妇女选举权

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由法律规定的妇女在全国和地方选举中的投票权。妇女投票权问题在19世纪引起争论,在英国和美国特别激烈。在美国妇女选举权的运动在反对奴隶制(参阅abolitionism)的高潮中开始。出现的领导人是马特和斯坦顿,她们认为妇女的权利应和黑奴的权利一样,必须加以调整。并筹画了塞尼卡福尔斯会议(1848)。1850年,史东召开第一次全国妇女运动会议。1869年安东尼和斯坦顿成立全国妇女选举权协会,宣布通过修改联邦宪法使妇女获得投票权。同时史东建立了美国妇女选举权协会,其目的是要通过修改各州宪法使妇女获得选举权。1890年这两个组织合并,称为全美妇女选举权协会。当怀俄明於1890年加入联邦时,在宪法中赋予妇女投票权。到1918年,妇女在十五个州内获得了选举权。妇女选举权修正案经国会通过後,1920年8月第十九条修正案成为宪法的一部分。在英国,1865年在曼彻斯特成立了第一个妇女选举权委员会,1870年代要求妇女选举权的请愿书,中约有三百万人的签名。虽然支持的力量不断成长,选举法案持续失利未能通过;由於受挫失望,部分的妇女选举权运动人士在潘克赫斯特和女儿克里斯塔贝尔领导下变得更加好斗了。1918年终於通过人民代表法案。妇女已经在纽西兰(1893)、澳大利亚(1902)、芬兰(1906)、挪威(1913)、苏俄(1917)、波兰(1918)、瑞典和德国(1919)及爱尔兰(1922)赢得了在全国性选举中的投票权。第二次世界大战後,法国、义大利、日本和印度也给予妇女投票权。

women's suffrage movement

Movement to grant women the right by law to vote. Women's voting rights became an issue in the 19th century, especially in Britain and the U.S. In the U.S. the women's-suffrage movement arose from the antislavery movement (see abolitionism) and the emergence of such leaders as Lucretia Mott and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, who believed that equality should extend to women as well as blacks and organized the Seneca Falls Convention (1848). In 1850 Lucy Stone established the movement's first national convention. Stanton and Susan B. Anthony formed the National Woman Suffrage Association in 1869 to secure an amendment to the Constitution, while Stone founded the American Woman Suffrage Association to seek similar amendments to state constitutions; in 1890 the two organizations merged as the National American Woman Suffrage Association. Following Wyoming's lead in 1890, states began adopting such amendments; by 1918 women had acquired suffrage in 15 states. After a women's-suffrage amendment was passed by Congress, a vigorous campaign brought ratification, and in August 1919 the 19th Amendment became part of the Constitution. In Britain, the first women's-suffrage committee was formed in Manchester in 1865. In the 1870s suffragists submitted petitions with almost 3 million signatures. Despite growing support, suffrage bills were continually defeated; in frustration, some suffragists became militant activists under the leadership of Emmeline and Christabel Pankhurst. Parliament finally passed the Representation of the People Act in 1918. Women had already won voting rights in New Zealand (1893), Australia (1902), Finland (1906), Norway (1913), and the Soviet Union (1917). They were followed by Poland (1918), Sweden (1919), Germany (1919), and Ireland (1922); France, Italy, India, and Japan passed women's-suffrage laws after World War II.