", got everyone’s knickers in a twist. She wasn’t about orgies on Main Street (though let’s be honest, that would’ve been entertaining). No, Victoria believed in the right to love without state interference. If you wanted out of a marriage, that should be your choice. America wasn't ready to hear that women might have desires (heaven forbid).
So while Ulysses S. Grant and Horace Greeley, her competition, bored people to death with mundane election chatter, Victoria was talking about liberation. And just as fast as she rose, she was smacked down. On Election Day 1872, where was she? In a jail cell. Charged with sending obscene material through the mail after publishing the scandalous Henry Ward Beecher affair—yeah, Beecher, the same preacher everyone loved, who was really getting freaky behind closed doors. Victoria paid the price for having an actual backbone.
The Complicated Legacy
Let’s pause and reflect on the madness of this story. America’s first female presidential candidate wasn't an heir apparent. She wasn’t rich, or particularly elegant, or anyone’s idea of a "respectable" lady. She was tough. She was strange. She was ready to break the country’s norms like they were glass ceilings under the heel of her boot. But history, that old villain, prefers its women palatable—or at least neat and easily summarized. Victoria was neither.
And here we are in November 2024 following an election where Kamala Harris was bested by Donald Trump. Victoria would have laughed, I think. She would have seen it for what it is: A reminder that history doesn’t always move in straight lines. Sometimes, it doubles back, slaps you across the face, and laughs. But she’d also have reminded us that the first steps are always ugly — that progress is full of people like her, who charge forward, make noise, and leave behind echoes for others to build on.
We don't get from Victoria Woodhull to Hillary Clinton to Kamala Harris without enduring a lot of nonsense, without realizing that the trailblazers are messy, and controversial, and flawed. They have to be. They make noise because someone needs to shout before anyone listens. Victoria did that, even if no one voted for her, even if she was jailed, ridiculed, and eventually faded to the background.
So remember her — the woman in 1872 who ran for president with the wind of scandal at her back and absolutely nothing to lose. Victoria Woodhull; a name that should never disappear into the dusty footnotes of American history, but instead stand as a bold, weird, unapologetic symbol of what it means to demand a seat at the table before anyone even thinks to set one out for you.
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