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FROM THE ARCHIVES:A noisy protest in the gallery of the House of Commons in 1906 by women campaigning for the right to vote was criticised by The Irish Times in an editorial, drawing a prompt counter response from several letter writers, including Francis Sheehy Skeffington, who was later murdered by a British army officer during the Easter Rising. – JOE JOYCE
Sir, – Will you allow me space for a few words of common sense in relation to the scene enacted in the House of Commons upon Wednesday night? Some comments in the Press remind me forcibly of a modification of the old saying to the effect that, while a man may steal a horse, a woman may not look over the wall. No one proposes to disenfranchise the entire male population of the United Kingdom on account of the disgraceful scenes that are sometimes exhibited, not, indeed, in the galleries, but upon the floor of the House, amongst the members themselves, and under the eyes of the Speaker; but because some half-dozen foolish women got an admission to the Ladies’ Gallery upon Wednesday night, the entire womanhood of the Kingdom are to be denied their constitutional rights indefinitely, if not, indeed, to the end of the world! I do not believe that the incident will have the effect of retarding the Parliamentary enfranchisement of women by a single day. Such incidents, if they were multiplied one hundred fold, would not have a feather’s weight, with reasonable men, in annulling the legitimate claims of women, which 400 members of the present House of Commons are pledged to support. Whether that support will embody itself in an Act during the existence of the present Parliament, I am not in a position to predict; perhaps the deputation to the Prime Minister upon the 19th of May may elicit an answer; but the cause of women is progressing by rapid strides throughout the whole civilised world and their Parliamentary enfranchisement cannot be much longer postponed at the bidding of an ever-diminishing number of opponents, even though consisting of both sexes. - Yours, etc., Thomas J. Haslam.
