I do not propose, in the present chapter, to discuss the hackneyed arguments for and against female suffrage, but to indicate the progress of the movement in the several Provinces of Australasia, and to note some of the results of the adoption of adult suffrage in South Australia and New Zealand. As regards the other Provinces, we are bound to consider the existing franchise for the election of members of the Assembly in order to realise what would be the effect of extending it to women upon similar terms. In Victoria manhood suffrage would be superseded by adult suffrage; in New South Wales and Western Australia, where residence of three and six months, respectively, forms a qualification, the vast majority of women would obtain a place on the rolls; but in Tasmania and Queensland the right to exercise the franchise would be confined, practically, to widows and women of independent means. {185} We are also bound to take into consideration the constitution of the Legislative Council in order to gauge the full significance of female suffrage. If it is elective, as the electors must be qualified as freeholders, leaseholders, or occupiers, the vote would be confined to women of independent means and widows or spinsters in personal occupation, and, while the wife and daughters of the poor man would necessarily be excluded from the register, those of the rich man might, as has been done in South Australia, receive special gifts of freehold property which would be sufficient to render them eligible. To this extent, therefore, as in Tasmania and, to a small degree, wherever plural voting is allowed, female suffrage would constitute a new property vote. Similar conditions would not prevail when the members of the Council are nominated upon the recommendation of Ministers who are subject to the control of the popular representatives. It is probable that Victoria will be the next Province to follow the example of South Australia and New Zealand. A ministerial measure which would have introduced female suffrage, though only in the constituencies of the Assembly, has twice been passed by that House. On the first occasion it was rejected by the Council, on the second it was laid aside on the ground that it had not been approved by the absolute majority which is required in the case of amendments of the {186} constitution. Both Bills were rendered distasteful to the Council by the inclusion of a provision for the abolition of the plural vote, but it is unlikely that the first would, apart from that fact, have been accepted. Many members of the Council, I was told, are favourable to female suffrage, but would have voted in accordance with their opinion that important constitutional changes should not be passed until they have been placed before the electorate. As the life of the Assembly may not exceed three years, the reference need not long be delayed.