The ablest speech of the evening was made by Mr.
Goschen, who ridiculed the idea of excluding married women from votes which were to be given to spinsters and widows, if the object were, as alleged, to enforce the equal rights of wives with their ;husbands over the custody of their children ; and he urged that the examples of women who, like Miss Octavia Hill, had effected much for us in the way of social reform, tended to show what good we get by keeping women out of the storms of politics, and not by launching them into those storms. Finally, he declared boldly that it is not at all for the interests of women themselves that the fran- chise should be given them. To this speech Sir Stafford North- cote replied by a very strong speech in favour of the amend- ment, urging that it was as representatives of property that he demanded the vote for women, and held it to be a makeweight in the Conservative scale.
Previous page
