Page:History of Woman Suffrage Volume 6.djvu/761

 745 practical" on our question and was prepared to introduce legis- lation upon it without delay. He no doubt remembered how emphatically he had told us in 1911 of the extreme value of the promises which had been made to us by Mr. Asquith, and how in our meeting in the Albert Hall in the following March he had referred to the doubt which some suffragists had ex- pressed upon the worth of these promises as "an imputation of deep dishonour which he absolutely declined to contemplate." He had in 1911 put into writing and sent as a message to the Com- mon Cause, the official organ of the N.U.W.S.S., a statement of his conviction that Mr. Asquith's promises made the carrying of a Women's Suffrage amendment to next year's franchise bill a certainty and he had offered his personal help to bring this about. It has already been described how all these confident hopes had been brought to nought; but now, December, 1916, within a fortnight of becoming Prime Minister, Mr. Lloyd George let us know that he was not only ready but keen to go forward on practical lines. When Parliament met we asked the Prime Minister to receive a large and representative deputation of women who had worked for their country during the war. Our object was to ask him to legislate at once on the lines rec- ommended by the Speaker's Conference but we were pushing an open door. The new Prime Minister had arranged to receive us on March 29, 1917, and on the 28th Mr. Asquith had moved a resolution in the House of Commons, and his motion had been agreed to by 341 votes to 62, calling for the early introduction of legisla- tion based on the recommendations of the Speaker's Conference. When our deputation waited on Mr. Lloyd George the following day lie vns able to inform us that he had already instructed the Government draftsman to draw up a bill on these lines. The debate in the House on March 28 had turned mainly on Women's 1 the immense majority in support of Mr. Asquith's motion was rightly regarded as a suffrage triumph. Every leader of every party in the House of Commons had taken part in the debate and had expressed his support of the enfranchisement The Government whips had not been put on and throughout the debates which followed the Bill was not treated