Tag Archives: Politics and Suffrage

The Married Women’s Property Acts (UK, 1870, 1882 and 1893)

By Claire Jones These acts were a milestone along women’s route to equality. The legal position of married women for most of the nineteenth century was little short of that of a slave. (This was the way in which philosopher

Prostitution and the Contagious Diseases Acts (1864, 1866 and 1869)

By Claire Jones Overview The passing of the Contagious Diseases Acts, search which stripped poor and working-class women of their rights, healing shocked many respectable middle class women and provoked a major campaign for repeal. The Acts were a legal

A brief history of feminism

By Claire Jones Many people think of feminism as beginning with the women’s movement of the 1970s, generic but feminism was around even before bras had been invented -  let alone burned. Women scholars were arguing for a fairer deal

Davies and Davison

Is commemoration a matter of deeds versus words? The famous tragic incident when suffragette Emily Davison fatally threw herself in front of the King’s horse at the Epsom Derby, 1913, remains engraved on the public’s memory. Indeed, many of you

Suffragists and Suffragettes

An overview of the Votes for Women campaign By Claire Jones Introduction Before the 1832 Reform Act most men and all women did not have the vote. This act created a wider franchise but used the term ‘male person’, specifically