Source D is a passage from a book written by Emmeline Pankhurst in 1912. She writes “Now the newspapers are full of us”, by this time, people were fed up of reading about the Suffragettes in the newspapers. Pankhurst is regarded un-lady like when she says “we will fight for our cause”. This was another reason why the women did not receive the vote. She continues to write “In 1906 there was a very large section of the public who were in favour of women’s suffrage”, this may have been a large exaggeration and she is biased.
A further reason why the suffragettes did not receive the vote was that they did not stick together. In September 1907, The WSPU split into two. It was still dominated by the Pankhursts but some members broke away to form the ‘Women’s Freedom League’. The two organisations often worked together but there were many disagreements about the amount of violence.
Another reason why they did not gain the vote was because not all women wanted the franchise. Even the Queen did not agree with women's vote. She said, "With the vote, women would become heartless and disgusting human beings”. With the Queen and many other women against women's suffrage it held back the vote.
One of the biggest reasons was people’s views on equality of the sexes. The public, MP's and even the other women felt that men were superior to women. Men of that era believed that women were irrational, second class and unsuitable. Source E, part of a speech made by a Member of Parliament in 1913 stated that if women did gain the vote, it meant that most voters would be women. This was most probably typical of Parliament’s views and as the government reflects public opinion, we can see why many men would be against giving the vote. At that time, men dominated politics and they were afraid to lose all control, authority, power and grip over women. Permitting the vote would undermine traditional control and the traditional political system
Another reason was that all MP's were worried about giving women the vote; they were concerned about which party the women would vote for. The Liberals were the most worried as the majority of the population able to vote would be women. Men were 47.3% of the population and women, the other 52.7%. Now that two campaigns were running for women’s votes, these percentages became a cause for concern. Disagreements existed on how to extend the vote for women. If they were given the vote on the same terms as men, only the wealthier women would receive suffrage. Both the labour and the liberal parties believed that this would aid the conservative parties. They were not prepared to risk this.
Another reason why the vote was not permitted before the war was because their violent tactics were regarded as attention and publicity seeking. Pankhurst explained that they were driven to these tactics because peaceful methods had failed. The suffragettes lost support due to their irrational behaviour. Some of these violent tactics were throwing stones at 10 Downing Street, the smashing of major department stores, Hunger Strike and the slashing of the Rokeby Venus painting. Such brutality alienated many people.
