President Trump to posthumously pardon Susan B. Anthony

The women's rights activist Susan B. Anthony - who was charged with voting illegally in the 1872 presidential election - is to be posthumously pardoned by President Donald Trump, it has been announced.

On Tuesday afternoon (August 18), Trump announced the pardon at the White House before signing a proclamation marking the 100th anniversary of the ratification of the 19th Amendment, which granted women with the right to vote.

Per NBC News, Trump said:

"Later today, I will be signing a full and complete pardon for Susan B. Anthony. She was never pardoned. Did you know that? She was never pardoned.

"She was never pardoned - for voting. She was guilty for voting. And we are going to be signing a full and complete pardon, and I think that's really fantastic."

The announcement comes on the 100th anniversary of the ratification of the 19th Amendment, which granted woman's suffrage nationwide

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Anthony was arrested in Rochester, New York, in 1872 after voting in the presidential election between Ulysses S. Grant and Horace Greeley.

When registering to vote, Anthony cited the Fourteenth Amendment to the election inspectors, which reads: "No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States."

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During the United States v. Susan B. Anthony trial, Anthony testified: "Your denial of my citizen’s right to vote is the denial of my right of consent as one of the governed […] the denial of my sacred rights to life, liberty, property."

In response to the announcement, former American politician and feminist author has taken to Twitter to slam the move.

She wrote: "Susan B. Anthony did not want to be pardoned. She was very pointed about this. Not until all women had full equality (which we still don’t have).

"She said instead she would 'urge all women to... the old revolutionary maxim that Resistance to tyranny is obedience to God.'

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Others have questioned whether or not Trump's announcement has been made as a means of appealing to female voters.

Per the House Office of the Historian, Anthony was found guilty, but never paid the $100 fine she received and never served jail time.