amended the previous act, enabling married women to acquire, hold and dispose by will or otherwise of any real or personal property without the intervention of a trustee.
1876. — Medical Education Act permitted medical degrees to be conferred on women.
1890. — Intestates Act provided that when a man dies intestate leaving a widow and no children, all his estate if under £500, goes to the widow, if over £500 she shall have £500 in addition to her share in the residue.[1]
LAWS RELATING TO LOCAL GOVERNMENT. (SUFFRAGE.)
1869. — Municipal Corporations Act restored to women ratepayers of England the vote in Municipal Elections which had been taken away by the Municipal Corporation Act of 1835.
1870. — Elementary Education Act created School Boards and placed women on a complete equality both as electors and as eligible for election.
1881-1882. — The Municipal Act for Scotland gave to women the same Municipal Franchise possessed by those of England since 1869. They already had the School Franchise.
1888. — The County Electors Act gave women equal franchises with men for the election of Councillors for the County Councils created by the Local Government Act of that year.
1894. — Local Government Act which reorganised the Parochial Poor-Law Administration in the Counties, confirmed the rights of women to all Local Franchises and their eligibility as Poor-Law Guardians; and made them also eligible as Parish and District Councillors.
1896. — Poor-Law Guardian Act for Ireland made women for the first time eligible as Poor-Law Guardian.
1898. — Irish Local Government Act reorganized the system of Local Government in Ireland on similar lines to that in England. Women who had hitherto been excluded from the Municipal Franchise now had all Local Franchises conferred on them and were made eligible for Rural and Urban District Councils.
- ↑ No reference has been made in the above table to the various Factory Acts which impose restrictions on women's labour — these belong to a different department — but whether their interference with the labor of women be for good or for evil, that interference is an additional argument for allowing them a voice in the election of representatives.
