Editing Women's suffrage (section)

==History==
[[File:Women_suffrage_world_decade.svg|thumb|400x400px|Women's suffrage globally by decade of approval.{{Legend|#FFE6D5|Before 1911}}{{Legend|#FFCCAA|1911–1920}}{{Legend|#FFB380|1921–1930}}{{Legend|#FF9955|1931–1940}}{{Legend|#FF7F2A|1941–1950}}{{Legend|#FF6600|1951–1960}}{{Legend|#D45500|1961–1970}}{{Legend|#AA4400|1971–1980}}{{Legend|#803300|After 1980}}{{Legend|#241C1C|No elections}}]]
{{For timeline|Timeline of women's suffrage}}
[[File:AnnaIIStolQued.jpg|thumb|upright|left|[[Anna II, Abbess of Quedlinburg]]. In the pre-modern era in some parts of Europe, [[abbess]]es were permitted to participate and vote in various European national assemblies by virtue of their rank within the Roman Catholic and Protestant churches.]]

===Before the 19th century===
In ancient [[Athenian democracy|Athens]], often cited as the birthplace of democracy, only adult male citizens who owned land were permitted to vote.{{Citation needed|date=February 2024}}  Through subsequent centuries, Europe was ruled by monarchs, though various forms of parliament arose at different times. The high rank ascribed to [[abbess]]es within the [[Catholic Church]] permitted some women the right to sit and vote at national assemblies – as with various high-ranking abbesses in Medieval Germany, who were ranked among the independent princes of the empire. Their Protestant successors enjoyed the same privilege almost into modern times.<ref name="Abbess">{{cite encyclopedia |url=http://oce.catholic.com/index.php?title=Abbess |title=Abbess |encyclopedia=Original Catholic Encyclopedia |date=July 2, 2010|access-date=December 26, 2012 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120114130058/http://oce.catholic.com/index.php?title=Abbess |archive-date=January 14, 2012 }}</ref>

[[Marie Guyart]], a French nun who worked with the [[First Nations in Canada|First Nations]] people of Canada during the 17th century, wrote in 1654 regarding the suffrage practices of [[Iroquois]] women: "These female chieftains are women of standing amongst the savages, and they have a deciding vote in the councils. They make decisions there like their male counterparts, and it is they who even delegated as first ambassadors to discuss peace."<ref>''Women Mystics Confront the Modern World'' (Marie-Florine Bruneau: State University of New York: 1998: p. 106).</ref> The Iroquois, like many First Nations in North America,{{citation needed|date=January 2021|reason=The only other First Nation example I could find was the Haida people}} had a [[matrilineal]] [[kinship system]]. Property and descent were passed through the female line. Women elders voted on hereditary male chiefs and could depose them.

[[File:Catherine Helen Spence.jpg|thumb|[[South Australia]]n suffragist [[Catherine Helen Spence]] stood for office in 1897. In a first for the modern world, South Australia granted women the right to stand for Parliament in 1895.<ref name=SA1895>{{cite web |url=https://www.parliament.sa.gov.au/education/teachers/Documents/Women's%20Petition%20Photograph.pdf |title=Women's Suffrage Petition 1894 |publisher=parliament.sa.gov.au |access-date=January 8, 2016 |archive-date=March 29, 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110329160732/http://www.parliament.sa.gov.au/education/teachers/Documents/Women%27s%20Petition%20Photograph.pdf |url-status=dead }}</ref>|330x330px]]
[[File:Marie Stritt.jpg|thumb|[[Marie Stritt]] (1855–1928), German suffragist, co-founder of the [[International Alliance of Women]]|330x330px]]

The first independent country to introduce women's suffrage was arguably Sweden. In Sweden, conditional women's suffrage was in effect during the [[Age of Liberty]] (1718–1772).<ref name="Karlsson Sjögren"/>

