Source 21:  The Citizenship of Women: A plea for Woman's Suffrage', by Keir Hardie MP

 

Description

James Keir Hardie (1856 - 1915) was an active supporter of the women's suffrage movement, and worked closely with Sylvia Pankhurst and other members of the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU). Keir Hardie became the first socialist MP in Britain, and was among the group that formed the Independent Labour Party in 1893. He was elected as the first leader of the Labour Party.

'The Citizenship of Women: A Plea for Woman's Suffrage' was first published in 1905 by W S Stead.

[NLS Shelfmark: Acc. 3721/148 (2)]

Transcript

John Stuart Mill declared it to have been one of his earliest, as it remained one of his strongest, convictions, 'that the principles which regulate the existing social relations between the two sexes - the legal subordination of one sex to the other - is wrong in itself, and now one of the chief hindrances to human improvement; and that it ought to be replaced by principles of perfect equality admitting no power or privilege on the one side not disability on the other.' I hold it to be true with those who say that the foundation upon which this equality is to be reared is the political enfranchisement of women.