Outline and assess the contributions made by the NUWSS and the WSPU to the achievement of votes for women in 1918.

Have a little read: ... Outline and assess the contributions made by the NUWSS and the WSPU to the achievement of votes for women in 1918. Prior to 1860 campaigners for votes for women were few and there were no women's suffrage societies. According to Bartley (1998) the vote was seen as 'more of an obligation than a human right'. In 1832 Mary Smith presented the first women's suffrage petition to Parliament, this is seen by some Historians as one of the key moments in the beginning of the women's suffrage movement. By the middle of the 19th Century the campaign began picking up supporters and the absence of the vote began to be seen by some women as symbolic of their second-class status. By 1914 there were fifty-six women's suffrage societies with some three hundred thousand members. The vote was finally given to women age thirty and over in February 1918 and the age qualification was abolished in 1928. This essay aims to outline the actions of the two main women's suffrage societies, the WSPU and the NUWSS, and assess the value of the contributions made by each in gaining the vote in 1918. The year 1866 was a significant landmark as some of the most influential feminists of the time, including Barbara Bodichon and Emily Davies, drafted a petition signed by fifteen hundred women, demanding enfranchisement of all householders regardless of sex. J S Mill and Henry Fawcett, sympathisers to the cause, presented it to parliament. Also in 1866 the Manchester National Society for Women's Suffrage was formed, led by Lydia Becker, followed by similar organisations around Britain. In 1868 they all joined to form the National Society for Women's Suffrage, this according to historians, was the beginning of organised national action. After numerous splits the two remaining societies, the National Central Society for Women's Suffrage and the Central Committee of the National Society for Women's Suffrage joined, and in 1897 formed the National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies, or the NUWSS. Lydia Becker was elected president and after her death three years later Millicent Fawcett became the new leader. The NUWSS concentrated its efforts on public meetings, publishing newspapers, organising petitions and writing letters to politicians. They also lent their support to other causes including, Josephine Butlers campaign against white slave traffic, and Clementina Black's against low wages for women. The leaders of the NUWSS were a closely-knit circle and, although the NUWSS claimed to be non-party political, the majority of the leaders had access to Liberal politicians either through family or friendship circles. Tensions developed between the older middle-class members and the newer working-class recruits from the Northern cities. In 1903 a number of these working-class women formed the Lancashire and Cheshire