In 1756, [[Lydia Taft]] became the first legal woman voter in colonial America. This occurred under [[British North America|British rule]] in the [[Province of Massachusetts Bay|Massachusetts Colony]].<ref name="address">{{cite book |last=Chapin |first=Judge Henry |title=Address Delivered at the Unitarian Church in Uxbridge; 1864 |page=[https://archive.org/details/addressdelivere00socigoog/page/n19 172] |year=1881|publisher=Worcester, Press of C. Hamilton |location=Worcester, Mass.|url=https://archive.org/details/addressdelivere00socigoog}}</ref> In a [[New England]] [[town meeting]] in [[Uxbridge, Massachusetts|Uxbridge]], Massachusetts, she voted on at least three occasions.<ref name="blacks">{{cite web|title=Uxbridge Breaks Tradition and Makes History: Lydia Taft by Carol Masiello|publisher=The Blackstone Daily|url=http://blackstonedaily.com/Journeys/cm-lt.htm|access-date=January 21, 2011|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110812130808/http://blackstonedaily.com/Journeys/cm-lt.htm|archive-date=August 12, 2011}}</ref> Unmarried white women who owned property could vote in [[New Jersey]] from 1776 to 1807.<ref>[https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2020/local/history/new-jersey-women-vote-1776-suffrage/ "More than a century before the 19th Amendment, women were voting in New Jersey"]. ''Washington Post''.</ref>

In the 1792 elections in [[Sierra Leone]], then a new British colony, all heads of household could vote and one-third were ethnic African women.<ref>[[Simon Schama|Schama, Simon]], ''[[Rough Crossings]]'' (2006), p. 431.</ref>

Other early instances of women's suffrage include the [[Corsican Republic]] (1755), the [[Pitcairn Islands]] (1838), the [[Isle of Man]] (1881), and [[Franceville, New Hebrides|Franceville]] (1889–1890), but some of these operated only briefly as independent states and others were not clearly independent.

===19th century===
The female descendants of the [[Mutiny on the Bounty|''Bounty'' mutineers]] who lived on [[Pitcairn Islands]] could vote from 1838. This right was transferred after they resettled in 1856 to [[Norfolk Island]] (now an Australian external territory).<ref name="elections.org.nz">{{cite web|author=EC |url=http://www.elections.org.nz/votes-women/first-world |title=First in the World |website=Elections.org.nz |publisher=[[New Zealand Electoral Commission]] |date=February 1, 2013|access-date=June 18, 2016}}</ref>

The emergence of modern democracy generally began with male citizens obtaining the right to vote in advance of female citizens, except in the [[Kingdom of Hawai'i]], where universal suffrage was introduced in 1840 without mention of sex; however, a constitutional amendment in 1852 rescinded female voting and put property qualifications on male voting.<ref name="Kauanui 2018 187–189">{{cite book |last=Kauanui |first=J. Kehaulani |date=2018 |title=Paradoxes of Hawaiian Sovereignty: Land, Sex, and the Colonial Politics of State Nationalism |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_yRvDwAAQBAJ&pg=PT187 |location=Oxford, North Carolina |publisher=Duke University Press Books  |pages=187–189 |isbn=978-0822370499 }}</ref>

