Although you would never have known from the newspapers and media at the
time the year 2003 marked the 100th Anniversary of the establishment of
Women’s Social and Political Union, or the Suffragettes as they are more
commonly known. In the following article, Carol Farmer takes a look at the
conditions which led to their establishment, their many achievements and
their legacy.

It was in the supercharged political atmosphere of revolution and debate
that Tom Paine first published his book, ‘The Rights of Man’, in 1791, in
which he attacked hereditary government and argued for equal political
rights. The following year, Mary Wolstonecraft published her book
‘Vindication of the Rights of Women’, a corner stone for the feminist and
suffragist movements which were to follow.

The issue of voting rights was on the parliamentary agenda many times in
subsequent years. The Reform Act of 1832 had begun the process of
increasing the number of those allowed to vote in elections. Still, only
one in seven males now had the vote, though significant in the passing of
the bill was the abolition of the rotten boroughs in which the total
number of electors could be counted on one hand.

There followed, in fairly slow succession, a series of Acts which
increased the rights of the common man to partake in the decision making
process of Government. The 2nd Reform Act (1867), extended the right to
vote to more working class males; The Ballot Act (1872), introduced the
secret ballot; The Corrupt Practices Act (1883), specified how much money
each candidate was allowed to spend during an election; The 3rd Reform
Act, (1884) extended voting rights to include men in rural areas; and the
Redistribution Act (1885) specified the ratio of seats to the population.

It was not however until some 85 years after the passing of the 1st Reform
Act, that legislation was finally passed allowing women, for the first
time, to take an active role in the selection of their Government (The
Qualification of Women Act, 1917).

With the introduction of the Representation of the People Act the
following year, limited voting rights for women were introduced onto the
statute books: the battle was hard fought, the war not yet won, but
suffrage had finally achieved the first step on the ladder toward
political equality.

(The Sex Disqualification Removal Act, which made it illegal to exclude
women from jobs on account of their sex, was introduced in 1919, and the
Equal Franchise Act, giving women the vote on the same terms as men, was
finally passed in 1928. It was not to be until almost 50 years later that
legislation was introduced making it illegal to discriminate against a
woman because of her sex, (Sex Discrimination Act 1976) and later still,
the Equal Pay Act made it law that women working in the same or similar
job to a man should be paid an equal wage.

Suffrage, the campaign for the right to vote, was born out of the social,
industrial and political upheaval of the latter part of the 19th century.
The need for contraception and contraceptive advice for working class
women, the appalling working conditions endured by young girls and women
in all fields of work, the existence and effects of the Poor Laws and the
Workhouse, the slow but relentless march toward social reform and the rise
of the burgeoning trade union movement and the formation of the Labour
Party all added fuel to the fire of the movement to gain the right for
women to vote on equal terms with men.
Millicent Fawcett founded the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Society
in 1897, bringing together under one umbrella the various suffrage groups
throughout the country. The aim of the NUWSS was the pursuance of the
right to vote by peaceful means (the Suffragists), with logical and
cohesive argument. It was argued that women could hold positions of
responsibility, could be employers and managers, could pay taxes, and were
subject to laws they had no part in making, but they were still not
allowed to vote
Progress was slow, however, and on October 10th 1903, the Women’s Social
and Political Union was founded, with an exclusively female membership.
Emmeline Pankhurst, her daughters Christabel and Sylvia together with
others of similar mind, were not prepared to wait for the advances that
logical argument alone might bring. They wanted change, and they were not
afraid to use aggression to achieve their aims.
Two years after the founding of the Suffragettes, as the Union became
known, two leading members of the group were forcibly ejected from a
political meeting in Manchester, at which Winston Churchill and Sir Edward
Grey were speakers, after they interrupted the meeting with calls for
votes for women, constant heckling and finally by assaulting the speakers.
Both women were arrested, but refused to pay the fines imposed, preferring
a prison sentence, drawing attention to the injustices of the time.
This was the start of a long campaign during which many more meetings were
disrupted, and a good many Suffragettes hurt. The Suffragettes refused to
bow to violence, but were unafraid to employ it. The Church of England
voiced it’s opposition to the concept of suffrage, so the Suffragettes
burned down churches; they attacked the heart of the city [of London] by
breaking windows in Oxford street; politicians were subject to physical
attack, and their homes fire bombed and vandalized;
Suffragettes chained themselves to Buckingham Palace because the Royal
Family spoke out against the movement; golf courses were vandalised, and
the business life of the capital city disrupted when telephone lines were
severed and letters destroyed when chemicals were poured inside post
boxes. The campaign sought to hurt influential men where it would do the
most damage, and the cost to both business and private individuals mounted
steadily.
The official answer was to arrest and imprison the perpetrators in an
attempt to divide and weaken the movement. Women were given sentences
ranging from a few days to many months, depending on the severity of the
‘crime’.
In July, 1909, an imprisoned suffragette, Marion Dunlop, refused to eat.
The Government took fright at the idea of possibly creating a martyr to
the cause, and she was released. Other imprisoned suffragettes adopted the
same strategy, but rather than be seen to be capitulating, the decision
was taken to force-feed those on hunger strike. Many suffragettes died
following a period of incarceration, probably as a result of the horrific
process of enforced nourishment that took place daily in the prisons.

