[3] After being pressured by party leaders and receiving misleading telegrams from his constituents telling him his district was overwhelmingly opposed to woman suffrage, he began to side with the Antisuffragists.

[3] However, a letter from his mother asking him to vote in favor of the amendment helped to change his mind: Febb Ensminger Burn of Niota had written a long letter to her son, which he held in his coat pocket during the voting session on August 18, 1920.

The letter contained the following: Dear Son: ... Hurrah and vote for Suffrage and don’t keep them in doubt.

I’ve been watching to see how you stood but have not seen anything yet ... Don't forget to be a good boy and help Mrs. ‘Thomas Catt’ with her "Rats."

He responded to attacks on his integrity and honor by inserting a personal statement into the House Journal, explaining his decision to cast the vote in part because "I knew that a mother’s advice is always safest for a boy to follow, and my mother wanted me to vote for ratification.

"[6] As anti-suffragists had been fighting and preparing for this moment over the summer, they became very enraged when they discovered the news of Burn's decision.

Contrary to popular belief, Burn was not chased out of the capitol by an angry mob of anti-suffragists.

Burn narrowly won reelection to a second term in the house after a grueling campaign back home in McMinn County.

Burn was a member of several civic and fraternal organizations, including the National Society Sons of the American Revolution, serving as President-General for the 1964–1965 term.

Winter Wheat, a musical about the ratification of the 19th Amendment in Tennessee, premiered in 2016 after its original version had a limited run in 2014; Harry Burn, his mother Febb, and his younger brother Jack, are major characters.