Discuss if women earned the vote not because of their contributions in the war years

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Ronan 11T

I believe that the women earned the vote not because of their contributions in the war years, but because of other reasons that were happening at the time. Many historians also agree with me view as they that the wartime opportunities were simply a “blip” in the system, and women’s lives and roles returned to normal when the men returned from the war. This is an obvious sign that the women’s war efforts were unappreciated by men.

Source H is a piece of text from a history book called “Women’s Suffrage in Britain”, which also agrees with my view. It says that even though the newspaper reports of the time gave women workers a warm welcome; in farms, hospital and in factories they were greatly resented. Moreover, this was the reflecting of most men’s attitude towards women at the time. They all preferred if women became nurses, providers of refreshments and mothers – a position with the least amount of responsibility and work. The politicians agreed with the idea that the women who successfully brought up children during the war years had performed a great service for the government which would be rewarded by giving them the right to vote. Only the women above the age of 30 were given the vote as they were more sensible and more likely to vote for the same party as their husbands – which would be the current government at the time. The women who earned the vote were the ones who would stay at home and bring up children and would not “steal” mean’s jobs, whereas the younger women doing the dirty and the dangerous jobs of men did not get the vote, so the vote being a reward is not entirely true. As the source says that the women were given the vote because of their war time efforts is not true as the source says that it was because of bringing up children as a service to the country.

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However, some might completely disagree with my view and say that the only reason the women were granted the vote was because of their wartime efforts. Source J agrees with this point. It is a part of a speech by Herbert Asquith in the House of Commons in 1917. He opposed the women’s right to vote for many years and the source says that his opposition was well known. On the other hand, the suffragettes did not start their violent campaigns and they contributed to every aspect of the war services during the war. Because of this, he believes ...

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