Enquiry 2 What were the suffrage campaigners fighting for?

1. Enquiry 2What were the suffrage campaigners fighting for?

2. Enquiry overview Lesson 1: What were the nineteenth-century campaigners fighting for? Lesson 2: What were the radical suffragists fighting for? Lesson 3: Were the suffragettes and the suffragists fighting for the same things? Lesson 4: What were different people within the suffrage movement fighting for? Lesson 5: What had been won by 1918? Outcome activity: Write an extended explanation answering the enquiry question.

3. Lesson 2What were the radical suffragists fighting for?

4. Lesson 2 overview • Content covered in the lesson: • Nineteenth-century campaigners represented middle-class women: working-class women were not necessarily persuaded by their views. • The difference between ‘adult suffrage’ and ‘women’s suffrage’. • The co-operative movement, Trades Union Congress and ILP. • Selina Cooper, Hannah Mitchell and Helen Silcock.

5. What were the suffrage campaigners fighting for? Recap • Recap: How persuaded were working-class women by nineteenth-century suffrage campaigners? • In1867 and 1884, two acts were passed through Parliament, expanding the number of men who could vote. • Some middle-class women formed campaigning societies such as the Kensington Society and the Langham Place Group and, with the help of sympathetic MPs like John Stuart Mill, tried to persuade Parliament to include some women in these acts by compiling petitions to demonstrate how many women wanted the vote. • They were unsuccessful, and neither the 1867 nor the 1884 Acts included women. However, this set the stage for campaigning movements, which would take the fight forward into the twentieth century.

6. The difference between ‘adult suffrage’ and ‘women’s suffrage’ At the end of the nineteenth century, an increasing number of working women became interested in the vote. However, unlike the earlier, more middle-class campaigners, there was disagreement about what kind of suffrage they should campaign for. Women’s suffrage: Campaigning for women’s suffrage meant arguing that women should be granted the vote on the same terms as men. Before 1918, however, this meant that a property qualification would be applied to them in the same way as men, meaning that only women who owned a certain amount of property would be able to vote, excluding a lot of working women. Adult suffrage: Campaigning for adult suffrage meant arguing that all adults, men and women, should be given the vote without any property qualifications. Working-class campaigners argued that this would be fairer, as otherwise only wealthy men and women would have a voice. However, many worried that this would be much harder to achieve. The term ‘radical suffragists’ is used by historians to describe some of the women who began to campaign for the vote in parts of the north of England in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Unlike the campaigners you looked at last lesson, these women tended to be working class and many of them were also linked to trade unions and to the new Labour Party. For many, campaigning for votes for women was part of their larger goal to improve conditions for all working people.

7. The co-operative movement, Trades Union and ILP The Co-operative Guilds: The Co-operative Guilds were organisations of working people who joined together to provide goods and services to working communities at a fair price. Right from the start, women were deeply involved in the co-operative movement, and people like Selina Cooper and Sarah Reddish quickly gained leadership positions and experience that they would bring to the suffrage campaign. The Co-operative Guilds were therefore openly supportive of women’s suffrage from the 1890s onwards.

8. The co-operative movement, Trades Union and ILP The Trades Union Congress: The TUC organised all of the different trade unions that organised workers in different industries to campaign for their rights. Although the TUC was closely linked to the Labour Party, and a lot of the key trade unions – especially in the cotton industry – had a lot of women members, it wasn’t very supportive of women’s suffrage. Nevertheless, many women, like Helen Silcock, gained a lot of experience in organising political campaigns in their trade union and, if the TUC could be persuaded to back women’s suffrage, it would be a big step forward.

9. The co-operative movement, Trades Union and ILP The Independent Labour Party: In 1893, the Independent Labour Party was formed to represent the interests of working people and, in 1895, the party conference voted to support suffrage for all men and women. However, aside from a few members like KeirHardie, campaigning for full adult suffrage was not a priority, as most members wanted to focus on fighting poverty and improving working conditions. However, the party platform welcomed men and women as equal members and therefore many women joined the Labour Party, including Emmeline Pankhurst, and got a lot of experience of speaking and campaigning.

10. The co-operative movement, Trades Union and ILP Opportunity: In 1894, the Local Government Act allowed women to stand for election to the Boards of Guardians. These were organisations of local people whose job it was to ensure that assistance was given to people in poverty, which included women and children who had no way of supporting themselves. The Labour Representation Committee, which found candidates to stand for Labour in local and national elections, saw elections to the Boards as important, as they directly affected the lives of working people. In 1904, it nominated Selina Cooper and Harriette Beanland to be elected to the Burnley Board of Guardians.

11. Selina Cooper and Hannah Mitchell Selina Cooper and another woman, Hannah Mitchell, were elected after this campaign. Selina Cooper had worked in a cotton mill from the age of 11 and had joined her local branch of the NUWSS. She was active in local politics and a brilliant speaker. Hannah Mitchell was also from a working-class background and was a campaigner for the rights of working people. What is the difference between the kinds of arguments that Cooper and Beanland were putting forward and the arguments of the nineteenth-century suffragists? Why might these people go on to campaign for the vote in national elections? Read the manifesto issued by Selina Cooper and Harriette Beanland in 1904, explaining why they should be elected to the Board of Guardians. Q: Why do Cooper and Beanland argue that it is necessary for working-class people to be on the Board? Q: Why do Cooper and Beanland argue that it is necessary for women to be on the Board? Q: What do Cooper and Beanland say they want to achieve if they are elected?

12. Helen Silcock and the TUC In 1901, Helen Silcock was elected to the 1901 Trades Union Congress. Helen Silcock was a working woman who had been made President of the Wigan Weavers. She was also one of the radical suffragists and she therefore seized the chance to submit a motion in support of women’s suffrage to be debated and voted on during the Congress. If she could get the TUC to vote in support of women’s suffrage, then this would be a big advance; however, she was faced with an alternative motion, brought by other delegates, arguing for adult suffrage. In 1901, the TUC applauded Helen Silcock’s speech but decided to support the motion calling for adult suffrage instead. Q: Why do you think they came to this decision?

13. What were the suffrage campaigners fighting for? Activity: Arguments for women’s/adult suffrage Your challenge is to sort out arguments into those for women’s and those for adult suffrage. • Tasks: • Draw up a table like the one below and put the arguments in each column according to whether you think they were put forward by people supporting women’s suffrage or adult suffrage in the TUC and Labour Party.

14. The nineteenth-centurycampaigners People in the suffrage movement The suffragettes The radical suffragists What were the suffrage campaigners fighting for? Plenary: Was it only middle-class women? Which women would be left out of these campaigns by the dawn of the twentieth century?