FOR AND AGAINST: Different Agendas
Document 3

From the early 1890s women formed leagues in support of Federation, encouraging men to vote for the Bill. Women were granted the right to vote in Commonwealth elections in 1902. In some colonies (and, later, states) women had the right to vote prior to this date: South Australian women received the right to vote in colonial (and later, state) elections in 1894; Western Australian women in 1899; women in New South Wales in 1902 (consistent with their federal franchise); Tasmanian women in 1903; women in Queensland in 1905; and women in Victoria finally received the right to vote in state elections in 1908, 24 years after the first Women's Suffrage Society in Australia was formed in Melbourne in 1884.

Women's Federal League.

EQUITABLE BUILDINGS,
GEORGE STREET, SYDNEY,
25TH. APRIL 1898.

DEAR MADAM,-
The vote to be taken on June 3rd will decide the most important question yet submitted to the voters of Australia. After that day we must either forget petty rivalry and begin the great solemn task of building an Australian nation, or we must sink back for years to smaller provincial life and mutual jealousy. Although the Constitution under which we live makes no provision for recording the woman's opinion, it must still be wise and right that those who think on these matters should make their opinions known; for a nation is not wealthy cities and fertile lands, but men and women.

I therefore make no apology in asking you to consider the provisions of the Commonwealth Bill as set forth by its friends and its enemies, and I would urge you to do all in your power to ensure the recording (in your district) of votes in its favour.

Shortly, the matter stands thus:- After much consideration, our voters chose, from among a number of candidates, ten men to represent us at a Convention, and to draw up, with ten from each of the sister colonies, a Constitution which should be acceptable to all. The fifty delegates spent several weeks on three different occasions in debating and dividing on every important question, and the Commonwealth Bill is the result. Nine out of the ten delegates are satisfied with it, but it does not please every elector. Now could a bill drawn up by fifty men for 4½ millions of people please everybody? In every community there are extremists – far as the poles asunder – and none of them could possibly be satisfied with moderation. But the essence of good government lies, not in pleasing the extremists, but in doing the best with all, for the good of all.

If you have not time to study the Bill itself, a few enquiries as to diverse mental attitudes of its opponents will probably convince you that it steers a fair middle course-too democratic for extreme conservatives, too conservative, if it is so at all, for extreme democrats. You may be told that Federation will involve enormous expenditure and increased taxation. Very little thought will enable you to see the future economic advantage of co-operation in the housekeeping of the now separated sister colonies. Even though the first expense of Federation may be great, even though we may have to pay a large share of it, it cannot be ruinous, and the ultimate advantage to ourselves and our children will outweigh, beyond measure, the initial expense. The cost will be returned to us "good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over," in the impetus given to our commerce, and in our broader life.

But the Bill itself is easily procurable, it is easy to understand, and I beg you to read and consider it. Its acceptance or rejection involves an important question. Shall our children be Australians and of one family, or shall they be colonists and rivals? It is a woman's question, for from the home the national life must spring, and from the home and the mothers must come the first throb of patriotic impulse.

Not every generation can watch a nation struggle to its birth. In this crisis of our history I am confident that most of my fellow women will look beyond the narrow horizon of to-day, and stand firm by the men who are fighting for United Australia.

There is no doubt that the great majority of the people are in favour of Federation, but men busy with their daily work may be over-confident of the acceptance of the Bill, and may neglect to vote. It is therefore proposed to assist in the organisation by forming a Women's Federal League, of which you are now invited to become a member, and in setting on foot a branch in each centre of your district. It is also proposed that small bodies of women canvassers should be organised in every electorate, so that outlying parts may be visited, and every man urged to procure his Elector's Right, and to record his vote on June 3rd.

No complicated machinery is necessary, and very few meetings. If you are disposed to help the cause of Federation, will you invite some of the ladies in your neighborhood to join in obtaining each a certain number of promises to vote for the Bill. When you have met and arranged your plans, will you kindly send the names and addresses of those ladies who are working with you to the Secretary, Sydney. The Federalist newspaper will then be regularly posted to each one, and any information that may be necessary.

I am, dear Madam,
Yours truly,
M. S. WOLSTENHOLME,
HON. SEC.

M. S. Wolstenholme's open letter to women on behalf of the Women's Federal League, 25 April 1898, cited in Raymond Evans et al., 1901 Our Future's Past, Macmillan, Sydney, 1997, p. 135.