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- The suffragette movement. Only just over a hundred years ago, men and women were not considered to be equal. This angered some women so much that they took matters into their own hands.
- The Suffragists. The suffragists were led by Millicent Fawcett, head of the National Union for Women’s Suffrage Societies (NUWSS). It was founded in 1897 but merged with other organisations that dated back to the 1860s.
- The Suffragettes and the Pankhurst family. In 1903, the Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU) was formed when Emmeline Pankhurst and her daughters became disappointed with the lack of progress by the NUWSS.
- Direct action. The use of direct action in order to achieve progressive change has always been debated throughout history. Many argue against direct action because of the violence it creates and think that persuading others is a better means of achieving one’s aims.
- Early Life
- Family and Activism
- The WSPU
- Escalating Tactics
- The WSPU and World War One
- Success and Legacy
Emmeline Pankhurst was born in Manchester in 1858 to parents who were both keen social reformers and activists. Contrary to her birth certificate, Pankhurst claimed that she was born on 14 July 1858 (Bastille Day). She said that being born on the anniversary of the French Revolution had an influence over her life. Pankhurst’s grandfather had been p...
In 1879 Emmeline married a barrister and political activist, Richard Pankhurst, and soon bore him five children. Her husband agreed that Emmeline should not be a ‘household machine’, so hired a butler to help around the home. Following her husband’s death in 1888, Emmeline established the Women’s Franchise League. The WFL aimed to help women achiev...
Dissatisfied with the progress being made towards female suffrage, Pankhurst founded the Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU) in 1903. Its famous motto, ‘Deeds not Words’, would come to be a fitting slogan for the group’s actions in the years to come. The WSPU organised protests and published an official newspaper, the aptly titled ‘Votes for ...
Many women, including all three of Pankhurst’s daughters, were imprisoned for their participation in WSPU protests. Hunger strikes became a common tool of resistance in prison, and jailers responded with violent force-feedings. Drawings of women being force-fed in prison were circulated in the press and highlighted the plight of suffragettes to the...
Unlike other women’s rights organisations, the WSPU were uncompromising in their sole aim of achieving votes for women. Pankhurst refused to allow democratic votes within the group itself. She argued that this meant the WSPU was not ‘hampered by a complexity of rules’. The WSPU halted their activities during World War Oneand supported the British w...
In February 1918 the WSPU finally achieved success. The Representation of the People Act gave women over the age of 30 the vote, providing they met certain property criteria. It wasn’t until 1928, the year in which Pankhurst passed away, that women were granted electoral equality with men through the Equal Franchise Act. This historic achievement m...
- Celeste Neill
The modern campaign to secure the right to vote for women began in the mid-19th century. This aim was partially achieved with the Representation of the People Act 1918, which allowed some women over the age of 30 to vote in national elections.
- Susan B. Anthony, 1820-1906. Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, pioneers of the Women's Rights Movement, 1891. Library of Congress. Perhaps the most well-known women’s rights activist in history, Susan B. Anthony was born on February 15, 1820, to a Quaker family in the northwestern corner of Massachusetts.
- Alice Paul, 1885-1977. Alice Paul makes a toast to Tennessee's ratification of the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, giving women the right to vote.
- Elizabeth Cady Stanton, 1815-1902. WATCH: The Seneca Falls Convention. Elizabeth Cady Stanton was one of the foremost women’s-rights activists and philosophers of the 19th century.
- Lucy Stone, 1818-1893. Lucy Stone, born in Massachusetts in 1818, was a pioneering abolitionist and women’s-rights activist, but she is perhaps best known for refusing to change her last name when she married the abolitionist Henry Blackwell in 1855.
In 1897, regional societies with no political party allegiances established to lobby peacefully for the Parliamentary vote came together to form the National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies (NUWSS). They were led by Millicent Garrett Fawcett (1847-1929).
Emmeline Pankhurst (1858-1928) became involved in women's suffrage in 1880. She was a founding member of the WSPU in 1903 and led it until it disbanded in 1918. Under her leadership the WSPU was a highly organised group and like other members she was imprisoned and went on hunger strike protests.
People also ask
When did women get the right to vote?
Who were the members of the National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies (NUWSS)?
When did women's suffrage start?
Why did women fight for women's suffrage?
The suffragists were known as the parliamentarians. In Ireland, Isabella Tod, an anti-Home Rule Liberal and campaigner for girls education, established the North of Ireland Women's Suffrage Society in 1873 (from 1909, still based in Belfast, the Irish WSS).
