women and the vote

[manchester regiment]

sorry for my ignorance,but when were women granted the vote,i ask out of curiosity,i am making copies of all the absent voters lists for manchester,and i found this ladys name in the 1918 AVL.

nurse dora kendall

VAD

imtarfa hospital,malta

she lived at.

30 hermitage rd,blackley,manchester

bernard

[John_Hartley]

Bernard

It was the 1918 Representation of the People Act. It gave the vote to women aged over 30 and men over 21. Younger women had to wait until 1928 for the vote. The Act is also the one that introduced the concept of "absent voting".

The first woman MP, Countess de Markievicz, was elected in 1919 for a Dublin seat.

John

[Sue Light]

Bernard

The Representation of the People Act 1918 gave women the right to vote in Parliamentary elections. This extract [not great quality] dated February 1918 gives information and advice to nurses:

Sue

[John_Hartley]

Sue's extract reminds me that there were different qualifications (for men and women) for parliamentary and local elections.

IIRC, whilst all men and women over 30 could vote at parliamentary elections, you had to be a householder, or married to one, to vote at local government elections. Meaning that a son, aged over 21 but still living at home, would not have a local council vote. Can't recall when this was scrapped completely - might have dragged on to the 1949 Act in some form.

John

[Sue Light]

John - I was holding back from being really boring [unlike me ] but as you mentioned it... this refers to a specific area, but gives the main outline:

Who could vote and when

It is important to bear in mind that before 1928 the number of people eligible to vote in elections was restricted. Before 1867 in urban areas and before 1884 in rural areas most men could not vote and would not appear in the register. No women could vote in parliamentary elections before 1918. Until 1884 there were two types of franchise: the borough and the county. In county constituencies, men over 21 who owned freehold land worth 40 shillings a year and over were qualified to vote. Before 1832 the borough franchise varied according to local custom. For example, Westminster, which was the only parliamentary borough in Middlesex at that time, had a ‘which qualified all men paying poor rates.

1832 Representation of the People Act (2 & 3 Will IV c.45)

For county voters the main qualification remained the holding of freehold property worth 40 shillings a year. However, the vote was extended to include £10 copyholders, £10 leaseholders (whose leases were for sixty years or more), and £50 tenants. The borough franchise was standardised in 1832 by giving the vote to owners of property worth £10. But in certain ancient chartered boroughs such as Westminster, this meant that fewer people than before could now vote. Therefore, it was enacted that anyone entitled to vote prior to 1832 might retain that right provided he remained resident in the same borough.

Three new parliamentary boroughs were created within Middlesex -

Finsbury, Marylebone, and Tower Hamlets.

1867 Representation of the People Act (30 & 31 Vic c.102)

The borough franchise was now given to every man who had, ‘during the whole of the preceding Twelve Calendar Months been an Inhabitant, Occupier, as Owner or Tenant, of any Dwelling House within the Borough, and has ... been rated as an ordinary occupier in respect of the premises so occupied ...’ The occupation franchise was also extended to lodgers in boroughs. Some working class men in urban areas were now able to vote for the first time. Chelsea became a parliamentary borough and Tower Hamlets was divided into two parliamentary boroughs - Hackney and Tower Hamlets.

1884 Representation of the People Act (48 & 49 Vic c.3)

The 1867 Act was applied to the counties in 1884. The distinction between the county and borough franchise was effectively abolished, and every male householder was now eligible to vote. However, half the men in the country were still unable to vote due to a clause in the Act which stated that ‘Where two or more men are owners either as joint tenants, or as tenants in common of an estate in any land or tenement, one of such men, but not more than one shall ... be entitled to be registered as a voter.’

Therefore, adult sons living at home or heads of households who shared houses were not eligible tovote. The following year the number of parliamentary boroughs in Middlesex excluding the City of London and Westminster was increased to sixteen. The remaining part of Middlesex was divided into seven parliamentary divisions.

1918 Representation of the People Act (7 & 8 Geo V c.64)

This Act enabled all men over 21 to vote. Women were allowed to qualify if they were local government voters, or the wives of local government voters provided that they were over 30.

1928 Equal Franchise Act (18 & 19 Geo V c.12)

Women over 21 became eligible to vote under this Act.

1948 Representation of the People Act (11 & 12 Geo VI c.65)

This Act abolished the business premises and university seats qualifications to vote which ensured that no person had more than one vote.

1969 Representation of the People Act (17 & 18 Ez II c.15)

The voting age was lowered to 18 years of age (this became effective from 1971). This Act also stated that those becoming eighteen during the period covered by the annual electoral register will have the date on which they reach their eighteenth birthday inserted in the register and they are able to vote from that date.

Sue

[Sue Light]

I have a feeling that Bernard might be sorry he asked

Sue

[Borys]

Ahoj!

Very interesting, thank you.

Borys

[John_Hartley]

Sue

I studied constitutional law as one of the subjects for my professional qualification so am reasonably well schooled in the boring bits.....but it was over 35 years ago so the memory of some of the detail has started to fade (mercifully).

John

[manchester regiment]

I have a feeling that Bernard might be sorry he asked

Sue

hiya sue/john,ime glad i asked,i always thought that ladies were given the vote in the 1920s,but when i saw the nurse mentioned in the AVL,i thought it may have been a mistake,bernard

[alliekiwi]

As an aside, were there any racially associated restrictions on voting in the UK, or did everyone of a certain age get the right to vote, no matter race, under that Act of 1928?

Just wondering, as I know Australia and Canada both gave white women the vote quite early on to be equal with the white men, but the native people were not able to vote til the early 1960s.

Allie

[Gibbo]

I don't know for sure if there were any racial restrictions on voting in the UK but I'd be surprised, given that there was an Indian MP, Dadabhai Naoroji, at Westminster as early as 1892.

Dadabhai Naoroji

[John_Hartley]

were there any racially associated restrictions on voting in the UK,

No. A citizen is a citizen.

We still have a quirk of history though, in that citizens if the Irish Republic resident in the UK, have the vote at parliamentary elections.

I think I'm also right in saying that citizens of the EU may also vote in local, but not parliamentary, elections in the countries in which they are resident. My Spanish is not too good but I was reading a local newspaper when I was on holiday and am pretty sure that, in at least one local council area on the Costa del Sol, the majority of voters are foreign nationals (probably mainly Brits).

John

[alliekiwi]

Thanks for that! It didn't seem likely there were racial differences, but then I was shocked when I found out about the aboriginal thing.

Gotta love those quirks of history - will have to try out the Irish thing if I'm ever in the UK when an election is on.

Allie

whose NZ citizenship status is a trifle dodgy