representative basis without altering the numerical balance of parties in the country. It was calculated that slightly over 1,000,000 women would be enfranchised. After considerable pressure both inside the house and outside, Mr Asquith consented to give two days of government time for the debate, and the second reading, moved by the Labour member, Mr D. J. Shackleton, was carried by a majority of 110 votes. A further attempt to commit the bill to a Grand Committee failed by 175 votes; the bill was therefore sent to a committee of the whole house, and Mr Asquith announced that he would not give further facilities. It was noteworthy that, though the bill was opposed as undemocratic by Mr Lloyd-George and other Liberals, it was supported by 32 out of 40 of the Labour members, and evidence was given that a large proportion of the new voters would have been working women.
The leading women's suffrage societies may here be mentioned. All these societies have advocated precisely the same view, namely that women should have the same electoral privileges as men, whatever franchise system be adopted.
1. The National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies is the oldest organization. It began about 1867 as a number of separate local committees, and after various reorganizations a great amalgamation of all local societies was framed in 1896 under the present title. This union had 200 branches in 1910. All the early suffragists belonged to this body, and in latter years the chief name is that of Mrs Henry Fawcett. The union pursued continuously the “constitutional” policy and stood apart altogether from the “militant” societies. Its official organ, The Common Cause, was founded in 1908.
2. The National Women's Social and Political Union, associated chiefly with the name of Mrs Emmeline Pankhurst and Miss Christabel Pankhurst, formed in 1906, originated the more “militant” policy. Its income in 1909-1910 reached the figure of £60,000, and up to September 1910 some 500 of its members had undergone imprisonment. It undertook a widespread campaign of meetings, and though at first its speakers were subjected to an opposition of a violent character, there was no doubt that the movement received from its activities a wholly new stimulus. Its official organ, Voles for Women, obtained a large circulation.
Societies of various kinds multiplied. In 1907 were formed (3) the Women's Freedom League (chiefly associated with the name of Mrs C. Despard, a prominent supporter of the Labour party), whose members objected to the internal administration of the Social and Political Union, but agreed in adopting its policy in a modified form; and (4) the Men's League for Women's Suffrage, a society which included men of all parties, and in September 1910 adopted the anti-government election policy. Numerous other party[1] and non-party societies were formed, and resolutions supporting the principle, either in the abstract or as a part of adult suffrage, were passed by various Conservative, Liberal and Labour conferences and associations.
The remarkable prominence of the movement and the fact that successive parliaments contained a majority of pledged suffragists led to the formation of opposition societies. In 1908 was formed the Women's National Anti-Suffrage League, of men and women, which drew into its ranks prominent persons such as Lord Cromer, Lord Curzon, Lady Jersey and Mrs Humphry Ward; and about the same time the Men's League for Opposing Women's Suffrage came into existence. These two leagues amalgamated in December 1910, as the National League for Opposing Women's Suffrage, with Lord Cromer as president. The Anti-Suffrage Review was founded in 1909.
In New Zealand a measure for the enfranchisement of women, introduced by Richard Seddon, was carried in September 1893 (in the upper house by a majority of 2). In Australia the vote has been extended to all adult women both in the states (the first being South Australia, 1894, the last Victoria, 1908) and for the Commonwealth parliament. They have, moreover, the right to sit in the representative assemblies.
