towards the enfranchisement of women, exceeded any previous experience and on February 18th the motion to adjourn discussion was rejected by 159 ayes, 102 noes, and the bill passed second reading without further division; but before going into Committee another dissolution of Parliament took place.
The General Election which followed was even more favorable, the friendly Members returned being in an actual majority, and yet session after session passed and the pressure of Government business consumed Parliamentary time.
"1887-1890." — The need of a central point, such as is afforded when there is a bill before the House, round which all the suffrage forces could rally independent of party, made it difficult for them to maintain their cohesion. The Central Committee of the National Society for Women's Suffrage had been such a point but it could not escape the distracting outside influences, and a revision of its rules took place in December, 1888, with the result that the Society as hitherto existing dissolved and reformed in two separate organisations. One of these established new rules which enabled it to affiliate with Societies formed for other purposes; and one adhered to the old rules which admitted only organisations formed with the sole object of obtaining the Franchise. But if, as was held, the internal re-organisation of the Societies redounded to greater strength, even more so did an unprecedented attack from the outside, in the Summer of 1889, when the "Nineteenth Century" opened its pages to a protest against the enfranchisement of women, to which a few ladies in London society had been diligently canvassing for signatures. The appearance of this protest was naturally the sign for an immediate counterblast, and the two Central Societies in London put a form of declaration into immediate circulation. The "Fortnightly Review" gave space to a reply from the pen of Mrs. Millicent Garrett Fawcett and to a selection from the signatures which poured into the Suffrage Offices with a rapidity that was amazing, as in sending out the forms for signature numbers had not been aimed at but rather it was sought to make the list representative. The "Nineteenth Century" had contained the names of 104 ladies, mostly known as wives of public men, while those who had taken part in