The seed for the first Woman's Rights Convention in the United States in [[Seneca Falls Convention|Seneca Falls]], New York, was planted in 1840, when [[Elizabeth Cady Stanton]] met [[Lucretia Mott]] at the [[World Anti-Slavery Convention]] in London. The conference refused to seat Mott and other women delegates from the U.S. because of their sex. In 1851, Stanton met temperance worker [[Susan B. Anthony]], and shortly the two would be joined in the long struggle to secure the vote for women in the U.S. In 1868 Anthony encouraged working women from the printing and sewing trades in New York, who were excluded from men's trade unions, to form Working Women's Associations. As a delegate to the National Labor Congress in 1868, Anthony persuaded the committee on female labor to call for votes for women and equal pay for equal work. The men at the conference deleted the reference to the vote.<ref>{{cite web|author=web-wizardry.com |url=http://susanbanthonyhouse.org/her-story/biography.php |title=Biography of Susan B. Anthony at |publisher=Susanbanthonyhouse.org |date=March 1, 1906|access-date=September 2, 2011}}</ref> In the US, women in the [[Wyoming Territory]] were permitted to both vote and stand for office in 1869.<ref name="Wyoming">see facsimile at {{Cite web|url=http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/displayPhoto.pl?path=/pnp/ppmsca/03000/&topImages=03000r.jpg |title=An Act to Grant to the Women of Wyoming Territory the Right of Suffrage and to Hold Office|date=December 10, 1869|access-date=December 9, 2007|publisher=[[Library of Congress]]}}</ref> Subsequent American suffrage groups often disagreed on tactics, with the [[National American Woman Suffrage Association]] arguing for a state-by-state campaign and the [[National Woman's Party]] focusing on an amendment to the U.S. Constitution.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://depts.washington.edu/moves/NWP_project.shtml|title= National Woman's Party: a year-by-year history 1913–1922}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |title=The School of Voters |date=September 15, 1917 |publisher=Vogue |location=New York |page=52 |url=http://www.oldmagazinearticles.com/women-immigrants_and_New-York-State_Suffrage_Amendment_article-pdf}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Adams |first1=Kimberly |title=The campaign finance of women's suffrage |url=https://www.marketplace.org/2019/06/04/the-campaign-finance-of-womens-suffrage/ |website=The Campaign Finance of Women’s Suffrage, Marketplace |date=June 4, 2019 |publisher=Marketplace |access-date=10 May 2024}}</ref>

The [[1840 Constitution of the Hawaiian Kingdom|1840 constitution]] of the Kingdom of Hawaii established a House of Representatives, but did not specify who was eligible to participate in the election of it. Some academics have argued that this omission enabled women to vote in the first elections, in which votes were cast by means of signatures on [[petition]]s; but this interpretation remains controversial.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Sai |first1=David Keanu |title=Memorandum—Re: Suffrage of Female Subjects |url=https://www.hawaiiankingdom.org/info-suffrage.shtml |website=HawaiianKingdom.org |publisher=Acting Council of Regency |access-date=14 December 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171021210546/https://www.hawaiiankingdom.org/info-suffrage.shtml |archive-date=21 October 2017 |location=Honolulu, Hawaii |date=12 March 1998}}</ref> The [[1852 Constitution of the Hawaiian Kingdom|second constitution of 1852]] specified that suffrage was restricted to males over twenty years-old.<ref name="Kauanui 2018 187–189"/>

In 1849, the [[Grand Duchy of Tuscany]], in Italy, was the first European state to have a law that provided for the vote of women, for administrative elections, taking up a tradition that was already informally sometimes present in Italy.

The 1853 Constitution of the province of Vélez in the [[Republic of New Granada]], modern day [[Colombia]], allowed for married women, or women older than the age of 21, the right to vote within the province. However, this law was subsequently annulled by the [[Supreme Court of Justice of Colombia|Supreme Court of the Republic]], arguing that the citizens of the province could not have more rights than those already guaranteed to the citizens of the other provinces of the country, thus eliminating female suffrage from this province in 1856.<ref>{{cite web|date=2019|title=Santander: el primer intento del voto femenino en Colombia|url=https://www.radionacional.co/cultura/santander-el-primer-intento-del-voto-femenino-en-colombia|website=Radio Nacional de Colombia|language=Spanish}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|last=Mira|first=Carlos Andrés|title=Primer paso en la lucha por el sufragio femenino en Colombia: historia de un intento de construcción de escenarios de inclusión política|url=https://www.urosario.edu.co/Revista-Nova-Et-Vetera/Vol-2-Ed-18/Omnia/Primer-paso-en-la-lucha-por-el-sufragio-femenino-e/|website=Revista Nova et Vetera de la Universidad del Rosario|language=Spanish|access-date=August 24, 2021|archive-date=August 24, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210824203845/https://www.urosario.edu.co/Revista-Nova-Et-Vetera/Vol-2-Ed-18/Omnia/Primer-paso-en-la-lucha-por-el-sufragio-femenino-e/|url-status=dead}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|title=El voto femenino|url=https://www.rtvc.gov.co/elecciones-colombia-2019/el-voto-femenino|website=RTVC Colombia|date=October 23, 2019|language=Spanish}}</ref>

