Timeline

Women's suffrage is first introduced into South Australian Parliament by Dr. Edward Stirling. This resolution moved in favour of enabling widows and single women who owned property to vote, but not married women. The resolution passed but has no legislative power.

6 June 1888

Mary Lee, at a meeting of the Ladies Social Purity Society (of which she was then secretary) puts three resolutions to the meeting:

1. That the moral, social and industrial interests of women would be advance by women's political enfranchisement.
2. That, as the ultimate aim of this Society is the moral elevation of women, the Social Purity Society stands pledged to support all efforts likely to assist this aim. Hence it is resolved;
3. That this committee, in the name of the Society, pledges itself to advance and support the cause of woman suffrage in this colony

These resolutions would give rise to the Women's Suffrage League, officially formed on 20 July 1888.

Women's Suffrage League officially formed in South Australia. Their constitution reads as follows:

1. That the women of the country should have a voice in the choice of representatives to the House of Legislature.
2. That the qualifications entitling women to vote should be the same as those which apply to men.
3. That while woman's suffrage is desired no claim is put forward for the right to sit as representatives.

Point three is said to have allowed the organisation to focus on the gaining of the vote, and to avoid distraction from this central principle.

Catherine Helen Spence joins a deputation led by House of Assembly member Robert Caldwell to the Premier, Thomas Playford, speaking in favour of suffrage. At this meeting Spence asserted that she was 'in her seventh decade and still had no more vote than a child of three years', believing it was 'perfectly absurd to condemn half the human race to silence upon public questions'.

Further deputations to Premiers Holder in 1892 and Downer in 1893 gained in principle support and also importantly, gained press publicity.

John Hannah Gordon MLC introduces a bill based on the Women's Suffrage League constitution, which would grant equal voting rights without any restriction. This Bill is similar to the 1893 bill however does not include a referendum measure.

More than 50 parliamentarians speak on the issues. The gallery is frequently full of ladies, eager to hear the debates and provide a visible presence for local organisations.

Members attempted to undermine the bill by adding various amendments, voting to actually remove the clause preventing women from sitting in Parliament (this was a plot to make the bill less popular).

A huge petition tied with a yellow ribbon is presented to the House of Assembly consisting of 11,600 signatures. Around a third of the signatures collected are from men. The petition is officially tabled on 30 August.

On the same day, the Adult Suffrage Bill is introduced in the Assembly by John Cockburn.

At 10:30am the House of Assembly meets and soon passes the Bill with amendments.

The short wording of the Constitution Amendment Act read:

1. The right to vote for persons to sit in Parliament as members of the Legislative Council, and the right to vote for persons to sit in Parliament as members of the House of Assembly, are hereby extended to women.
2. Women shall possess and may exercise the rights hereby granted, subject to the same qualifications and in the same manner as men.
3. All Constitution and Electoral Acts and all other laws are hereby amended, so far as may be necessary to give effect to this Act.

The Act is assented to by Queen Victoria, giving women in South Australia the right to vote and the right to stand for  Parliament ‘subject to the same qualifications and in the same manner as men’.