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Bien que le caractère fondamental du droit, pour les citoyens, de participer aux élections par l’exercice du droit de vote ne soit plus contestable dans les pays démocratiques et que son caractère universel soit largement acquis, il semble néanmoins subsister un fort a priori quant aux qualités morales requises pour pouvoir disposer de la capacité électorale. En effet, dans de nombreux États, on considère que les détenus doivent systématiquement être privés de leur droit de vote, car indignes de participer à la vie démocratique. Néanmoins, tant la Cour constitutionnelle d’Afrique du Sud que la Cour suprême du Canada et la Cour européenne des droits de l’Homme ont, au cours des dernières années, invalidé des dispositions législatives qui prévoyaient la suppression générale et automatique du droit de vote aux personnes condamnées. L’analyse comparative de ces décisions, doublée d’une étude de l’évolution historique du droit de vote, révèle que ce droit, autrefois conçu comme un droit fonctionnel – soit un droit de vote ayant d’abord pour objectif la protection de la démocratie en tant qu’institution – est aujourd’hui perçu essentiellement comme un droit individuel - soit un droit de vote avant tout défini comme un droit fondamental attaché à l’individu et à sa dignité. Or, il semble que ce passage d’un droit axé sur son « sujet » davantage que sur son « objet » ait eu des conséquences insoupçonnées. Outre le fait que cette sacralisation de l’aspect individuel du droit de vote laisse désormais peu de place aux limitations étatiques, elle a aussi pour effet d’occulter les valeurs collectives qui sont, autant que la participation individuelle au suffrage, au cœur de la démocratie. Cette thèse propose ainsi certaines pistes de solutions qui visent à rétablir un équilibre entre les deux pôles du droit de vote, en cherchant à la fois à préserver la dignité individuelle attachée à l’acte électoral et à valoriser la dignité de la fonction électorale comme élément essentiel de l’intégrité du processus démocratique. / While the fundamental and universal nature of a citizen’s right to participate in the electoral process through voting is no longer disputed in democracies, the degree of morality required for electoral capacity is still up for debate. Indeed, in many countries, felons are thought unworthy of participation in the democratic process and are thus systematically disenfranchised. However, the Constitutional Court of South Africa, the Supreme Court of Canada and the European Court of Human Rights have all, in recent years, invalidated legislation that provided for general and automatic disqualification of convicted felons. A comparative analysis of these rulings, paired with a study of historical evolution of the right to vote, reveals that what was once designed as a functional right, one primarily aimed at protecting democracy as an institution, is now perceived strictly as an individual right attached to one’s personal dignity. The shift from a right focused on its “subject” rather than its “object” has had unexpected consequences. The sanctification of the individual’s right has not only encroached on the government’s ability to limit the franchise, it has also undermined the collective values that are, as much as is the individual right to participate in the election, at the heart of democracy. This thesis proposes a number of solutions to the current imbalance between the two aspects of the right to vote, all aimed at preserving the individual dignity tied to the right to cast a ballot but also at promoting the electoral function, crucial to the integrity of the democratic process.

Abstract Syfte: Studien grundar sig på ett problemområde gällande uteslutandet av kvinnlig rösträtt i demokratimätningar. Syftet är att undersöka hur demokratimått förändras när kvinnlig rösträtt tas med i mätningarna. Studien analyserar två klassiker inom demokratiforskning, Seymour Lipset (1959) och Samuel P. Huntington (1991) samt tre modernare demokratimått (Democracy index, BMR, Polity IV Revised combined score).   Teori: Studien utgår ifrån en teori hämtad från Pamela Paxton (1995). Teorin handlar om konsekvenser och kritik mot demokratiforskare som uteslutit kvinnlig rösträtt i mått på demokrati.   Metod: En kvantitativ metod i form av statistisk dataanalys har använts. Med hjälp av tidsserier har jämförelser över införandet av demokrati samt kvinnlig rösträtt genomförts.   Resultat: Resultatet visar att Paxtons kritik är befogad samt bekräftar hennes teori och slutsatser. Införandet av kvinnlig rösträtt i ovannämnda demokratimått innebär en förändring för de studier där måtten har använts.   Nyckelord: kvinnlig rösträtt, demokrati, demokratisk transition, Huntington, Lipset, Paxton, women’s suffrage

