Maryland

Maryland’s legislature was so opposed to women’s enfranchisement that it sent members to lobby against it elsewhere.   When the 19th Amendment was ratified, however, Mary Risteau ran and won at the first opportunity; she became the first woman elected to both of Maryland’s legislative chambers.

Maryland Manual Collection, MSA SC 1198.

Mary E.W. Risteau (1890-1978)

    Born in Towson in 1890, Mary E.W. Risteau graduated from high school in 1907 and went on to study mathematics at prestigious John Hopkins University.  Although the course that she completed was termed “advanced,” she nonetheless taught at the elementary level until 1917, when she took over the family farm.

    Risteau won election to the first of four terms in the Maryland House of Delegates in 1922, the first year that it was possible for her to run.  Women’s right to vote had been secured by the US Constitution, but Maryland was akin to other states in failing to adjust laws for full equality, and one of Risteau’s first goals was a law confirming that women had the right to serve in all public offices. 

    A Democrat who lived in the town of Jarrettsville, her committee assignments included Agriculture, Education, Libraries, and the Committee on Chesapeake Bay and its Tributaries.  Her background in teaching was well utilized:  she successfully worked for the establishment of Maryland State Teachers College at Salisbury, and the governor appointed Risteau to head the State Board of Education.  This 1922 achievement was another first for Maryland, and she served in the unpaid position for sixteen years.  During this time, Risteau also was a leader in celebrating the 300th anniversary of Maryland’s 1631 founding.

    Voters promoted her to the state Senate in 1934, and Risteau thus was a senator when she attended Baltimore College of Law during 1935-38.  She rose to chair the Senate’s Agriculture and Labor Committee and was vice-chair of its Education Committee. She also served on the Senate Temperance Committee, as well as its Finance Committee and Federal Relations Committee.

    Risteau left her legislative seat in 1938, and judges of the Third Judicial Circuit appointed her as clerk for Harford County.  The following year, the governor appointed her to another executive position, Administrator of Loans.  The City of Baltimore honored her in 1943, as would the Maryland State Teachers Association in 1961.

    After more than a decade out of elective office, Risteau returned to the House of Delegates in 1951.  Continuing her work on education and agriculture, she finally won a seat on the important Ways and Means Committee.  She also continued to champion women’s causes and was a member of both the National Order of Women Legislators and its state affiliate, the Maryland Women’s Legislation Group.  Among many other organizations, she held membership in the League of Women Voters.

    A careful record keeper, she kept a Girl Scout attendance book from 1916, and her desk diaries alone fill ten volumes at the Maryland Historical Society.  After a lifetime of public service, Mary Risteau died at age 88.