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1. Mr Agg-Gardiner (proposing the Bill): I am bound to admit that within the last few weeks the prospect [for the Bill] have been dimmed and darkened by the deplorable conduct of certain person who desire to obtain its object – the enfranchisement pf women… I prefer to regard them as victims of a probably well-intentioned and perhaps earnest, but certainly misguided enthusiasm… [Arguments against giving women the vote] are both out of date and out of place. They might have been correct and proper two or three centuries ago, when the duties of women were restricted to weaving tapestries and looking after children, but not in the twentieth century, when women have for years, by common consent, taken an active part in public affairs, when they are members of town councils, boards of guardians and Royal Commissions; when they speak on public platforms and are prominent members of political associations… There are countless [women], some of whom have won the highest distinction in the realms of literature, of science and of art, but who are not entitled [to vote]… |
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2. Sir Alfred Mond (seconding the Bill): The fact that we have in this country over 5 million women engaged in earning their own living, over 2 million engaged in industrial pursuits, surely is sufficient argument to those who still talk of setting up woman as a sort of china doll in a sacred hearth to be worshipped from afar… Today [woman] is interested in all the widest spheres of legislation in every sense of the word. There is not a single political problem, there is not a Bill which comes before this House which does not affect millions of women… The right Honourable Members for East Worcester is an anti-Suffragist, but he has not hesitated to address a large meeting of women on the question of Tariff Reform… If they are capable of being addressed and instructed, surely they are capable of farming an opinion… I think women have been very patient. Many people who oppose giving them the vote think nothing of asking them to go out at election times, day after day and night after night, canvassing the slums. Apparently they are quite capable of instructing men electors what to do… We have a large number of Colonies, a number of States in America, and several European countries which have given women the vote. Am I to be told that the conditions of these countries are so very different to the conditions of this country? To widen the sphere of influence for women is a good thing. It is good for the wife and it is good for the mother, and it is a good thing for the home of the citizen, and therefore argument against it ought to be abandoned… It is particularly true that the mentality and ordinary emotions of women are not exactly the same as those of men. It is to my mind an advantage to the State that this is so… it would, to me mind, impoverish the State if we do not bring this section of the community into our counsels. Men take women’s advice frequently and very often they find it better than their own judgement… Some who have voted in the past for Woman Suffrage have suddenly changed their mind. Their argument is: ‘If certain sections of those in favour of Woman Suffrage commit acts which we strongly disapprove of, therefore we will oppose the Bill, and thus punish all the other women who have done nothing at all… By committing am injustice of this kind, punishing all to penalise a few, you are doing nothing but stirring up bad feeling and committing a grave injustice. |
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3. Mr Harold Baker (opposing the Bill): The exact numbers of women who were serving in public capacities [is very small]… On boards of guardians there were only 1,327 women serving out of a total of 24,824; on town councils there were only 24 women out of a total of 11,140; on urban district councils there were only 6 women out of a total of 10,561, and on county councils there were only 4 women out of a total of 4,615… It shows a very undue reluctance to take advantage of the considerable opportunities which at this moment are offered to them… The question is not the enfranchisement of any particular class, but the enfranchisement of politically inert masses who take no interest in politics and do not desire to do so… I think the influence of women in legislation is practically unlimited. Take the case of the pit-brow women – it happened not many years ago – by merely explaining their case in plain terms, women succeeded in avoiding what they conceived to be an injustice which was about to be inflicted on them by an Act of Parliament… [The vote] is a badge, not of superiority, but of difference, a difference of masculine character and coercive power, a difference which is adapted for the governance of alien races and for the safeguarding of our Empire… I think the breaking of windows has let in a good deal of fresh air on this subject… it goes to show that those who claim to have more power to persuade women are exactly those who are least fitted to exercise political power… [There had been a postcard census of women’s opinions1] Of the replies which have been received there are against the Suffrage 42, 793, in favour of it there are 22,176, neutral 9,404. That is the opinion of women. This is a man-made Bill which they are forcing upon the vast majority of women against their wishes… |
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4. Viscount Helmsley (seconding the opposition): I maintain that the whole position and functions of Parliament would be altered… the fact of the two sexes sitting together in an assembly such as this would no doubt alter the whole tone and whole feeling of this Parliament. I do not think that any man will deny that he is conscious when he is debating in common with women of an extremely different feeling, a feeling of reserve, which is very different from the feeling which men have when they are discussing freely and debating freely with one another… The way in which certain types of women, easily recognised, have acted in the last year or two, especially in the last few weeks, lends a great deal of colour to the argument that the mental equilibrium of the female sex is not as stable as the mental equilibrium of the male sex. The argument has very strong scientific backing… It seems to me that this House should remember that if the vote is given to women those who will take the greatest part in politics will not be the quiet, retiring, constitutional women… but those very militant women who have brought so much disgrace and discredit upon their sex. It would introduce a disastrous element into our public life… One feels that it is not cricket for women to use force… It is little short of nauseating and disgusting to the whole sex… Government? Where are the women merchants and the women bankers? Where are the women directors of great undertakings? Nowhere to be seen at the head of the great businesses of the country. I can imagine very few undertakings in which women exercise an equal share of the control with the men… It appears to me that it is one of the fundamental truths on which all civilisations have been built up, that it is men who have made and controlled the State, and I cannot help thinking that any country which departs from that principle must be undertaking an experiment which in the end will prove to be exceedingly dangerous… I believe that the normal man and the normal women both have the instinct that man should be the governing one of the two, and I think that the undoubted dislike that women have for men who are effeminate and which men have for masculine women is nothing more or less than the expression of this instinct… |
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5. Mr McCurdy In a civilised state of society, those who pay the taxes and have to obey the laws, should have a voice in the making of those laws… For my own part, the recent militant tactics have strengthened my desire to see a measure of Woman Suffrage placed upon the Statue Book… |