By 1913, the campaign of violence and the destruction of both private and
public property had escalated to new heights. Suffragettes were still
being arrested, still being imprisoned, still going on hunger strike and
still being force fed by the authorities. But despite the public
condemnation of the acts of destruction perpetrated, public opinion was
rising against the barbarism of forced feeding. The Government were
determined that none of these women should be allowed to become martyrs,
but were forced to rethink their strategy.

The Prisoners Temporary Discharge of Ill Health Act allowed for prisoners,
weakened and made ill by self imposed starvation, to be released from
prison for just long enough for them to be nursed back to health. The ones
who had been released were in no fit state to join the struggle again, and
once they were deemed fit, they were rearrested, imprisoned to complete
their sentences and the whole process began again. If the prisoner died
after being released this saved the Government any embarrassment.

From the point of view of the Government of the day, this was an effective
way to combat the problems of a hunger strike without causing a national
outrage, or capitulating to the demands of the suffragette movement.
Because of the way in which it was operated, the legislation became known
as the Cat and Mouse Act.

The effect of the Act and its consequences only served to make the
Suffragettes all the more determined and all the more extreme. In June of
1913, Emily Wilding Davison, a staunch campaigner and activist in the
WSPU, threw herself beneath the King’s horse, as it took part in the Derby
of that year. She was killed, giving the movement its first martyr.
Unfortunately, those campaigning against the right for women to vote,
notably the National Anti-Suffrage League, used the incident against the
movement, citing it as an example of the hysteria to which women were
subject, and suggesting that women were too irrational to be allowed the
vote

The arson campaign continued to gain momentum. The house of David Lloyd
George was partly blown up in early 1913, and despite the punitive
measures of the Cat & Mouse Act, there was no let up in the violence and
disruption. But in August 1914, Britain was plunged into World War One.
The immediate effect on the WSPU was for Emmeline Pankhurst to instruct
Suffragettes to end all hostilities and offer their full support to the
war effort. She successfully negotiated the release of all Suffragettes
from prison at this time.

The NUWSS announced it’s intention to suspend all political activity until
the war was over, but the Women’s Freedom League, formed by those
suffragists who had left the WSPU when the campaign of violence had begun,
disagreed with the notion of a suspension of political campaigning, and
continued their campaign to secure votes for women throughout the term of
the war.

The war itself was to have a profound effect on the lot of women. Men were
leaving in droves to fight at the front. They left behind jobs which
needed to be done. Women, whose chief employment prior to the onset of war
had been in service, were now enlisted into all manner of profession, in
order to keep the country running smoothly. They became bus-conductor’s,
ticket-collector’s, post-women, bank clerk’s, driver’s, farm-labourer’s
and munitions maker. Industries that had previously excluded women now
welcomed them.

As the War progressed, the vital part that women were playing was
grudgingly acknowledged. It became more and more obvious that the notion
that women were hysterical beings, subject to flights of fancy was a total
misrepresentation. Women not only held down what had been seen to be
‘men’s’ jobs, but continued to run homes and bring up children as well.

The dissenters were swept aside, and in 1918, after so many years of
struggle, violence and debate, the Representation of the People Act was
passed, granting voting rights to women over the age of 30. It was not to
be until 10 years later, that women were given voting rights from 21 on
the same terms as men, with the passing of the Equal Franchise Act. The
struggle was at last over…women had finally won equal rights in the
political arena. The Suffragettes and Suffragists were victorious.