Deeds not Words

1
Deeds not Words

• The Fight for the Right to Vote

2
Key Words

• Democracy
• All adults have the right to take part in
  regular, fair and free elections.
• Suffrage
• The right to vote
• Franchise
• The right to vote
• Militant
• Prepared to use violence

3
Extension of the Franchise

• In the 19th Century Britain was not a democracy.
• Three great reform acts 1832, 1867 and 1884
  gradually extended the franchise to most men.
• Women were not allowed to vote at all.

4
Votes for Women

• Women were treated as second class citizens.
• Women knew they would never achieve equality with
  men unless they had the vote.

5
The Suffragists

• In 1867 MP John Stuart Mill proposed that women
  should be given the vote. This was rejected.
• Women Suffragists campaigned peacefully through
  letters and petitions hoping to persuade the
  government to change its mind.
• In 1897 all the womens suffrage societies joined
  together in the National Union of Womens
  Suffrage Societies (NUWSS) led by Millicent
  Fawcett.

6
The WSPU

• In 1903 frustrated by their lack of success,
  Emmeline Pankhurst and her daughter Christabel
  broke away from the NUWSS and formed their own
  suffrage movement the Womens Social and
  Political Union.

7
Tactics

• The main aim of the WSPU was to attract
  publicity.
• Initially women disrupted political meetings,
  held demonstrations and devised publicity stunts
  like chaining themselves to the railings at
  Downing Street.
• They did get publicity but they were often
  ridiculed.

8
The Suffragettes

• Despite their efforts the women were still no
  nearer to getting the vote.
• After 1905 more militant action was proposed even
  if it meant breaking the law.
• A number of arrests and imprisonments followed as
  the women were charged with disorderly conduct.
• The Daily Mail coined the nickname the
  Suffragettes.

9
Hunger Strikes

• In 1909 Marion Wallace Dunlop was the first
  Suffragette to go on hunger strike in prison.
• The Government were alarmed by this they decided
  to force feed the hunger strikers.
• Struggling suffragettes were held down and rubber
  tubes two feet long were pushed down their noses
  into their stomachs and liquid food forced into
  them.

10
The Cat and Mouse Act

• There was uproar in the press when news of the
  force feeding was leaked.
• The Government passed the Prisoners Temporary
  Discharge Act to allow ill suffragettes to go
  home, recover, then rearrested them in an attempt
  to prevent any actual deaths from hunger strike.
• This Suffragette poster shows what they thought
  about the government.

11
Black Friday

• In 1910 a peaceful demonstration to the House of
  Commons ended in violent action by the police
  against the demonstrators.
• This photo appeared in the press the next day
  entitled Black Friday.

12
The Wild Period

• In 1912, hundreds of women took to the streets of
  London to protest after, once again, Parliament
  refused to give women the vote.
• They smashed shop windows on Oxford street and
  even threw stones at 10 Downing Street.
• At the Derby in 1913 Emily Wilding Davison threw
  herself in front of the Kings horse and was
  killed she was the first suffragette martyr.

13
Further Violence

• January to July 1914 there were 107 incidents of
  arson
• 11 works of art were damaged including the Rokeby
  Venus
• Telegraph wires were cut.
• Acid was poured through letterboxes
• Liberal MPs including the prime minister were
  physically attacked.

14
War Breaks Out

• On the 4th August 1914 Britain declared war on
  Germany.
• Mrs Pankhurst called off the suffragette campaign
  and urged women to join the war effort.
• Women joined the VADs as nurses and took over all
  sorts of mens jobs
• Women risked their lives working in the munitions
  factories
• The womens war effort was highly praised by the
  public and the press

15
The Representation of the People Act 1918

• Soldiers who had been out in France fighting for
  their country had lost the right to vote.
• A Speakers conference was called to discuss that
  and the issue of women voting.
• The new prime minister Lloyd George and other MPs
  were more sympathetic to the idea of giving women
  the vote.
• It was decided to give women over the age of 30
  the right to vote.
• Women did not achieve voting rights to equal to
  men until 1928.

16
Did the Womens War Effort get the Vote?

• There was a great deal of praise for women
  especially women munitions workers but under the
  30 year age rule most munitions workers were left
  out.
• The government were worried that there might be
  renewed violence by the suffragettes.
• In France where there was no corresponding
  suffragette movement women did not get the vote
• However women in other democratic countries eg
  New Zealand, Australia, Finland, Denmark, Norway
  and Canada were getting the vote. How could
  Britain lag behind?

17
Did Violence help the Suffragette Cause?

• Yes
• The brutal treatment given in prison won the
  support of the public.
• The government did not want a renewal of pre war
  violence
• The violence kept the suffragette issue in the
  forefront of public attention

• No
• A lot of people were convinced that the
  suffragettes were mentally unstable.
• The government could not be seen to give way to
  violence
• Violence provided the government with an excuse
  not to give the vote.
• The violence of the suffragettes undid much of
  the good work of the peaceful suffragists.

18
Women in Parliament

• 17 women candidates stood in the 1919 election,
  only one Constance Markiewicz was elected but she
  refused her seat in the commons.
• The first woman to enter parliament was Nancy
  Astor.
• The first and only woman Prime Minister so far
  was Margaret Thatcher elected in 1979
• Currently 126 out of 646 MPs are women.