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HAS SUFFERED SERIOUS REVERSES IN THE BRITISH HOUSE OF LORDS. The Prime Minister Woman’s Warmest Advocate—Supporters will Needs Bestt Themselves to Recover the Set-back. Now that we have before us full re ports of the debates in Parliament on the Lords’ amendment to the London Government bill, an amendment by which women were made ineligible for the office of alderman or councillor in the new metropolitan municipalities, we cannot but recognize that the wo man suffrage movement in Great Bri tain has encountered a serious reverse. The discussion turned undisguisedly on the question whether even an initial step should be taken toward the be stowal of the Parliamentary franchise upon women, and a negative answer was returned by a large majority in the House of Commons, which, hith erto, on several occasions, has encour aged the advocates of woman’s rights, not a few distinguished Conservatives, as well as many Liberals, having de clared themselves in favor of the en tire political equality of the sexes. It now looks as if the woman suffrage so cieties would have to put redoubled pressure upon candidates for seats in the next Parliament, if they are to re gain the lost ground. It will be remembered that the Lon don Government bill, which has now become a law, provides for the local administration of the various districts included in the wide area for whose collective needs the London County Council was instituted. When the bill was under discussion in the Com mons, an amendment was moved mak ing women eligible for the office of al derman or councillor in the new muni cipal districts. The Government did not oppose the amendment, and it was carried. When the measure reached the House of Lords, Lord Dunraven, of international yacht race notoriety, moved to expunge this particular clause, on the express ground that, were it allowed to stand, its principle logically must be extended to all municipal councils in the country. Lord Salisbury defended the cause, pointing out that the Commons have merely given women the same right of access to the new councils that they then enjoyed to the London vestries, which were to be supersed ed. It would be unreasonable, he said, that, under the cloak of a mere change in the name of the local bodies, women should be subjected to a par liamentary condemnation without any proof that they had been unworthy of the trust with which they were al ready invested. He added that, as a matter of fact, the new councils would have to consider such questions as the housing of the working classes, with which women are peculiarly fitted to deal. SHOULD SIT IN PARLIAMENT. The Prime Minister was supported by the Archbishop of York and Lord Londonderry; and, what is especially to be noted, Lord Kimberley, the lead er of the Liberals, asserted that it would be contrary to practice and to ordinary justice to deprive women of a privilege they already possessed, and that no supporter of the clause would be, necessarily, committed to woman suffrage in the broadest sense. The Lord Chancellor, on the other hand, did not hesitate to oppose his chief, on the distinct plea that the question at issue was, at bottom, no less momentous than this: Whether or not, for all purposes, and in respect of all political power, distinction and disqualification of sex should be main tained. The Duke of Devonshire took the same position, holding that, as wo men were allowed to sit in town coun cils, the claim would be presently ad vanced that they should sit in Parlia ment. The Duke of Northumberland hinted that all the friends of the clause in the Lower House needed to do was to stand firm, for he simply urged that the Commons should have a further opportunity of considering the matter. In the ensuing division, notwithstanding the attitude assumed by the official leaders of both the Government and the Opposition, Lord Dunraven’s amendment expunging the clause making women eligible to the district councils was carried nearly 3 to 1. The bill went back to the Commons, and there is little doubt that, had the professed friends of woman suffrage been inflexible, the Lords would have ultimately acquiesced in their de mands. The test was applied on July 6, when Mr. Leonard H. Courtney pro posed a compromise, by suggesting that women should be eligible for councillors, but not for aldermen. Had this compromise been accepted, the principle of woman's fitness for politic al duties would of course, have been upheld. Mr. A. J. Balfour, however, the spokesman for the Government in the House, although he has been sup posed to favor woman suffrage de clared that it was not in the interests of the bill that the Commons should enter into a contest with the Upper House upon a minor question. EQUALITY OF THE SEXES. No member of the front opposition bench took part in the debate, and the defense of a woman’s eligibili; to local offices, corresponding to those which she already filled, was conducted by Mr. Augustine Birrell, the author of “Obiter Dicta,” and by two private members. Mr. Balfour, upon his part, found unexpected support from a Radi cal member, Mr. Labouchere, who in sisted that the scheme to get women on the town councils was simply a stage in a general plot to place women on the same political footing as men. He contended that, as there is a large majority of women in the United King dom, the political equality of the sexes would, in the natural course of events, inevitably involve the submerging of the numerically smaller sex by the larger one. It would involve, in oth er words, the transfer of the Govern ment of the British Empire from male to female hands. Strange to say, Mr. Labouchere, who formerly, in connec tion with the second Home Rule bill, maintained that the House of Lords had no moral right to revise the judg ment of the House of Commons, now complimented the Upper House on hav ing construed accurately the real mind of the Commons. When the motion was made that “the House do agree in the said amendment, that made by the Lords,” it was carried by a majority of 69. It is idle that this reversal of its Previous action by the House of Com mons augurs ill for the immediate Prospects of woman suffrage in Great Britain. It is a coincidence that the incident occurred at the very time when a Woman's Parliament was sit ting in London. We repeat that the woman suffr age societies will need to bestir them selves at the next general election, if they desire to recover the hold which they have hitherto possessed upon the House of Commons.
Newspaper Details
Durham Chronical and Grey County Advertiser
Durham, Ontario, CA
Thu, Sep 21, 1899
Page 8
Full Page
Clipped by
Tracy Z.
CA 17 Oct 2025
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Durham Review
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