The new republic Czecho-Slovakia as well as the newly reconstituted state of Poland at once conceded full political citizenship to their women. In Czecho-Slovakia eight, and in Poland five women were elected to the Parliaments.
In Sweden full suffrage was accorded to women May 28th, 1919, when a bill was passed by large majorities in both houses of the National Parliament, according to which every subject, man or woman, who has attained his or her twenty-third year, is qualified to vote.
In France the "Union Francaise pour le Suffrage des Femmes" sent on January 24th, 1919, a proclamation to the Parliament demanding that French women be given the franchise. The proclamation pointed to the fact that the right to vote had been recognized in enemy and allied countries and that therefore France should not be backward. But in spite of this on April 4th two women suffrage amendments to the Electoral Reform Bill were killed in the Chamber of Deputies. The provision making women eligible for election to the Chamber was defeated, 302 votes to 187. The vote against transmission of the right to vote to the next of kin of heads of families, without distinction of sex, was defeated 335 to 134. But on May 20th the Chamber of Deputies adopted a bill granting women the right to vote in all elections for members of the Communal and Departmental Assemblies. The vote was 377 to 97. The measure then went to the Senate.
Switzerland, with the European spread of woman suffrage all around, may be expected to soon respond to the wave of democratic sentiment. On January 22, 1919, the delegates of the Swiss Union of Women's Clubs adopted a resolution to request the Federal Council to order a radical revision of the Constitution, and grant to women equal political rights with men. On March 17th, the Grand Council of the Canton of Neuchatel declared for the principle of Woman Suffrage, and likewise instructed the Government to prepare a suffrage bill. If passed this bill will probably be decided by referendum.
The Belgian Chamber of Deputies, by unanimous vote, adopted on April 11th, 1919, an electoral Reform Bill, under the terms of which the right to vote is limited to widows who have not remarried, to the mothers of soldiers killed in battle and to the mothers of civilians shot by the enemy.
In Holland the first Chamber of the Dutch Parliament adopted on July 1 2th, 1919, a motion to introduce woman suffrage by a vote of 34 to 5.
In the United States of America the Western States have, as pointed out in a former chapter, never hesitated to acknowledge the rights of women to vote. But the Southern and Eastern States had remained reluctant in granting this privilege. And so the suffragists were compelled to conquer these regions step by step. The women of New York wen full suffrage in
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