Sheffield Female Political Association
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The Sheffield Female Political Association was the first
women's suffrage Women's suffrage is the women's rights, right of women to Suffrage, vote in elections. Several instances occurred in recent centuries where women were selectively given, then stripped of, the right to vote. In Sweden, conditional women's suffra ...
organisation in the United Kingdom. The reason as to why this group was formed was due to the 1832 Reform Act explicitly banning women from voting, as it defined a voter as a male person. The group was founded in February 1851 by several
Sheffield Sheffield is a city in South Yorkshire, England, situated south of Leeds and east of Manchester. The city is the administrative centre of the City of Sheffield. It is historically part of the West Riding of Yorkshire and some of its so ...
women who were also active in the
Chartist movement Chartism was a working-class movement for political reform in the United Kingdom that erupted from 1838 to 1857 and was strongest in 1839, 1842 and 1848. It took its name from the People's Charter of 1838 and was a national protest movement, wi ...
, led by Anne Kent and Anne Knight.Anne Knight (1786-1862)
It also gained the support of Isaac Ironside's local Central Democratic Association. The association passed a resolution written by Abiah Higginbotham in support of the suffrage of adult women, and persuaded
George Howard, 7th Earl of Carlisle George William Frederick Howard, 7th Earl of Carlisle (18 April 1802– 5 December 1864), styled Viscount Morpeth from 1825 to 1848, was a British statesman, orator, and writer. Life Carlisle was born in Westminster, London, the eldest son of ...
to submit this as a
petition A petition is a request to do something, most commonly addressed to a government official or public entity. Petitions to a deity are a form of prayer called supplication. In the colloquial sense, a petition is a document addressed to an officia ...
to the
House of Lords The House of Lords is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Like the lower house, the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminster in London, England. One of the oldest ext ...
. This probably inspired
Harriet Taylor Mill Harriet Taylor Mill (born Harriet Hardy; 8 October 1807 – 3 November 1858) was an English philosopher and women's rights advocate. Her extant corpus of writing can be found in ''The Complete Works of Harriet Taylor Mill''. Several pieces can a ...
to write '' The Enfranchisement of Women''. Later in 1851,
feminist Feminism is a range of socio-political movements and ideology, ideologies that aim to define and establish the political, economic, personal, and social gender equality, equality of the sexes. Feminism holds the position that modern soci ...
activists Jeanne Deroin and Pauline Roland wrote to the group for support while imprisoned in France.Ed. Nancy Hewitt,
Internationalizing Feminism in the 19th Century
''


References

Political parties established in 1851 Politics of Sheffield Women's suffrage in England 1851 establishments in England Organisations based in Sheffield {{England-hist-stub