At this point Burns was completely exhausted and quoted as saying "I don't want to do anything more. I think we have done all this for women, and we have sacrificed everything we possessed for them, and now let them fight for it now. I am not going to fight anymore." All of her time spent in jail and experiences as a suffragist had left her bitter towards married women and others who didn't take action during the suffrage movement. After the women of the United States gained the right to vote, Burns retired from political life and devoted herself to the Catholic Church and her orphaned niece. She died on December 22, 1966 in Brooklyn, New York.