The movement assumed an organized form in the United States somewhat earlier than in the United Kingdom. It arose out of the interest taken by women in the temperance and antislavery agitations, and was fostered by the discussion on women's property rights. In 1840 the question was raised in a more acute form by the exclusion of women delegates from the World's Convention, and in 1848 the first women's suffrage convention was held at Seneca Falls, the leading spirits being Mrs Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Martha C. Wright and Lucretia Mott. Later conventions at Salem and Worcester, Massachusetts, in 1850, were the predecessors of annual meetings, but the extravagant dress adopted by some of the women brought ridicule upon the movement, which was further thrown into the background by the Civil War. In 1869 were formed: (1) in New York, the National Women's Suffrage Association, and (2) in Cleveland, the American Woman's Suffrage Association. In 1890 these two societies amalgamated as the National American Woman's Suffrage Association, of which in 1900 Mrs Carrie Chapman Catt became president. The question was considered by a select committee in the 48th Congress, and 200 petitions, representing millions of individuals, were presented in 1900. The Labour and Socialist parties in general supported the women's claim, but there was considerable opposition in other parties. In 5 states (Wyoming since 1869; Colorado, 1893; Utah, 1896; Idaho, 1896; and Washington, 1910) women are electors, and in 25 states they have exercised the school suffrage. In Louisiana they obtained the suffrage in connexion with tax levies in 1898. Anti-suffrage societies have also been formed in Brooklyn (1894), Massachusetts (1S95), Illinois (1S97), Oregon (1899).
In Finland all adult men and women over the age of 24, excluding paupers, received the right to vote for members of the Diet in 1906, in which year nineteen women became members of the Diet. In Norway, where there is male suffrage for men over 25 years of age, women were entitled to vote by a law of 1907, provided they or, if married, their husbands (i.e. where property is jointly owned) had paid income tax on an annual income of 400 kroner (£22) in the towns, or 300 kroner (£16, 10s.) in country districts. In Sweden a suffrage bill was carried in the lower but rejected in the upper house in 1909. In all the chief countries there are suffrage societies of greater or less strength. In Russia the question was placed in the forefront of the demands made by the Duma in 1906, and in 1907 propertied women received the right to confer votes on their sons who would otherwise be unenfranchised. In France a feminist congress met at Lyons in 1909.
The International Woman Suffrage Alliance originated in the United States in 1888. Its membership increased steadily, and at the Convention held in London in 1909 delegates were present from twenty-two countries. In the United Kingdom this Alliance is represented by the National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies. A social and propagandist club was founded in London in 1909 with an international membership. An international journal under the title Jus Suffragn (Brussels) was founded in 1907.
Authorities.—It is impossible to do more than mention a few works out of many dealing with various phases of the modern “women's movement.” See Alice Zimmern's Renaissance of Girls' Education in England (1898); A. R. Cleveland, Women under English Law (1896); J. L. de Lanessan, L'Éducation de la femme moderne (1908); M. Ostrogorski, Femme au point de vue du droit public (1892); Mrs C. P. Gilman, Women and Economics (1899); Miss C. E. Collet, Report on Changes in the Employment of Women (1898; Parl. papers, C. 8794); B. and M. Van Vorst, Woman in industry (1908); A. Loria, Le Féminisme au point de vue sociologique (1907); Helen Blackburn, Record of Women's Suffrage, in the United Kingdom (1902); Susan B. Anthony, History of Woman's Suffrage, in the United States (4 vols., 1881-1902); C. C. Stopes, British Free Women (1894); W. Lyon Blease, The Emancipation of Women (1910). The classical exposition of the arguments on behalf of women's suffrage is J. S. Mill's Subjection of Women; the most important statement in opposition is perhaps that of Professor A. V. Dicey in the Quarterly Review (Oct. 1908). (X.)
WOOD, ANTHONY À[2] (1632-1695), English antiquary, was the fourth son of Thomas Wood (1580-1643), B.C.L. of Oxford, where Anthony was born on the 17th of December 1632. He was sent to New College school in 1641, and at the age of twelve was removed to the free grammar school at Thame, where his studies were interrupted by civil war skirmishes. He was then placed under the tuition of his brother Edward (1627-1655), of Trinity College; and, as he tells us, “while he continued in this condition his mother would alwaies be soliciting him to be an apprentice which he could never endure to heare of.” He was entered at Merton College in 1647, and made postmaster In 1652 he amused himself with ploughing and bell-ringing,
- ↑ E.g. the Conservative and Unionist Women's Franchise Association, of which the countess of Selborne became president in 1910.
- ↑ In the Life he speaks of himself and his family as Wood or à Wood, the last form being a pedantic return to old usage adopted by himself. A pedigree is given in Clark's edition.
