The demand for ‘votes for women’ is closely tied up with two other interrelated topics - the demand for women’s rights in the nineteenth century, and the growth of democracy in general. There is much overlap in content as well as in personnel. Women, for instance, played an important part in the Chartist movement as well as early trade unions. And, of course, don’t forget that women’s political rights developed faster at a local level than at the national level. (By 1914 more than 1 million women were voting in local elections.) It is also a topic where feminist historians have played a major part in revising ideas and accepted explanations. There is an ongoing debate whether gender or class is the most important factor in influencing behaviour; there is no doubt that the experience of working-class women during the period was very different to that of middle- and upper- class women.

Make sure you know the start points and end points of the specification you are studying - some begin in the 1860s, others the 1880s; some conclude in 1918, some continue to 1928. Find out which topics are regarded as central, and likely to figure in an exam, and which are regarded as background supporting knowledge. You will need to be able to put the topic clearly into context to do well in an exam. What will the examiner expect you to be able to do in the exam? Are you expected to recall factual know-ledge, analyse sources or interpret historians’ views? This must influence how you prepare.

(a) What was the position of women in society in the mid-nineteenth century? How did the doctrine of ‘Separate Spheres’ affect the part played by women in politics? Who led the demand for increasing legal rights? For better education? To own property? Did the failure to achieve meaningful progress in these areas lead to the demand for the vote?

(b) How important was the part played by the NUWSS and Millicent Fawcett? Why did they adopt the constitutional path to reform? How did the part played by middle- and upper-class women in the new constituency parties - organising, leafleting, attending meetings, etc, influence attitudes? What progress had been made by 1900?

(c) How important were the Pankhursts and the WSPU? Why were women adopting an increasingly militant approach to reform? What was the government’s response to increasingly militant tactics by the suffragettes? Was it violence that led to the development of the Anti-Suffrage League in 1908? Why did the press become increasing hostile? Did militancy create support or opposition?

(d) How did the political parties react? If the Liberals were increasingly in favour - individual freedom came to include the idea of women, too! - why did Asquith adopt such delaying tactics? Why were the Conservatives becoming more pro the idea - except in power? What was the attitude of the Labour party?

(e) How did the First World War influence women gaining the vote? Was it because militancy ended with the outbreak of war? Or because of women’s important role as war workers?

(a) Why were women so divided over the issue? Was it mostly middle- and upper-class women who were pushing for the vote? Did the idea of ‘separate spheres’ apply to working-class women? Why did so many women join the Anti-Suffrage movement?

(b) Who were more important in achieving the vote - suffragists or suffragettes? Historians used to focus more on the Pankhursts and the suffragettes, downplaying the role of the suffragists. Recent studies have altered the focus. Why?

(c) Why were the political parties so divided over granting women the vote? Was ‘votes for women’ a party issue, or an issue that divided parties among themselves? Was it an issue that depended on other changes in society taking place first, before politicians would take it seriously? Why did political parties tend to pay more attention to women’s rights when in opposition rather than in power?

(d) Were the suffragette and suffragist societies mostly middle class? Working women tended to be involved in trade unions, if at all. Why? What part did working-class men play in the campaign - positive or negative? Why did more working women demand the vote in the twentieth century than the nineteenth?

(e) When does the consensus that women should get the vote emerge? Why? How did the war change attitude towards democracy in general, and the role of women in society in particular? Why were women over 30 given the vote in 1918 rather than over 21 like men?