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Kate Sheppard- Fighting the good fight (Part 1) - Page 2

© Philippa Jane Ballantine

Walter and Kate spent 1877/1878 in England, and one can but speculate that she might have picked up some of the suffragette ideas coming alive there.

Kate's first and only child, Douglas was born in 1880, but this certainly didn't mean Kate was going to sit idle, shortly after Kate was teaching at the local Sunday school, and did what was probably expected of her and joined the local Ladies' association, the YWCA, and the Choral Society. However it was from the temperance movement that Kate's future would be laid out.

Probably just when this intelligent women was beginning to feel a little restless with her life, salvation arrived in the form of Mary Clement Leavitt from Cleveland Ohio. This temperance missionary arrived with her white bow (symbol of purity) and a fire in her belly to stomp out the evils of drink. Soon Kate had been converted, and overcoming her nervousness about speaking in public, began working for the Women's Christian Temperance Movement. This is turn led to her reading more widely on the suffragette movement. And soon what had begun as a temperance crusade turned into a battle to get women the right to vote.

Pamphlets were printed and meetings were organized to this end, all the time with the scorn and outrage of various men ringing in their ears. Suffragettes in those days had to possess thick skins, as there accused of being shrieking harridans, devoid of all female charms. But fortunately they also had their supporters, who helped the debate reach the house of representatives early in 1887. It was however defeated, many saying that women did not in fact want the franchise. Kate was listening and determined to prove to them that was obviously untrue- she was now aware of the power of the petition. Kate was also gaining confidence in her public speaking, talking more often on how it was only just that all New Zealander's had the right to vote. She used ammunition and ideas from American and British suffragettes in her argument, and wrote screeds of missives to her supporters in the capital Wellington encouraging them to fight on. She traveled the country, which in those days was not an easy task, lecturing and promoting endlessly, sometimes to the converted sometimes to her detractors. This work was vital, as many women did not even know that such a thing was possible, and those that did had to work hard to educate them.

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