Who did the most to win women the vote?

Authors Avatar
Who did the most to win women the

vote?

Women wanted the right to vote. Its as simple as that. Or is it? Through years leading up to 1918 women done horrendous acts for the attention of getting the right to vote for women. There were many things women could not do without the vote, such as; Become lawyers, work in banks, to get a degree and in jobs they were paid a lot less than men. The vote would have a large affect on women's lives and would gain more respect for them. So why didn't women have the vote? Men didn't believe that women should hold such the large responsibility to have a say in how the county is run. Men thought women were irrational and hysterical. They say man was created by god to rule over women and we have no right to alter this. Unfortunatley for the women most mp's were men, so they were at a huge loss. Being able to get them on there side was going to be a long and hard job. After all this hard work, death's and imprisonments women finally gained suffrage . This was because of the first world war, women finally had the chance to show men that they're just as good as them!

Millicent Fawcett started the National Union of Women's Suffrage, what we know as the suffragists late in the 1890's. She believed in peaceful protest. She felt that any violence or trouble would persuade men that women could not be trusted with the vote. But these protests weren't making any progress this made many women angry, and in 1903 Emmeline Pankhurst and her daughters Christabel and Sylvia founded the Women's Social and Political Union, The suffragettes. The suffragettes were militant and out spoken, they committed many assaults and performed many violent acts. But it wasn't until 1910's that they became this violent, beforehand they were relatively peaceful but still gained a lot of attention. The sort of things they did were, magazine publishing, merchandise making as they needed a lot of money to spread their propaganda- the suffragette's were represented by three colours, white, purple and green. So you could identify if a women was a suffragette of a suffragette supporter because somewhere she would be wearing the three colours, maybe on a badge, scarf or ribbons. They sent out Christmas cards, had cups and saucers, postcards, kites. These three colours all represented something-white was the colour of purity, purple symbolised dignity and green was a sign of living things- hope for the future. They marched up and down the streets holding demonstrations. But the one thing they did that caused the suffragette activity to become more violent is when Christabel Pankhurst and Annie Kenney interrupted a political meeting in Manchester to ask two liberal politicians which were Winston Churchill and Sir Edward Grey if they believed women should have the right to vote. Neither man replied. As A result the women got out a banner which had on it ' Votes for Women' and shouted at the politicians to answer there question. These actions where unheard of. But it got worse. Pankhurst and Kenney were thrown out of the meeting and arrested for causing an obstruction and a technical assault on a police officer. But both refused to pay the fine.
Join now!


The Suffragettes refused to bow to violence. In November 1910 the Prime minister promised to change the laws and give women the right to vote this seemed to be a long awaited victory for women, but then an election was held and the plan was abandoned. The suffragette's became furious and frustrated. They burned down churches as the Church of England was against what they wanted; they vandalised Oxford Street, apparently breaking all the windows in this famous street; they chained themselves to Buckingham Palace as the Royal Family were seen to be against women having the right ...

This is a preview of the whole essay