Conciliation bills were bills proposing to introduce

women's suffrage in the United Kingdom A movement to fight for women's right to vote in the United Kingdom finally succeeded through acts of Parliament in 1918 and 1928. It became a national movement in the Victorian era. Women were not explicitly banned from voting in Great Brita ...

subject to a property qualification, which would have given just over a million wealthy women the right to vote in parliamentary elections. Three Conciliation bills were put before the

House of Commons The House of Commons is the name for the elected lower house of the Bicameralism, bicameral parliaments of the United Kingdom and Canada. In both of these countries, the Commons holds much more legislative power than the nominally upper house of ...

, in 1910, 1911, and 1912, but each failed. After the January 1910 election, the Parliamentary Franchise (Women) Bill was drafted by a Conciliation Committee for Woman Suffrage, ultimately comprising 54 Members of Parliament (MPs — 25 Liberal, 17

Conservative Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy and ideology that seeks to promote and preserve traditional institutions, customs, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civiliza ...

, 6 Labour and 6

Irish nationalist Irish nationalism is a nationalist political movement which, in its broadest sense, asserts that the people of Ireland should govern Ireland as a sovereign state. Since the mid-19th century, Irish nationalism has largely taken the form of cult ...

), with Lord Lytton as chair and H. N. Brailsford as secretary."Woman Suffrage", ''The Times'', 27 May 1910, p. 10. While the minority Liberal government of H. H. Asquith supported the bill, a number of

backbencher In Westminster system, Westminster and other parliamentary systems, a backbencher is a member of parliament (MP) or a legislator who occupies no Minister (government), governmental office and is not a Frontbencher, frontbench spokesperson ...

s, both Conservative and Liberal, did not, fearing that it would damage their parties' success in

general election A general election is an electoral process to choose most or all members of a governing body at the same time. They are distinct from By-election, by-elections, which fill individual seats that have become vacant between general elections. Gener ...

s. Some pro-suffrage groups rejected the bills because they only gave the vote to propertied women; some MPs rejected them because they did not want any women to have the right to vote. Liberals also opposed the bills because they believed that the women whom the bills would enfranchise were more likely to vote Conservative than Liberal.

Conciliation Bill 1910

Prime Minister Asquith agreed to give the bill parliamentary time after pressure from the Cabinet. The bill passed its first reading. It passed a

second reading A reading of a bill is a stage of debate on the bill held by a general body of a legislature. In the Westminster system, developed in the United Kingdom, there are generally three readings of a bill as it passes through the stages of becoming ...

on 12 July by 320 votes to 175. However, for committee stage it was referred to a Committee of the Whole House rather than to a public bill committee, which in effect meant it would never be passed within the parliamentary session. Further parliamentary progress became impossible on 18 November 1910, when Asquith announced a

dissolution of parliament The dissolution of a legislative assembly (or parliament) is the simultaneous termination of service of all of its members, in anticipation that a successive legislative assembly will reconvene later with possibly different members. In a democracy ...

for 28 November and ensuing general election in December. The

Women's Social and Political Union The Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU) was a women-only political movement and leading militant organisation campaigning for women's suffrage in the United Kingdom founded in 1903. Known from 1906 as the suffragettes, its membership and p ...

(WPSU) saw this as a betrayal, and their protest march later on 18 November became known as Black Friday.

Conciliation Bill 1911

The Second Conciliation Bill was debated on 5 May 1911 and won a majority of 255 to 88 as a Private Members Bill. The bill was promised a week of government time. However, in November Asquith announced that he was in favour of a manhood suffrage bill and that suffragists could suggest and propose an amendment that would allow some women to vote. On 21 November 1911, the WPSU carried out an "official window smash" along

Whitehall Whitehall is a road and area in the City of Westminster, Central London, England. The road forms the first part of the A roads in Zone 3 of the Great Britain numbering scheme, A3212 road from Trafalgar Square to Chelsea, London, Chelsea. It ...

and

Fleet Street Fleet Street is a street in Central London, England. It runs west to east from Temple Bar, London, Temple Bar at the boundary of the City of London, Cities of London and City of Westminster, Westminster to Ludgate Circus at the site of the Lo ...

; its targets included the offices of the ''

Daily Mail The ''Daily Mail'' is a British daily Middle-market newspaper, middle-market Tabloid journalism, tabloid conservative newspaper founded in 1896 and published in London. , it has the List of newspapers in the United Kingdom by circulation, h ...

'' and the '' Daily News'' and the official residences or homes of leading Liberal politicians. The bill was consequently dropped.

Conciliation Bill 1912

The Parliamentary Franchise (Women) Bill was again introduced on 19 February 1912 and set down for Second Reading on 22 March, although the debate was later delayed to 29 March. However this time the bill was defeated by 208 to 222. The reason for the defeat was that the

Irish Parliamentary Party The Irish Parliamentary Party (IPP; commonly called the Irish Party or the Home Rule Party) was formed in 1874 by Isaac Butt, the leader of the Nationalist Party, replacing the Home Rule League, as official parliamentary party for Irish nati ...

believed that a debate over votes for women would be used to prevent Irish Home Rule. However, the WPSU blamed Asquith, as the eight members of the Government who had voted against the bill would have overturned the result had they voted the other way. A Franchise and Registration Bill, for

universal manhood suffrage Universal manhood suffrage is a form of voting rights in which all adult male citizens within a political system are allowed to vote, regardless of income, property, religion, race, or any other qualification. It is sometimes summarized by the s ...

, was introduced in 1912. On 27 January 1913, James Lowther, the Speaker, ruled that amendments relating to women's franchise were out of order, and the bill was withdrawn.

References

Sources

* * {{cite book , last1=Pankhurst , first1=Christabel , author-link=Christabel Pankhurst , editor-last1=Pethick-Lawrence , editor-first1=Frederick , editor-link=Frederick Pethick-Lawrence, 1st Baron Pethick-Lawrence , title=Unshackled: The Story of How We Won the Vote , date=1919 , publisher=Hutchinson , location=London , pages=148–236 , url=https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.500484/page/n153 , language=en

External links