Changing status of women 1880-1980

• What were the arguments for women’s suffrage before 1918?

  For: women could vote locally

  Against: if Queen Victoria didn’t care, why should other women?
• What was the NUWSS?

  Set up by Milicent Fawcett in 1897

  Peaceful: public meetings, 1910: got 300,000 men to sign their petition

  50,000 members- mainly middle class

  Branch in Cardiff

  Suffragists
• What was the WSPU?

  Suffragettes, set up by Emmeline, Sylvia and Christabell Pankhurst in 1903

  Militant: 1908 Trojan Horse, 28 women left out of a van to force their way into the House of Commons

  Publicity
• What was the Cat and Mouse Act 1913?

  1908: Marian Dunlop Started the hunger strike

  To avoid a martyr through force feeding, the government would let the women go and re arrest when they were more healthy
• What did the WSPU do between 1913-14?

  Jan 1913: Firebombed DLG and Asquith, lack on control

  Emily Wilding Davison horse
• What did G. R Searle say about the WSPU?

  They harmed the Lib party but didn’t help their cause
• What did the WSPU do during WW1?

  Stopped militancy

  Whitehall 1915: We demand the right to serve
• What did Millicent Fawcett and Emmeline Pankhurst do in 1917?

  Met with DLG to talk about women’s franchise post war?
• What happened to the movements in the interwar period?

  Demand lessened

  NUWSS branches decreased from 478 to 48 by 1935
• What did women do in WW1?

  100,000 military nurses

  WLA: 113,000

  Filled 1.7 million of the 4.9 jobs- biggest factor
• What was the 1918 Representation of the People’s Act?

  Gave women 30+ with land the vote

  Reward for war, stopped militancy, fear of revolution

  21+ would have enfranchised 14 million, outnumbering the men. Lib feared they would vote against them
• Who were the women in parliamen?

  1921: Nancy Astor first female MP

  Margaret Bondfield first female cabinet member

  Megan Lloyd George: 1929-51
• What was the 1928 Equal Franchise Act?

  21+ could vote

  Reward for stopped militancy, Germany did it in 1920?

  Passed 387-10: Lib not in charge
• How many women left their jobs post WW1?

  600,000
• How much did the government invest in the Committee for Women’s Training and Employmen

  £500,000 towards hairdressing, journalism and domestic work; only one supported after 1921
• What Acts were passed in relatio to women’s sexuality?

  1913: Mental Deficiency Act: gave local authorities responsibility over pregnant, homeless and immoral women

  1923: Martrimonial Causes Act: adultery and rape from a husband is sole grounds for divorce

  Marie Stopes opens first birth clinic
• What was mass produced in the interwar period?

  Cosmetics and clothes

  All women could engage in fashion
• What made up 45% of the female workforce in the interwar period?

  Young female breadwinners
• How many women got involved in WW2?

  7 million
• What did Labour Reforms do?

  Created ‘women’s work’ with the NHS and nurses
• How many women 15-64 were in the Labour force?

  1955: 46%

  1965: 51%
• What happened in 1970

  Equal Pay Act
• What did not represent women’s rights?

  Trade Unions
• What was the post-ww2 social impact?

  Baby boom: women encouraged to leave the world of work

  1960s: 38% of married women worked part time and would leave if pregnant

  Vacuum cleaners and consumerism reduced the amount of time spent on house work

  Womens wages seen as extra to a mans
• What were the important social developments post WW2?

  1964: Married Women’s property act- married women got to keep their own money

  1968: 187 women in a Ford factory in Dagenham strike over equal pay

  1975: Welsh women drive to Brussels to give the European Parliament a petition for womens rights