The Movements for Womens Suffrage 18501928

1
The Movements for Womens Suffrage 1850-1928
2
Economic and Social Progress 1850-1900

• Between 1850-1900 women did make progress and
  acquire greater rights in a number of areas.
• However this progress was limited and women knew
  that without the vote they would never gain
  equality with men.

3
Employment/Trade Unions

• New technology e.g. typewriter and telephone
  opened up office work for women. This offered a
  better quality of life than factory work.
• Women continued to be paid less than men and face
  a marriage bar in many occupations.
• The number of women in trade unions increased.
  Successful strikes such as the Match Girls
  Strike in 1889 helped women to achieve better pay
  and conditions.

4
Marriage and Family Life

• Changes in the law improved womens rights with
  regards to access to children after divorce and
  it gave them a measure of financial independence
  during marriage and after divorce.
• However the laws concerning divorce continued to
  favour men and socially being divorced was
  scandalous and unacceptable in Victorian society.

5
Education

• Middle and upper class women did not receive an
  academic education they were educated to be
  good wives and mothers.
• First academic schools were set up in the 1850s
  by feminists.
• Then in the 1870s womens colleges were founded
  at Oxford and Cambridge.
• By 1900 a small but increasing number of women
  were going into male-dominated professions e.g.
  teaching, law, medicine.
• These changes had little effect on working class
  women.

6
To What Extent Did The Suffragists Help To Win
the Vote For Women?

• For
• They had a realistic strategy of targeting the
  very people who could give them the vote MPs.
• They did win over a number of MPs e.g the first
  Conciliation Bill showed there was support among
  MPs.
• Their peaceful tactics proved women were
  intelligent and rational

7
To What Extent Did The Suffragists Help To Win
the Vote For Women?

• Against
• They made tactical errors. They argued unmarried
  heads of households should get the vote.
• Politicians were more interested in giving
  married women the vote they would be influenced
  by their husbands when it came to voting.
• They were essentially a middle class organisation
  and were not a mass movement.
• They failed to form an alliance with the Labour
  Movement.

8
To What Extent Did The Suffragettes Help To Win
the Vote For Women?

• For
• Their militant campaign gained support and
  publicity for their cause e.g the first
  Conciliation Bill showed there was support among
  MPs.
• The issue of votes for women was firmly on the
  political agenda.

9
To What Extent Did The Suffragettes Help To Win
the Vote For Women?

• Against
• Their militant campaign scared off potential
  supporters and failed to scare the government.
• Other issues grabbed the headlines and the
  governments attention e.g. civil war in Ireland.
• Organised attacks on economic targets such as
  railways, docks and factories would have been
  much more disruptive and put real pressure on the
  government.

10
To What Extent Did The Suffragettes Help To Win
the Vote For Women?

• Against
• The failed to form an alliance with the Labour
  movement (trade unions and the Labour Party).
• A number of working class men did not have the
  vote but belonged to trade unions.
• Both groups could have worked together to achieve
  universal suffrage for men and women.
• Trade unions could have used the threat of
  strikes to force the government into action and
  Labour MPs in Parliament could have pushed the
  issue.

11
From War To Equal Voting Rights

• Aims
• To identify how the First World War contributed
  to women gaining the vote.
• To identify the different opinions of historians
  about this issue.

12
Historians Views

• The traditional view of historians is that women
  undertook a range of mens jobs during the war.
  This helped prove their worth and secured them
  the right to vote.
• Recent research has disputed this. Some
  historians argue womens contribution to the war
  effort is not as significant as we once thought
  and that the war actually delayed votes for women.

13
To What Extent Did the First World War Help To
Win Votes For Women?

• For
• Women proved their worth during the war. They
  took over mens jobs in a range of areas and
  proved their economic worth.
• This gave them a higher profile and greater
  credibility and changed attitudes towards women.
• The coalition government contained MPs
  including Labour MPs more sympathetic to votes
  for women

14
To What Extent Did the First World War Help To
Win Votes For Women?

• Against
• The war removed the issue from the
• political agenda. Both the Suffragists and
• Suffragettes threw their energies into the
• war effort.
• Meetings took place just before the war
• between the government and members of
• both groups. The war delayed votes for
• women.

15
To What Extent Did the First World War Help To
Win Votes For Women?

• Against
• For the first couple of years during the war
  there was not a dramatic increase in the number
  of women in the workplace.
• By the end of the war 83 of women were doing
  work in factories which had previously been
  regarded as womens work.
• The 1918 Representation of the People Act was
  more concerned with giving the rest of the male
  population the vote. If winning the vote was a
  reward for their war efforts why did this act
  exclude many young, single women?