In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries the members of the woman’s suffrage movement in the United States and Britain looked to soften their hard masculine image given to them by the press and to increase participation in the cause. They found that by including theatrical performances and benefits at meetings, and hosting tea socials afterwards, they could motivate many women to join without alienating or threatening men. This study looks at how tea socials and theatrical performances were used subversively to recruit new members, to debate ideas, and to disseminate information about the cause. Playwrights wrote plays that examined the questions and issues surrounding this movement, and upstart, female-operated theatre groups and social clubs presented these plays to the public, allowing the debate to reach a wider audience. Actresses themselves joined clubs to increase their presence in society, to help out other actresses, and to find political agency.

Paru dans la deuxième moitié du XIXe siècle, le féminisme roumain se manifeste dans la période d'entre les deux guerres dans toute sa puissance, quoique la plupart des femmes impliquées dans le mouvement soient les représentantes d'une élite féminine, sans des rapports trop profonds avec le reste de la population. Les premières féministes découvrent le féminisme français par l'intermédiaire des études et des stages faits à l'étranger. Leurs contacts deviennent de plus en plus durables une fois que le mouvement roumain s'intègre, s'organise et s'affirme en public après l'union de 1918. L'implication des principales associations sur le plan international, la propagande et les actions déroulées au niveau national, les " victoires " obtenues (les droits civils en 1932, politiques intégrales en 1938) sont la preuve incontestable que dans l'espace roumain il y a eu un mouvement féministe fort. De plus, la période d'entre les deux guerres en est le moment d'apogée, " l'indifférence patriarcale " et une partie de l'opinion publique sont combattues grâce aux efforts soutenus et à la patience spécifique féminine. Les affinités franco-roumaines, relevées dans notre thèse, celles au niveau des programmes, de l'organisation et même des formes de manifestation ne sont pas des nouvelles, mais plutôt une preuve que le cadre national est dépassé. Ces deux pays latins ont déroulé des actions communes à l'intérieur des fors féminins internationaux, les liaisons d'amitié se manifestant aussi au niveau officiel que sur le plan personnel. Mais, chaque mouvement se dessine dans des contextes sociopolitiques différents, avec des nuances et spécificités qui leur donnent l'individualité.

This dissertation offers a new narrative for the local woman suffrage movement in nine rural counties in Texas. I argue that, unlike cities, where women used dense organizational networks to create a coherent suffrage movement, conservatism inherent in rural Texas denied suffrage advocates the means to achieve similar objectives. Rural women nevertheless used the suffrage campaign to articulate feminist sensibilities, thereby reflecting a process of modernization ongoing among American women. Rural suffrage advocates faced unique obstacles, including the political influence of James E. Ferguson, who served as Governor for almost two administrations. Through Ferguson's singular personality, a propaganda campaign that specifically targeted rural voters, and Ferguson's own tabloid Ferguson Forum, rural voters found themselves constantly bombarded by messages about how they should view questions of reform in their state. The organizational culture that sustained suffrage organizations in urban Texas failed to do so in rural Texas. Concerned for their status, rural women scorned activism and those who pursued it. Absent an organized campaign, the success of suffrage initiatives in rural Texas depended on locally unique circumstances. Key factors included demographic trends, economics, local politics, and the influence of frontier cultural dynamics. The tactics and rhetoric employed by rural suffragists in Texas generally reflected those used by suffragists nationwide. While rural suffragists mustered arguments grounded in natural and constitutional rights, rural voters responded more to the claim that votes projected woman's feminine virtue into public life, which accommodated prevailing attitudes about woman's place. The First World War supplied rural suffragists with patriotic rhetoric that resonated powerfully with Texans. Rural Texas women successfully reframed public dialogue about women's roles, articulating feminist ideas through their work. Unlike rural clubwomen, suffragists pursued the ballot as a means to improve the status of all women. Feminist ideas increasingly obtained with women in visible leadership, and eventually reached all rural women, as countless hundreds registered to vote, and still more educated themselves on political issues. In doing so, rural women in Texas joined women across America in challenging the limits of domesticity and envisioning a fuller role for women in public life.

