[Speakers who opposed the motion are
shaded blue.]
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against giving women the vote] are both out of date and out of place.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]…
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.
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…
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…
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…
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.
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…
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.
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…
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…
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.
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…
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.
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.
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.
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.
17.
Sir William Byles
My
firm and unshaken belief is in the emancipation of women and in the justice of
electoral equality for them.
18.
Mr Dickinson
I
regard this question of the women’s franchise as part of the movement of
civilisation.
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.
Vote:
Ayes 208, Noes 222
From
Official Reports 5th Series Parliamentary Debates: Commons,
Vol
xxxvi (Mar 25 – Apr 12, 1912) cols
615–732.
[1]
Lord Cecil said of this survey: ‘a canvas by post cards is an
exceedingly unsatisfactory method of ascertaining anything’