The Case for Women's Suffrage

THE CASE

FOR

WOMEN'S SUFFRAGE

Edited by

BROUGHAM VILLIERS

With Contributions by

MABEL ATKINSON		MARGARET MCMILLAN
FLORENCE BALGARNIE		ROSALIND NASH
EVA GORE-BOOTH		EDITH PALLISER
ROBERT F. CHOLMELEY		CHRISTABEL
C. DESPARD		PANKHURST
MILLICENT GARRETT		EMMELINE PANKHURST
FAWCETT		CONSTANCE SMEDLEY
J. KEIR HARDIE		BROUGHAM VILLIERS
NELLIE ALMA MARTEL		ISRAEL ZANGWILL

LONDON

T. FISHER UNWIN

ADELPHI TERRACE

MCMVII

(All rights reserved.)

CONTENTS

	page
Introduction	9
Brougham Villiers
The Women's Suffrage Movement in the Nineteenth Century	22
Florence Balgarnie
The Present Position of the Women's Suffrage Movement	42
Emmeline Pankhurst
The Women's Suffrage Movement Among Trade Unionists	50
Eva Gore-Booth
Co-operator and Citizen	66
Rosalind Nash
Women and Politics	78
J. Keir Hardie, M.P.
The Legal Disabilities of Women	84
Christabel Pankhurst, LL.B.
The Civic Rights of the Married Woman	99
Constance Smedley
Woman in the Past and Future	106
Margaret McMillan
Women and the Revival of Interest in Domestic Politics	122
Mabel Atkinson, M.A.
The International Movement for Women's Suffrage	135
Edith Palliser
Women's Votes in New Zealand and Australia	140
Nellie Alma Martel
Tactics	154
Robert F. Cholmeley
A Pioneer of the Movement	164
Millicent Garrett Fawcett
Woman in the New Era	190
C. Despard
APPENDIX
One and One are Two	200
Israel Zangwill
Talked Out	210
Israel Zangwill

THE LEADERS OF THE FOUR PARTIES ON THE SUFFRAGE QUESTION.

THE RT. HON. SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN, M.P.

"… The more I come to close quarters with the social questions which affect the great mass of the people of this country, the more am I driven to the belief that women ought to have the power of expressing their opinions on those subjects and help in their solution."

THE RT. HON. A. J. BALFOUR, M.P.

"We have been told that to encourage women to take an active part in politics is degrading to the sex, and that received the assent of an hon. friend of mine below the gangway. It has received the assent of almost every speaker to-day. I should think myself grossly inconsistent and most ungrateful if I supported that argument in this House, for I have myself taken the chair at Primrose League Meetings, and urged to the best of my ability the women of this country to take a share in politics, and to do their best in their various localities to support the principles which I believe to be sound in the interests of the country. After that, to come down to the House, and say I have asked these women to do that which degrades them, appears to me to be most absurd."

MR. JOHN REDMOND, M.P.

"Is it not absurd to say that a woman in this country who may be left a widow, who may have the training of her children, the regulating of their education, the forming of their character, is to have no voice whatever in the laws to govern the state of the future citizens of which she has had the training?"

MR. J. KEIR HARDIE, M.P.

"I know of no argument in support of the grant of the franchise to men which does not equally apply to giving the franchise to women."