Why Women Did Not Gain the Vote in 1914
In 1914 women could work as highly respected members of society. They
could be teachers, moulding the minds of future generations, doctors
or nurses caring for the sick and injured and of course mothers
possibly the most important role in society. Yet, they had no say in
how the world around them was run. This essay will explain why women
were blocked from the right to vote, why their say was disregarded,
and why they were seen as inferior, in early 20th centaury society.
Firstly, this male dominated society viewed women as weak, overly
emotional and under educated. The common women, the working class,
were not considered to be intellectual enough to vote in the
elections. They tended to miss school when they were younger to help
out at home with the laundry, sewing, cooking and looking after
siblings. This reflects how the males viewed their position in later
life, they should apparently only be thinking about the days chores,
not who would be the next leader of their country. It was societies
belief that the women's place was to support the man, and that women
should not try and become as important as him in society.
On the other hand the upper class women was educated, just not on the
right subject matter. Women with more riches and property were mainly
educated in etiquette, and all they seemed to want out of life was to
get married and have children. This of course meant that they didn’t
think about the policies for the country very much, and were more
concerned with chocolate, puppies, babies, hats, letters and dresses,
or so the men thought. Proof that the women of the middle classes
really were concerned with politics came with the suffragette and
suffragist movements.
Although these two campaign groups are much heard about, they did a
lot more harm for the cause than good, making men believe that women
were reckless creatures that needed to be controlled, rather than the
human beings that they were.
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Show MoreWomen were trying to get the vote for many years before 1900, however this was not a serious concern and they were not doing much to achieve this. However in 1900 this all changed. The NUWSS (Suffragists) and the WSPU (Suffragettes) were set up in the early years of 1900; their goal was to allow women to get the vote. Their reason was that women were already allowed to work on city councils and become doctors, some notable ones too such as Florence Nightingale. The NUWSS believed that if women were house owners and had respectable jobs they should be allowed to vote. This is because men who were allowed to vote could be white slave owners and lunatics so why could these men vote and women could not? Notably however Queen Elizabeth herself proclaimed that women should not get muddled up with the world of politics.
Women, like black slaves, were treated unequally from the male before the nineteenth century. The role of the women played the part of their description, physically and emotionally weak, which during this time period all women did was took care of their household and husband, and followed their orders. Women were classified as the “weaker sex” or below the standards of men in the early part of the century. Soon after the decades unfolded, women gradually surfaced to breathe the air of freedom and self determination, when they were given specific freedoms such as the opportunity for an education, their voting rights, ownership of property, and being employed.
Women’s role in society changed quite a bit during WWI and throughout the 1920s. During the 1910s women were very short or liberty and equality, life was like an endless rulebook. Women were expected to behave modestly and wear long dresses. Long hair was obligatory, however it always had to be up. It was unacceptable for them to smoke and they were expected to always be accompanied by an older woman or a married woman when outing. Women were usually employed with jobs that were usually associated with their genders, such as servants, seamstresses, secretaries and nursing. However during the war, women started becoming employed in different types of jobs such as factory work, replacing the men who had gone to fight in the war in Europe. In the late 1910s The National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) had been fighting for decades to get the vote for women. As women had contributed so much to the war effort, it was difficult to refuse their demands for political equality. As a result, the Nineteenth Amendment to the constitution became law in 19...
The opposition to women's suffrage in the early 20th century stems from a deep rooted social phenomenon in england that took hold in the 19th century. The victorian era gave rise to the system of gender roles and relations that sought to separate the sexes on all fronts of society. This sex class system, also known as the separate sphere ideology, developed from the changing economic scheme, the opinions of great victorian philosophers, and a revival of religious integrity. The separate sphere ideology very popular amongst english society and developed a level of indisputable credibility when publically defended by an emergence of pseudo science discoveries on a woman's capacities. The separate sphere mentality would define the clear roles, duties and responsibilities of men and women in a rigid unforgiving manner. It would shape the english morality, freezing women out of public life and into the cult of domesticity. This perceived gender role and relation system would become the single greatest platform for campaigning anti-suffragists, who lead poplar ‘antis’ movements . The key ‘antis’ arguments discussed developed from a separate sphere ideology outlook, and are as following; biological differences could not allow equal voting rights, changing the gender system would negatively alter woman's life, and women can not physically, socially or mentality navigate the world of politics.