Thesis (M.A.)--Iowa State University, 2009. / Includes bibliographical resources.

published_or_final_version / Law / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

The intention of this thesis is to draw attention to a much neglected part of women's suffrage history - that is, a comparative analysis of the suffrage movements in New Zealand and the United States. Historians have dismissed any suggestion of similarities between the two groups because' of the obvious differences in size and the time taken to gain the vote. However, this study reveals parallels between the two movements in terms of membership, leadership, ideologies and opposition. This is particularly highlighted in the comparison with Wyoming. These similarities, together with New Zealand women's new found 'prestige' after having won the vote, led to close relations between women of the two countries, as revealed in personal correspondence. By the late l890s United States suffragists had changed direction in both their tactics and arguments for suffrage and this, together with distance and a lack of time and money, meant that New Zealand suffragists aid was confined to emotional support rather than practical assistance. This study was, to a certain degree, limited by the lack of availability of United States primary sources. However, the Kate Sheppard Collection contains a wealth of correspondence between the New Zealand and United States suffragists and provides ample information to support the thesis. Prior to the examination of the interaction of the suffrage movements in New Zealand and the United States, we will first of all begin by considering the broader context of women's role in society. This is will be followed with a study of -the historiography of women's suffrage in Wyoming and New Zealand. We will then proceed to a comparative analysis of the leaders and supporters of the two movements. In New Zealand the women's suffrage and women's temperance organizations were inseparably linked, hence the comparative natured analysis dictates that points for comparison should be made in relation to the temperance origins of suffrage in the United States and New Zealand and to leaders with temperance links.

By the end of the Civil War in 1865 Indiana's Republicans were faced with a crucial dilemma. Republican Moderates were urging party rank and file to support a constitutional amendmdnt to change the basis of apportionment in the House of Representatives so that the South would not gain more seats by reason of the fact that the emancipation of the four million slaves had rendered the three-fifths compromise null and void. In other words, the Moderates were acutely aware that the South would now be able to count all of its black population for the purpose of apportionment in the House, and that this increase would also be reflected in the electoral college. The Radical Republicans, on the other hand, were urging the enfranchisement of southern Negroes because they felt that the creation of a voting block of loyal blacks would be the most practical way to offset the South's increased representation. The Radicals also believed enfranchisement was needed to protect the civil rights of thousands of uneducated and largely illiterate southern blacks.The Negro suffrage issue was particularly explosive in Indiana where white prejudice was of sufficient strength to make Indiana's Republicans fearful of a white backlash for enfranchising southern blacks. The way in which Indiana's Republican legislators reacted toward their party's dilemma was determined by studying votes in both the General Assembly and in the House of Representatives. Also evaluated were the speeches of the leading Republican and Democratic politicians in the state, newspaper editorials, private manuscripts, and the results of the 1866 nominating conventions and the general election in Indiana.From this study these conclusions emerged:1. President Andrew Johnson was partially to blame for the 1867 Reconstruction Act which imposed Negro suffrage and military occupation on the South because he encouraged a splinter political movement that forced Indiana's Republicans to resort to extreme measures as a means of self-protection.2. Indiana's Democrats must also accept part of the blame for reconstruction measures that after 1867 proved to be vindictive because their virulent Negrophobia helped to prevent any compromise with Republicans where the future of the black man was concerned.3. The study of Republican roll call votes in the House of Representatives (1863-1867) made by David Donald and published as The Politics of Reconstruction, (1965) was incomplete because Donald measured Republican Radicalism largely on the basis of votes in the second session of the 39th Congress rather than on those of the first session when the Negro suffrage issue clearly marked the demarcation line between Radicals and Moderates.4. The 1866 election in Indiana was not so much monopolized by claptrap issues raised by Republicans, as contended by Howard K. Beale in The Critical Year (1930), as by Democratic charges that Republicans were seeking racial equality.5. Indiana's Republicans did not favor Negro suffrage until the South had rejected the Fourteenth Amendment and President Johnson had failed to provide guarantees that the ex-Confederate states would not be restored to the Union with their representation and electoral votes increased.