women's suffrage

Mrs Henry Fawcett, the English campaigner who was a leading figure in the movement for women's rights for over fifty years. She founded a new women's suffrage society, later uniting the various separate organizations into the National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies. Opposed to the militant tactics of the Pankhursts, she believed that the enfranchisement of women could be achieved by peaceful means.

Women's right to vote in elections. After a prolonged struggle women were finally given the right to vote on equal terms with men in 1920 in the USA and in 1928 in Britain. Women's suffrage was granted at different times in different countries; for example Norway granted women the vote in 1913; Belgium in 1948. Swiss women won the right to vote only in 1971.

In the USA there had been organizations working to obtain women's suffrage for many years. Susan B Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton founded the National Woman Suffrage Association in 1869, the first women's movement in the USA. Initial success came in 1869, when Wyoming, then a territory, gave women the vote. In 1893 the state of Colorado followed. Then followed Utah, Idaho, and Washington. In 1919 the National Congress submitted a women's suffrage amendment to the constitution for action by the states. This became law in 1920.