Editing Women's suffrage (section)

=== Oceania ===
[[File:Women suffrage cartoon.png|thumb|upright|Australian women's rights were lampooned in this 1887 ''Melbourne Punch'' cartoon: A hypothetical female member foists her baby's care on the House Speaker. [[South Australian]] women were to achieve the vote in 1895.<ref name=SA1895/>]]

==== Australia ====
{{main|Women's suffrage in Australia}}[[File:Edith Cowan.jpg|thumb|upright|[[Edith Cowan]] (1861–1932) was elected to the [[Western Australian Legislative Assembly]] in 1921 and was the first woman elected to any Australian Parliament (though women in Australia had already had the vote for two decades).]]

Propertied women in the colony of South Australia were granted the vote in local elections (but not parliamentary elections) in 1861. [[Henrietta Dugdale]], [[Annie Lowe]], and [[Elizabeth Rennick]] formed the [[Victorian Women's Suffrage Society]], the first suffrage society in Australia in 1884.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Smart |first=Judith |date=July 2008 |title=Women's Suffrage Organisations - Entry - |url=https://www.emelbourne.net.au/biogs/EM01637b.htm |access-date=2025-04-22 |website=eMelbourne - The Encyclopedia of Melbourne Online: School of Historical Studies, Department of History |language=en-gb}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=Carey |first=Jane |date=4 May 2009 |title=The Victorian Women's Suffrage Society |url=https://www.womenaustralia.info/entries/the-victorian-womens-suffrage-society/ |access-date=2025-04-22 |website=Australian Women's Register |language=en-AU}}</ref> [[Womanhood Suffrage League of New South Wales|The Womanhood Suffrage League of New South Wales]] was founded in Sydney in 1891. Women became eligible to vote for the [[Parliament of South Australia]] in 1895, as were Aboriginal men and women.<ref name=SA1895/> In 1897, [[Catherine Helen Spence]] became the first female political candidate for political office, unsuccessfully standing for election as a delegate to Federal Convention on Australian Federation. [[Western Australia]] granted voting rights to women in 1899.<ref name="aec.gov.au">{{cite web|url=http://www.aec.gov.au/Elections/Australian_Electoral_History/milestone.htm |title=AEC.gov.au |publisher=AEC.gov.au |date=August 9, 2007 |access-date=January 8, 2011}}</ref>

The first election for the Parliament of the newly formed Commonwealth of Australia in 1901 was based on the electoral provisions of the six pre-existing colonies, so that women who had the vote and the right to stand for Parliament at state level had the same rights for the 1901 Australian Federal election. In 1902, the Commonwealth Parliament passed the Commonwealth Franchise Act, which enabled all non-indigenous women to vote and stand for election to the Federal Parliament. The following year [[Nellie Martel]], [[Mary Moore-Bentley]], [[Vida Goldstein]], and [[Selina Siggins]] stood for election.<ref name="aec.gov.au"/> The Act specifically excluded 'natives' from Commonwealth franchise unless already enrolled in a state, the situation in South Australia. In 1949, the right to vote in federal elections was extended to all indigenous people who had served in the armed forces, or were enrolled to vote in state elections (Queensland, Western Australia, and the Northern Territory still excluded indigenous women from voting rights). Remaining restrictions were abolished in 1962 by the Commonwealth Electoral Act.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.aec.gov.au/Voting/indigenous_vote/indigenous.htm |title=AEC.gov.au |publisher=AEC.gov.au |access-date=January 8, 2011}}</ref>

[[Edith Cowan]] was elected to the Western Australian Legislative Assembly in 1921, the first woman elected to any Australian Parliament. Dame [[Enid Lyons]], in the [[House of Representatives (Australia)|Australian House of Representatives]] and Senator [[Dorothy Tangney]] became the first women in the Federal Parliament in 1943. Lyons went on to be the first woman to hold a [[Cabinet of Australia|Cabinet]] post in the 1949 ministry of [[Robert Menzies]]. [[Rosemary Follett]] was elected [[Chief Minister of the Australian Capital Territory]] in 1989, becoming the first woman elected to lead a state or territory. By 2010, the people of Australia's oldest city, [[Sydney]] had female leaders occupying every major political office above them, with [[Clover Moore]] as Lord Mayor, [[Kristina Keneally]] as Premier of New South Wales, [[Marie Bashir]] as Governor of New South Wales, [[Julia Gillard]] as prime minister, [[Quentin Bryce]] as [[Governor-General of Australia]] and [[Elizabeth II]] as [[Monarchy of Australia|Queen of Australia]].

==== Cook Islands ====
{{Main|Women in the Cook Islands}}
[[Women in the Cook Islands|Women]] in [[Rarotonga]] won the right to vote in 1893, shortly after New Zealand.<ref name= Markoff >Markoff, John, 'Margins, Centers, and Democracy: The Paradigmatic History of Women's Suffrage' ''Signs the Journal of Women in Culture and Society'', 2003; 29 (1).</ref>

==== New Zealand ====
{{Main|Women's suffrage in New Zealand}}
New Zealand's Electoral Act of September&nbsp;19, 1893 made the self-governing British colony the first country in the world to grant women the right to vote in parliamentary elections.<ref name="elections.org.nz" /><ref>{{Cite web |last=Pickles |first=Katie |date=19 September 2018 |title=Why New Zealand was the first country where women won the right to vote |url=https://theconversation.com/why-new-zealand-was-the-first-country-where-women-won-the-right-to-vote-103219 |access-date=11 October 2024 |website=The Conversation}}</ref>

Although the [[Liberal Government of New Zealand|Liberal government]] which passed the bill generally advocated social and political reform, the electoral bill was only passed because of a combination of personality issues and political accident. The bill granted the vote to women of all races. New Zealand women were denied the right to stand for parliament, however, until 1920. In 2005 almost a third of the [[Parliament of New Zealand|Members of Parliament]] elected were female. Women recently have also occupied powerful and symbolic offices such as those of [[Prime Minister of New Zealand|Prime Minister]] ([[Jenny Shipley]], [[Helen Clark]] and [[Jacinda Ardern]]), [[Governor-General of New Zealand|Governor-General]] ([[Catherine Tizard]], [[Patsy Reddy]], [[Cindy Kiro]] and [[Silvia Cartwright]]), [[Chief Justice of New Zealand|Chief Justice]] ([[Sian Elias]] and [[Helen Winkelmann]]), [[Speaker of the New Zealand House of Representatives|Speaker of the House of Representatives]] ([[Margaret Wilson]]), and from March 3, 2005, to August 23, 2006, all four of these posts were held by women, along with [[Elizabeth II|Queen Elizabeth]] as [[Monarchy of New Zealand|Head of State]].

==== Pitcairn and Norfolk Islands ====
The female descendants of the [[Mutiny on the Bounty|''Bounty'' mutineers]] who lived on Pitcairn Island could vote for their local councils from 1838, and this right transferred with their resettlement to [[Norfolk Island]] (now an [[States and territories of Australia|Australian external territory]]) in 1856.<ref name=":1" /><ref>{{Cite journal |last=Palmieri |first=Sonia |last2=Howard |first2=Elise |last3=Baker |first3=Kerryn |date=2023-10-02 |title=Reframing Suffrage Narratives: Pacific Women, Political Voice, and Collective Empowerment |url=https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00223344.2023.2247348#d1e248 |journal=The Journal of Pacific History |volume=58 |issue=4 |pages=392–411 |doi=10.1080/00223344.2023.2247348 |issn=0022-3344|doi-access=free }}</ref>