Men's League for Women's Suffrage (United States)

Variant names

Dates:

Establishment 1910

History notes:

The Men's League for Women's Suffrage was a society formed in 1907 in London by Henry Brailsford, Charles Corbett, Henry Nevinson, Laurence Housman, C. E. M. Joad, Hugh Franklin, Henry Harben, Gerald Gould, Charles Mansell-Moullin, Israel Zangwill and 32 others. A similar organisation was formed in 1910 in America, by the left-wing writers Max Eastman, Laurence Housman, Henry Nevinson and others to pursue women's suffrage in the United States of America. Organizations were established in specific states, including New York. The society formed in 1907 in London by Henry Brailsford, Charles Corbett, Henry Nevinson, Laurence Housman, C. E. M. Joad, Hugh Franklin, Henry Harben, Gerald Gould, Charles Mansell-Moullin, Israel Zangwill and 32 others. Graham Moffat founded the Northern Men's League for Women's Suffrage in Glasgow also in 1907 and wrote a suffrage propaganda play, The Maid and the Magistrate. Bertrand Russell stood as a suffrage candidate in the 1907 Wimbledon by election. By 1910 Henry Brailsford and Lord Lytton had with Millicent Fawcett's permission created a proposal that might have been the basis of an agreement caused the suffrage movement to declare a truce on 14 February. In 1911 they successfully took Liberals in Bradford to court for assaulting Alfred Hawkins. Alfred had shouted a question during a speech by Winston Churchill and he was ejected from the hall without warning. The judge considered this to be assault. Hawkins had received a fractured kneecap and he was awarded £100 plus costs. The group heard in March 2012, from speakers like Lansbury, Mansell-Moullin and Victor Duval express their disgust at the treatment of William Ball a male suffrage supporter and hunger striker, not only force-fed but effectively driven to lunacy and separated from his family by the authorities. Nevison produced a pamphlet on his case for the League, with the subtitle " Official Brutality on the increase". The establishment of the American organization came during a rise of similar organizations for men advocating women's suffrage. Eastman, a key leader in establishing the League in New York, also served as President of the Men's Equal Suffrage League in his state. By 1912, the American organization was estimated to have 20,000 members nationwide. Prominent members in America, apart from the founders, included Rabbi Stephen Wise, R. B. Cunninghame Graham, Columbia professor, John Dewey and Oswald Garrison Villard, publisher of the New York Evening Post.