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6. The Prime Minister, Mr Asquith The natural distinction of sex, which admittedly differentiates the functions of men and women in many departments of human activity, ought to continue to be recognised in the sphere of Parliamentary representation… The question: ‘Why should you deny to a woman of genius the vote, which you would give to her gardener’ {is answered in this way]. You are dealing, not with individuals, but with the masses, in my judgement the gain which might result through the admission of gifted and well-qualified women would be more than neutralised by the injurious consequences which would follow to the status and influence of women as a whole. |
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7. Lord Robert Cecil The cause of Woman Suffrage is not as strong in this House today as it was a year ago, and everybody knows the cause. Everyone knows that the reason is purely and simply that certain women have broken the law in a way we all deplore… Here are a number of citizens who discharge all the ordinary duties of citizenship. Here is this great body of citizens, and no one really will doubt that they are not quite as industrious, quite as public-spirited and quite as self-sacrificing as men. They do not ask for any privilege greater than that which man has. What they do ask for is that where they are qualified they should be entitled to vote… |
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8. Mr Eugene Watson Up to the present time, and for many years past, I have voted for this question… I intend tonight to vote against this Bill. There was a meeting held at the Albert Hall on 28th February [to debate Woman Suffrage]. I believe that when these speeches were read those advocates of Woman Suffrage felt the case was put so strongly against them that they were beaten from the point of argument and that they should resort to violence… Even in this House, owing to this action, you cannot meet your wife as you used to, you cannot take your American cousin, coming over here, up to the Ladies’ Gallery. All this has been brought about by the militant Suffragists. |
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9. Mr Lane-Fox There is a considerable difference between women having votes in local government and the enactment of the legislation itself. [Those women who have taken part in local government] have been administering, and not legislating. They have been carrying out the wishes of Parliament. The supreme will of the nation, the supreme government of Empire, rests in the hands of man. The strongest reason, in my opinion, why we should not grant the vote to women is that it means the beginning of taking women away from the home into what must necessarily be the rather dirty game of politics. Everybody must know that a man without a woman to look after his home and his children is incompetent. The home cannot go on… |
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10. Mr Murray MacDonald [Law is a matter of right and wrong] sanctioned solely by regard to the moral right of the individual to make the best of his own life. If a woman has the same power of deciding what is right and what is wrong as a man, in the ordinary concerns of life, I personally can see no objection to her having her full right of expressing her judgement and of determining what ought to be the nature of the laws regulating our society… |
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11. Mr Charles Roberts There are some Honourable members who have a real fear of this Bill… They were wrong in 1832, and they were wrong in 1869, and there is every reason to think that they will probably be wrong in this case also… I am quite content to rest my argument in favour of the Bill upon the statement that it will enlarge the horizon of the home, and bring into the circle of citizenship a great number of those who are at present left outside. |
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12. Mr Stewart Men are under the potent influence of women already. They are controlled in childhood and cherished in old age. And between childhood and old age they are more subject to their influence than at any other period of life. Women have won the Empire by sending forth their sons to do its work, and they can win any election or carry any measure they set their minds to… |
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13. Mr Theodore Taylor Women claim, not as a favour, but as an inherent right as citizens if this country, a share in its government through their own votes and the ballot box… I know it is fashionable for us men to chuckle and say: ‘What superior being we are!’ I do not think we men can claim any superiority over women. |
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14. Mr Cator I think the Chancellor of the Exchequer and other prominent politicians have mentioned that they believe the result of this Bill would be an advantage to the Tory party… It is certain that if the Bill is going to be a good bill for the Conservative Party the other side will never rest until they have extended the Franchise until it embraces the whole of Adult Suffrage of this country… It is because we believe that this Bill can never remain a limited measure that we fear it is exceedingly dangerous and exceedingly wrong. |
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15. Mr Snowden The women who want the Parliamentary vote now are not governed by their consent, and that is a violation of the first principle of representative and democratic government. The opposition to the enfranchisement of women is not argument; it is a masculine prejudice. I support the enfranchisement of women because I believe the active partnership of men and women in political affairs will raise politics to a higher, a holier, a purer atmosphere. I believe it will bring to the relations between men and women in the affairs of life, democratic and social, holier and worthier associations. |
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16. Mr Arnold Ward Militantism and hysteria are inherent and inseparable from the Suffrage movement. They grow and progress as the Suffragist movement grows and progresses and, if this is so, then these militant outrages are a strong and serious argument against Woman Suffrage itself. |
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17. Sir William Byles My firm and unshaken belief is in the emancipation of women and in the justice of electoral equality for them. |
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18. Mr Dickinson I regard this question of the women’s franchise as part of the movement of civilisation. |
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19. Mr MacCullum Scott The argument against Woman Suffrage which has always impressed me most is the physical force argument. First, the only stable force of government is the one which secures that the balance of political power is in the same hands as the balance of physical force. Secondly, by counting heads you secure a rough approximate index as to where government or policy has the physical force of the country behind it. In the last place, women as physical force units are not equal to men. Therefore if you include women when you are counting heads, the result is not reliable as an index of the physical force in the country… By giving votes to women you are destroying the value of a General Election. |
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Vote: Ayes 208, Noes 222 |
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From Official Reports 5th Series Parliamentary Debates: Commons,
[1] Lord Cecil said of this survey: ‘a canvas by post cards is an exceedingly unsatisfactory method of ascertaining anything’
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