womans rights essays

womans rights essays The right to vote was one that women had a lot of trouble obtaining in England. A Woman named Emmeline Pankhurst was one of the women fighting with all her might for the right to vote and make a difference in the country in which she resided. She delivered a speech in 1908 reasoning the benefits as to why women should be able to vote. Pankhurst depicted the right to vote as a symbol for liberty and citizenship, a safeguard for liberty, and most importantly a tool that could be used to get beyond what our forefathers expected. Strongly she spoke of advancing female status in England and about the discrimination that her fellow women had to deal with in their everyday lives. By tradition was almost like a serf. She was tied to the land, which legally she cannot even call her own. In fact, nothing could have belonged to women. A womans well being depended on how her husband wanted to treat her. Women had no rights to their husbands assets. They were sometimes abused both physically and mentally by the people that they at one time took oaths love and to hold dear. Although not all men abused their wives but as Pankhurst pointed out, should they even have a chance? Women in England did not obtain even the simplest liberties. A mother had no say in how her children were raised for they were believed to only have one legal parent, the father. A widow had no rights to the property of her deceased husband. Even brilliant women who worked hard were rarely given the same opportunities as men and were always underestimated. Even if a women was more qualified and more educated than a man, more likely than not a man would have been chosen for a particular position. Women of the time believed that not only would the right to vote allow them to have more representation but also it would protect them from all sorts of abuse. They believed that with this vote they could strive to be so much more than just housewives. Wo...