In 1881 the [[Isle of Man]], an internally self-governing dependent territory of the British Crown, enfranchised women property owners. With this it provided the first action for women's suffrage within the [[British Isles]].<ref name="elections.org.nz"/>

The [[Pacific Ocean|Pacific]] commune of [[Franceville, New Hebrides|Franceville]] (now [[Port Vila, Vanuatu]]), maintained independence from 1889 to 1890, becoming the first [[Self-governance|self-governing]] nation to adopt universal suffrage without distinction of sex or color, although only white males were permitted to hold office.<ref>"Wee, Small Republics: A Few Examples of Popular Government", ''[[Hawaiian Gazette]]'', November 1, 1895, p. 1.</ref>

For countries that have their origins in self-governing colonies but later became independent nations in the 20th century, the [[Colony of New Zealand]] was the first to acknowledge women's right to vote in 1893, largely due to a movement led by [[Kate Sheppard]]. The British protectorate of [[Cook Islands]] rendered the same right in 1893 as well.<ref>{{cite web|author=EC |url=http://www.elections.org.nz/study/education-centre/history/votes-for-women.html#1 |title=Elections.org.nz |publisher=Elections.org.nz |date=April 1, 2005|access-date=January 8, 2011 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120819080640/http://www.elections.org.nz/study/education-centre/history/votes-for-women.html |archive-date=August 19, 2012 }}</ref> Another British colony, [[South Australia]], followed in 1895, [[Constitutional Amendment (Adult Suffrage) Act 1894|enacting laws]] which not only extended voting to women, but also made women eligible to stand for election to its parliament.<ref name=":0" /><ref name="FennaRobbins2013" />{{Refn|South Australia celebrated the centenary of the female franchise in 1994; that is, 100 years from the date the legislation was passed by parliament rather that from the date it gained royal assent.<ref>{{Cite web |title=South Australian women gain the vote: Overview |url=https://www.parliament.sa.gov.au/en/About-Parliament/Women-in-Politics |access-date=5 September 2024 |website=Parliament South Australia}}.</ref>}}

===20th century===
[[File:French pro women's suffrage poster 1934.jpg|thumb|French pro-suffrage poster, 1934]]
Following the [[Federation of Australia|federation of the British colonies in Australia]] in 1901, the new federal government enacted the [[Commonwealth Franchise Act 1902]] which allowed female [[British subject]]s to vote and stand for election on the same terms as men. However, many [[indigenous Australians]] remained excluded from voting federally until 1962.<ref name="Indigenous Australians">{{cite web|url=https://www.nma.gov.au/defining-moments/resources/indigenous-australians-right-to-vote |title=Indigenous Australians' right to vote |publisher=National Museum of Australia |access-date=November 14, 2023}}</ref>

The first place in Europe to introduce women's suffrage was the [[Grand Duchy of Finland]] in 1906, and it also became the first place in continental Europe to implement racially-equal suffrage for women.<ref name="eduskunta.fi" /><ref name="web.archive.org" /> As a result of the [[1907 Finnish parliamentary election|1907 parliamentary elections]], Finland's voters elected 19 women as the first female members of a representative parliament. This was one of many self-governing actions in the Russian autonomous province that led to conflict with the Russian governor of Finland, ultimately leading to the [[Independence of Finland|creation of the Finnish nation]] in 1917.

In the years before [[World War I]], women in Norway also won the right to vote. During WWI, Denmark, Russia, Germany, and Poland also recognized women's right to vote.

