Why did a campaign for women's suffrage develop in the years after 1870?

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Why did a campaign for women’s suffrage develop in the years after 1870?

      The movement for women’s suffrage became more powerful after 1870. There were a number of different reasons for this. In this essay I will be looking at these different reasons and I also will be writing about how things developed in time. I will start by looking at the situation in 1870.  

      In 1870 the situation for women was bad and women were unfairly treated compared to men. There was inequality at work, inequality before the law, inequality in education and inequality of voting rights. Women were unequally treated by the law. Women couldn’t divorce their husbands and if the husband left the wife, he would get the children, the home, the money and everything else the women owned. Women’s education was also very unfair compared to the education men got. In 1870, the laws changed, and the government made school compulsory for boys and girls. The school syllabus for girls was still very different from boys; girls had to learn about housewifery, laundry work and cookery. Middle class women started to get basic education. Men and women weren’t equally treated at work. Women worked in low paid jobs such as textile factories or as servants. Laws were passed to improve women's situation at work for example women were banned completely from work in the mines, women were limited to 12 hours work a day, women were limited to 10 hours work a day in textile factories and women were limited to 10 hours work a day in any place employing 50 or more people. Women didn’t get to vote, all voting was done by men. Women didn’t get a say in politics or get to choose they wanted to vote for. In 1867 most men had the right to vote. There was significant development that occurred gradually.

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      After 1870 there were a lot of changes, this helped the women's movement for suffrage; because of all these changes women became more confident. Women were allowed to keep their own income and property after they married. In 1878 a woman who was separated from her husband was legally allowed to claim maintenance to support her and her children, if she had to leave him because he was cruel. Finally in 1891 women could no longer be forced to stay home against their own will, they could leave and live elsewhere. Women were being allowed to take ...

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