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Jimbob

100 Years Ago

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100 Years ago to the day, the Representation of the People Act 1918 came into law in the UK.  Meaning women over the age of 30 could vote for the first time.  The same act also changed the age men could vote down to 21.  Quite a historic day today, it's being commemorated with a scheduled 24 hour hunger strike outside Parliament.

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That's.....an odd way to commemorate something.

Still, 100 years eh? Awesome.

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Wait what...what were the age limits before? What was the thought behind women having to be younger than 30 to vote?! And how old did a man have to be?

I knew the US was backwards with how long it took us to let women vote but at least we didn’t say they could be too old. 

Now im curious though, is voting still limited to 21 and older or not? 

 

And I concur, hunger strike is an odd commemoration. Probably fitting I suppose. 

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Wait what...what were the age limits before? What was the thought behind women having to be younger than 30 to vote?! And how old did a man have to be?

I knew the US was backwards with how long it took us to let women vote but at least we didn’t say they could be too old. 

Now im curious though, is voting still limited to 21 and older or not? 

 

And I concur, hunger strike is an odd commemoration. Probably fitting I suppose. 

No, before that no women could vote. When they allowed them the vote, they set the limit to be 30 and older, while men could be 21 and older. So not completely equal, but a large step in the right direction.

 

And the voting age is now 18 (perhaps 16 in Scotland for council elections?)

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4 hours ago, bob said:

No, before that no women could vote. When they allowed them the vote, they set the limit to be 30 and older, while men could be 21 and older. So not completely equal, but a large step in the right direction.

 

And the voting age is now 18 (perhaps 16 in Scotland for council elections?)

Your information is contradictory to Jimbobs opening post. 

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Your information is contradictory to Jimbobs opening post. 


Before 1918, no women could vote, and only older men could (I don't know what the age limit was before this).

After 1918, women older than 30 could vote, and they lowered the male voting age to 21.

I think that pretty much agrees with Jimbob? We're basically the same person anyway. We're both a bob.
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They didn't change the age of vote for men. Contrary to popular belief not all men could vote before 1918. You had to own property and other restrictions (basically only the wealthy could vote).

The 1918 act saw that all men 21 and over could vote, and that women 30 and over could vote (but women were still subject to restrictions that men previously faced, such as owning property).

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4 hours ago, bob said:

 


Before 1918, no women could vote, and only older men could (I don't know what the age limit was before this).

After 1918, women older than 30 could vote, and they lowered the male voting age to 21.

I think that pretty much agrees with Jimbob? We're basically the same person anyway. We're both a bob.

 

I am in fact, dumb. Completely misinterpreted the original message and then convinced myself you were contradicting what I had wrong. I read it as women having a vote but only if they were younger than 30.

One of those days I guess. 

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