Those of 11 George III., c. lv.; 22 George III., c. xxxi.; 44 George III., c. lx.; 11 George IV., and 1 William IV., c. lxxiv., confer the suffrage on “_every_ Freeholder being above the age of 21 years, or on inhabitant householders of same age.” There is no term ever used, that might not include a woman. But just at the time when the tide of civilisation and education was beginning to rise again, just after “The Appeal of Women” had appeared, by W. Thompson and Mrs. Wheeler (1825), all historical precedent was reversed. Concentrated social _opinion_ became boldly expressed in _law_. =In the Reform Bill of 1832=, the word “male” was interpolated before “persons” in the Charters of the newly created Boroughs. Never before, and never since has the phrase “male persons” appeared in any Statute of the Realm. By this Act, therefore, women were legally disfranchised for the first time in the history of the English Constitution. The privilege of abstention was converted into the penalty of exclusion. Curiously enough, the framers seemed to have had dim notions of this, as in all reference to older Charters the term “person” only appeared, and the interpolating adjective “male” is suppressed. Therefore in Boroughs holding by older Charters women were not necessarily excluded, except by the reflex action of the 1832 Statute. (_See_ 2 William IV., c. xlv., s. 24, 25, 31, 32, and 33.) In strange contrast to the spirit of this Act were the Bills passed in 1833 and 1834, which gave freedom, at the nation’s expense, to all Colonial slaves. The Municipal Franchises naturally followed the example of the Parliamentary one, and in spite of Charter, and in spite of precedent, limited their privileges to “male persons.”