Women's suffrage Guide, Meaning , Facts, Information and Description
The international movement for Women's suffrage, led by suffragists and suffragettes, was a social, economic and political reform movement aimed at extending the suffrage (i.e. the right to vote) to women, advocating equal suffrage (abolition of graded votes) rather then universal suffrage (abolition of discrimination due to, for instance, race), which was considered too radical. A catch phrase was "one man, one vote!"
In 1869 the Wyoming Territory in the United States became the first modern polity where equal suffrage was extended to women. The earliest country extending that right was Pitcairn Islands in 1838. In 1893, New Zealand was the first country to introduce universal suffrage.
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2 Countries without women's suffrage 3 Suffragists and suffragettes 4 See also 5 External links |
Timeline
Women's suffrage has been granted (and been revoked) at various times in various countries throughout the world. In many countries women's suffrage was granted before universal suffrage, so women (and men) from certain races were still unable to vote.
The table below lists years when women's suffrage was enacted in various places. In many cases the first voting took place in a subsequent year.
- 1776
- New Jersey (although rescinded in 1807)
- 1838
- 1862
- 1869
- United Kingdom (only in local elections, unmarried women only until 1894)
- 1869-1920
- 1881
- Isle of Man (only property owners until 1913, not universal until 1919)
- 1883
- Widows granted right to vote in Canada
- 1893
- New Zealand September 19, 1893 (although not to stand for election)
- Cook Islands
- 1894
- South Australia all adult women excluding Aboriginals (property owners could vote in local elections from 1861)
- 1902
- 1906
- 1913
- 1915
- 1918
- 1919
- Germany
- Luxembourg
- The Netherlands (right to stand in election granted in 1917)
- 1920
- Czechoslovakia (later divided into the Czech Republic and Slovakia)
- United States (Federal level and all remaining states)
- 1921
- 1922
- 1928
- United Kingdom: franchise equal as for men
- 1929
- 1930
- South Africa (only granted to white women on the same basis as white men; black women did not qualify for the vote even though some black men did)
- 1931
- Spain (of practical effect until the Spanish Civil War)
- Portugal (with restrictions following level of education)
- 1932
- 1934
- 1935
- India (same year as men)
- 1937
- 1939
- 1942
- 1944
- 1945
- 1947
- 1948
- The Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted by the UN includes Article 21: The will of the people shall be the basis of the authority of government; this will shall be expressed in periodic and genuine elections which shall be by universal and equal suffrage and shall be held by secret vote or by equivalent free voting procedures.
- Belgium
- 1949
- 1955
- 1960
- 1962
- 1963
- Afghanistan (revoked under Taliban rule 1996-2001)
- 1970
- 1971
- Switzerland (on the federal level; introduced on the Cantonal (state) level from 1958-1990)
- 1976
- Portugal (restrictions lifted)
- 1984
- 1994
- South Africa: franchise extended to black men and women
- 2001
- Bahrain (same as men)
- 2003
Countries without women's suffrage
Some countries do not extend suffrage to women, or extend it differently from that extended to men (this list does not include countries where neither men nor women have suffrage):- Bhutan -- One vote per family in village-level elections
- Kuwait -- Female suffrage at the municipal level only.
- Lebanon -- Proof of education required for women, not required for men. Voting compulsory for men, optional for women.
- Vatican City -- Voting restricted to all-male College of Cardinals.
- Oman -- limited to 175,000 people chosen by the government, mostly male
Suffragists and suffragettes
- Susan B. Anthony (US)
- Hubertine Auclert (France)
- Harriet Stanton Blatch (US)
- Amelia Bloomer (US)
- Carrie Chapman Catt (US)
- Emily Davison (UK)
- Maria Deraismes (France)
- Jeannne Deroin (France)
- Abigail Scott Duniway (US)
- Marguerite Durand (France)
- Olympe de Gouges (France)
- Gyp (France)
- Marianne Hainisch (Austria)
- Julia Ward Howe (US)
- Ellen Key (Sweden)
- Aleksandra Kollontai (Russia)
- Nellie McClung (Canada)
- Lucretia Mott (US)
- Anna Maria Mozzoni (Italy)
- Louise Otto (Germany)
- Aletta Jacobs (Netherlands)
- Christabel Pankhurst (UK)
- Emmeline Pankhurst (UK)
- Sylvia Pankhurst (UK)
- Alice Paul (US)
- Madeleine Pelletier (France)
- Marie Popelin (Belgium)
- Pauline Roland (France)
- Julia Sears (US)
- Séverine (France)
- Kate Sheppard (New Zealand)
- Elizabeth Cady Stanton (US)
- Lucy Stone (US)
- Flora Tristan (France)
- Clara Zetkin (Germany)
See also
External links
- Inter-Parliamentary Union: Women's Suffrage
- CIA Yearbook: Suffrage
- Press release wrt. Qatar and Yemen
- "Winning the Vote" International Woman Suffrage Timeline
- FemBio – Biographies of Notable Women International
- Legal Status Of Women In Iowa (1894) by Jennie Lansley Wilson, at Project Gutenberg.
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