KP/AK/4/2/1 - No Vote Resisted, No Census suffragette badge

KP/AK/4/2/1

Sub-item

No Vote Resisted, No Census suffragette badge

1911

1 Artefacts

Women's Social and Political Union
Merchants Portrait CompanyPublisher

In 1911, various suffrage organisations, including the WSPU and Women’s Freedom League, called on their members to boycott the government census, with the call “If women don’t count, neither shall they be counted.” Thousands of women spoiled their census papers, facing a month’s imprisonment or £5 fine, to protest against not recognising women as political citizens. The protest was covered negatively in the press, which provoked Emmeline Pankhurst to state: “The Census is a numbering of the people. Until women count as people for the purpose of representation in the council of the nation, we shall refuse to be numbered.”

Circular badge. White inscription on grey inner circle and white inscription on black outer circle.

The inscription on the badge reads: No Vote! No Census! Census Resisted! (outer circle); “A Census for G’ Britain shall be taken in the year 1911 & the Census day shall be Sunday the 2nd day of April in that year” (inner circle).