Women's Right to Vote

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Women's suffrage refers to the right of women to participate in democratic processes through voting on the same basis as men. In the medieval and early modern periods in Europe, the right to vote was typically severely limited for all people by factors such as age, ownership of property, and gender. The development of the modern democratic state has been characterized internationally by the erosion of these various limitations following periods of collective struggle. Women's suffrage has been achieved as part of this process of modernization at different times in different national contexts, although very few nations granted women the right to vote in elections before the twentieth century (Freedman, pp. 63).

The first convention held to campaign for women's rights in the United States was held at Seneca Falls, New York, in 1848. Most of the women who attended, including Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott, had been actively involved in antislavery campaigning, and drew their political and philosophical arguments for equality from the United States Declaration of Independence's articulation of inalienable rights to life, independence, and the quest of happiness. By the end of the nineteenth century, a number of states, including Wyoming and Utah, had granted women the right to vote in State elections, but it was not until 1920, and with the support of President Woodrow Wilson, that the Nineteenth Amendment, which prohibited gender- based exclusions from voting at all state and federal levels, was ratified and women's suffrage was achieved.

Similarly, in the United Kingdom there was a mixture of parliamentary and extra parliamentary activism from the mid-nineteenth century until women were ultimately granted the vote on t...

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...ions run on the base of widespread and equal suffrage is fundamental. A further Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women was approved by the United Nations in 1979, and well-established the right of women to take part on an equal base in all phases of democratic government. This international consensus has been tested on many occasions, and there are still a number of states where women are not granted the right to vote, or at least not granted it on an equal basis with men. The establishment and the preservation of women's suffrage thus remains an active focus of political activism across the globe.

Works Cited

Freedman, E. B. No turning back: The history of feminism and the future of women. New York: Ballantine, 2002.

McElroy, W. Liberty for women: Freedom and feminism in the 21st century. New York: Ivan R. Dee, 2002.

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