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Queen Victoria called women’s rights a “mad, wicked folly.”
But unlike their American counterparts, some British anti-suffragists proposed women’s councils, a ministry for women and even a separate women’s chamber of parliament organised around the belief that the sexes had different duties.
To understand how that vision made sense, I compare British and American anti-suffragism, from Queen Victoria and imperial motherhood to suffragette militancy.
READ THE BOOKS
Women Against the Vote by Julia Bush:
https://global.oup.com/academic/product/women-against-the-vote-9780199248773
The Freedom of Women by Ethel B. Harrison:
https://openlibrary.org/works/OL32871291W/The_freedom_of_women
The Status Game by Will Storr:
https://www.harpercollins.com/products/the-status-game-on-social-position-and-how-we-use-it-will-storr
ON THIS EPISODE
Jay Singleton: Writer and host
El Train: Music
JUMP TO:
(00:00) — Introduction and housekeeping
(02:47) — British vs. American anti-suffragism
(03:32) — How large were the two movements?
(05:00) — Suffragette militancy
(07:05) — What British and American antis shared
(08:06) — Queen Victoria: an anti-suffragist icon
(10:22) — Imperial motherhood
(12:18) — Did political authority depend on force?
(14:37) — The anti-suffragist “forward policy”
(15:23) — A separate political sphere for women
(17:51) — End Notes
(18:48) — The danger of defining human differences
(24:09) — Humiliation and political change
(27:41) — Outro