By 1913, the suffragette movement had exceeded a decade. The growing desperation of the suffragettes is clear in their calls for the aid of working men, echoing Emmeline Pankhurst’s “Freedom or Death” speech in November 1913. This appears as a change of heart in the operation of the WSPU, which had decreed to exclude men from their organisation and broken with the Labour Party in the previous year.
been able to vote at the legal age men were. At least they had drawn
to vote the same way as their husbands did, or used to if they had
Due to the a sentence of working men's, women were suggested to do men’s work, such as making clothes for oversea men, filling bullets and shell bombs with materials, and many more occupations and works that were once the ‘privilege’ only to men. After WWI ended, women were forced to leave their occupation and return back to their life as typical ‘house maids’. This did not only cause the women’s anger and rebellion due to the fact that their jobs were taken away from them, but it also planted seeds deeply within women’s hearts of the consciousness of gender inequality. Before women in Canada had ever taken on jobs before, their lives were all about pleasing their men and baring, caring for their children. Women did not have a life of their own before the famous The Person’s case, led by Emily Murphy, Irene Marryat Parlby, Nellie Mooney McClung, Louise Crummy McKinney and Henrietta Muir Edward; however , that is to say after the women in the prairies had granted votes for them. To resume, the newly funded experience for the women due to their new jobs had sparked the courage and anger in them. This can also explain the year of women first received their rights to vote in 1916, barely two years after the outbreak of WWI. While women’s men were away fighting during WWI, votes were given to women during conscription so that the wives could vote in place of their husband.
"Leeds Express: 4 March 1868 I wonder, Mr Editor, Why I can't have the vote; And I will not be contented Till I've found the reason out I am a working woman, My voting half is dead, I hold a house, and want to know Why I can't vote instead I pay my rates in person, Under protest tho, it's true; But I pay them, and I'm qualified To vote as well as you. " Sarah Ann Jackson The purpose of this investigation is to analyse the issues surrounding the eventual enfranchisement of women in 1918, to draw conclusions about the effectiveness of the militant Suffragette campaign in the early years of the twentieth century and to decide whether the outbreak of war was instrumental in achieving enfranchisement, or merely a fortunate coincidence. The poem written by Sarah Ann Jackson underlines the fact that many middle class women had, throughout the reign of Queen Victoria, taken issue with men's dominance over their lives and had worked hard throughout these years to draw attention to women's right to equality. For these women, enfranchisement was not their sole aim.
Before 1920 women did not have the right to vote. They were known as “second class citizens”. Women were to stay home to help and organize the family’s necessities. Having any other higher power was said to be way out of their limitations. Mainly because women weren’t fully exposed to the happenings outside of the home, which led to the male figure believing that it was impossible for women to vote if they didn’t know the facts. Men thought that if women were able to vote that they would reach a power, that they could not take away and they didn’t want that. Men wanted to be head of the household and everything else in between.
During the reconstruction of the South many people had opposing views on black rights. The south predominantly thought blacks were inferior, but the North was more accepting of black rights. After years of fighting between confederates and abolitionists black rights were finally put into place. Black rights caused disunity between the people just as Women's Suffrage in the 20’s did. Just as black rights were sanctioned with time, Women's suffrage should also have been acknowledged. Throughout the 20’s many woman tried to obtain popularity in women's suffrage by holding meetings. The Seneca Falls Convention, organized by Elizabeth Staton, was a convention held by women's rights activists. These meetings addressed many issues that affected women's rights. These meeting were held to start giving notoriety to the issues pertaining to woman. Women's rights in the 20th century was an extremely controversial topic. Although women had been seen as inferior for many years, looking at the documents it’s unequivocal that woman should have been given the same domestic, political and social rights as men.
The women suffrage movement spanning across the 19th century up to 1920 was a movement that advocated for a women’s right to vote. The movement decisively failed during the 19th century without seeing much fruition of women’s suffrage; it then eventually gained success in the early 20th century and realizing its ultimate goal in 1920. The women’s suffrage movement failure during the 19th century largely due to the lack of unity and the strategic miscalculations. The movement made great strides towards success upon solving the unity problems by the early 1900s, which provides for the basis for later success. Their strategic turn towards more aggressive and pressing actions afterwards had finally led to success of the movement.
As the beginning of the 1900s drew near there was a change in the rights of women. As more women were working and getting higher education there was a huge movement. Dresses got more practical as the hoop skirt was replaced with a narrower dress. Organizations of women worked very hard and finally in 1917 they finally got the right to vote.
Although they were fighting for a worthy cause, many did not agree with these women’s radical views. These conservative thinkers caused a great road-block on the way to enfranchisement. Most of them were men, who were set in their thoughts about women’s roles, who couldn’t understand why a woman would deserve to vote, let alone want to vote. But there were also many women who were not concerned with their fundamental right to vote. Because some women were indifferent in regards to suffrage, they set back those who were working towards the greater good of the nation. However, the suffragettes were able to overcome these obstacles by altering their tactics, while still maintaining their objective.
... to stop in order to help their country flight the war. They understand they needed to helping on the home front and this was the time for them to step up and show the British Parliament how valuable they are to their country. Lobbying did take place quietly, some women suffrage groups saw this time for to show they can do the same jobs as men and contribute to the war efforts. In 1918 passed the Representation of the People Act and enfranchising women over the age of 30 who meet property qualifications. This act was the stating of women gaining equality to men. Even though, women had to meet qualifications to vote, it was a start in changing society view on women’s rights. In 1928, ten year after the Representation of the People Act, the Conservative government passed the Representation of the People Act finally giving women vote right to all over the age of 21.