Margaret was not a Suffragette

Margaret was also Chairperson of the Adult Suffrage Society but wasn't a Suffragette. She felt they were just fighting for women's rights whereas Margaret wanted equal rights for all people whatever class they came from. At that time there were many men who didn't have a vote because they didn't own their own property.

Unlike some campaigners, she was totally opposed to the idea that initially only certain categories of women should be given the vote. She believed that such a limited franchise would act against the interests of the working class and feared it might form a barrier to the granting of universal adult suffrage. This unfortunately made her unpopular with middle class suffragettes who saw limited suffrage as an important step in the struggle to win the vote.

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World War 1 had brought an end to suffrage activities, however, from 1916 a Speakers Conference was convened to consider the issues of women’s franchise and make proposals for post war legislation. While Margaret pressed for universal adult suffrage the conference recommended only a limited extension to the franchise.

The subsequent Representation of the People Act, 1918, gave the vote to women over 30 who were property owners or the wives of property owners, or were university graduates. Margaret called this ‘mean and inadequate… creating fresh anomalies’

In 1928 all women and men over 21 got the vote increasing the voting population by 4 million. Margaret saw this as ‘a tremendous social advance’ and went on to say ‘at last (women) are established on that equitable footing because we are human beings and part of society as a whole’. Further she stated that ‘once and for all, we shall destroy the artificial barrier in the way of any women who want to get education in politics and who want to come forward and take their full share in the political life of their day’