09 / 50 · Law & political rights

Emmeline Pankhurst

Britain · 1858–1928

Pankhurst led the Women’s Social and Political Union, which made militant campaigning a highly visible part of the British suffrage struggle. Imprisonment, protest and state repression shaped that campaign.

Her approach differed from constitutional suffragists’ methods and was contested within the movement. The history of voting rights is richer when those disagreements remain part of the story.

“We are here, not because we are law-breakers; we are here in our efforts to become law-makers.”

Court statement reported in My Own Story (1914).