Canada gave right to vote to some women in 1917; women getting vote on same basis as men in 1920, that is, men and women of certain races or status being excluded from voting until 1960, when universal adult suffrage was achieved.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/franchise|title = Right to Vote in Canada &#124; the Canadian Encyclopedia}}</ref>

[[File:1930s Gladys Misick Morrell & Sergt Henderson & table at Cavello Hill, Bermuda.jpg|thumb|right|A [[Bermuda Police Service|Bermuda Police]] [[Police Sergeant|Sergeant]] confiscates women's suffrage activist [[Gladys Morrell]]'s table in the 1930s.]]
The [[Representation of the People Act 1918]] saw British women over 30 gain the vote. Dutch women won the passive vote (allowed to run for parliament) after a revision of the Dutch Constitution in 1917 and the active vote (electing representatives) in 1919, and American women on August 26, 1920, with the passage of the [[Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution|19th Amendment]] (the [[Voting Rights Act of 1965]] secured voting rights for racial minorities). Irish women won the same voting rights as men in the [[Irish Free State]] constitution, 1922. In 1928, British women won suffrage on the same terms as men, that is, for ages 21 and older. The suffrage of Turkish women was introduced in 1930 for local elections and in 1934 for national elections.

By the time French women were granted the suffrage in July 1944 by [[Charles de Gaulle]]'s government in exile, by a vote of 51 for, 16 against,<ref>{{cite web|url=https://information.tv5monde.com/terriennes/21-avril-1944-les-francaises-ont-enfin-le-droit-de-voter-3230|title=21 avril 1944 : les Françaises ont (enfin) le droit de voter|date=December 24, 2014|website=tv5monde.com}}</ref> France had been for about a decade the only Western country that did not at least allow women's suffrage at municipal elections.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www2.assemblee-nationale.fr/decouvrir-l-assemblee/histoire/le-suffrage-universel/la-conquete-de-la-citoyennete-politique-des-femmes|title=La conquête de la citoyenneté politique des femmes|author=Assemblée Nationale}}</ref>

Voting rights for women were introduced into [[international law]] by the United Nations' Human Rights Commission, whose elected chair was [[Eleanor Roosevelt]]. In 1948 the United Nations adopted the [[Universal Declaration of Human Rights]]; Article&nbsp;21 stated: "(1) Everyone has the right to take part in the government of his country, directly or through freely chosen representatives. (3) The will of the people shall be the basis of the authority of government; this will shall be expressed in periodic and genuine elections which shall be by universal and equal suffrage and shall be held by secret vote or by equivalent free voting procedures."

The [[United Nations General Assembly]] adopted the [[Convention on the Political Rights of Women]], which went into force in 1954, enshrining the equal rights of women to vote, hold office, and access public services as set out by national laws.

===21st century===
One of the most recent jurisdictions to acknowledge women's full right to vote was [[Bhutan]] in 2008 (its first national elections).<ref>{{cite journal|author=Mian Ridge |url=http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Asia-South-Central/2008/0325/p04s01-wosc.html |title=Bhutan makes it official: it's a democracy.|journal=Christian Science Monitor |date=March 25, 2008 |access-date=September 2, 2011}}</ref> Most recently, King [[Abdullah of Saudi Arabia]], after both national and international condemnation and activism by feminist groups, granted Saudi women the vote and right to run for office for the first time in the [[2015 Saudi Arabian municipal elections|2015 local elections]].<ref name="photographtasneemalsultan,nationalgeographic">{{cite web|url=http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2015/12/151212-saudi-arabia-election-women-vote/|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151217135730/http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2015/12/151212-saudi-arabia-election-women-vote/|url-status=dead|archive-date=December 17, 2015|title=In a Historic Election, Saudi Women Cast First-Ever Ballots|author=Photograph Tasneem Alsultan, National Geographic}}</ref><ref name="Stewart 2015">{{cite web | last=Stewart | first=Ellen | title=Women win seats in the Saudi election for the first time in history | website=i100 | date=13 December 2015 | url=http://i100.independent.co.uk/article/women-win-seats-in-the-saudi-arabia-election-for-the-first-time-in-history--bylIVXK3ql | access-date=14 December 2015 | archive-date=16 December 2015 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151216004819/http://i100.independent.co.uk/article/women-win-seats-in-the-saudi-arabia-election-for-the-first-time-in-history--bylIVXK3ql | url-status=dead }}</ref>