Pankhurst and the Vote
A global power1714 to 1901
For a long time a married woman could not keep her own earnings or property. A pair of Acts of Parliament changed that: from then on, a wife could keep what she earned and owned in her own name, rather than see it pass to her husband.
The wider fight for the vote was older still. The Chartists campaigned on behalf of the working classes and everyone else who owned no property, presenting petitions to Parliament. Campaigning for women followed: Emmeline Pankhurst, who was born in Manchester, founded the Women's Franchise League in 1889 to press for married women to be given the vote in local elections.
The same years brought conflict abroad and literary honour at home. The Boer War was fought in South Africa against settlers from the Netherlands, called the Boers, and made talk about the Empire's future more urgent. In 1907, Rudyard Kipling received the Nobel Prize in Literature, a writer whose poems and novels presented the Empire as a force for good.
What to remember
| The setting up of the Women's Franchise League | 1889 Campaigned to win married women the vote in local elections, an early step toward suffrage. |
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| Kipling being awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature | 1907 Kipling's poems and novels reflected the idea that the British Empire was a force for good. |
| The Acts of Parliament of 1870 and 1882 | giving wives the right to keep their own earnings and property Before them, a married woman's earnings and property automatically belonged to her husband. |
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| The Boer War | a war in South Africa against settlers from the Netherlands, called the Boers 1899 to 1902; it made the discussions about the future of the Empire more urgent. |
| The Chartists | campaigning for the vote for the working classes and other people without property They campaigned in the 1830s and 1840s and presented petitions to Parliament; their six demands are a row of their own. |
| Emmeline Pankhurst | Manchester Born in 1858; in 1903 she helped found the Women's Social and Political Union. |
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| Was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1907 | Rudyard Kipling |
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