Page:The case for women's suffrage.djvu/139

 BY EDITH PALLISER

O the National American Women's Suffrage Association belongs the honour of having initiated the International Movement for Women's Suffrage, which has for its object, "To secure the enfranchisement of women of all nations, and to unite the friends of Women's Suffrage throughout the world in organised co-operation and fraternal helpfulness."

The first step in organised effort to obtain the suffrage for women was also taken by the women of America, and that agitation dated from the World's Anti-Slavery Convention which was held in London in 1840.

In considering the many predisposing causes which led very gradually up to the demand by women for their political enfranchisement, it is interesting to note that it was from a passionate desire for a reform of the unsatisfactory and in many cases degrading social and political conditions of their country, together with a chivalrous pity for the weak and