 Women forced out of their jobs  Unemployment levels increase  Inflation (rise in prices, drop in buying power)  Spanish flu epidemic kills 50,000 Canadians  Demand for women’s rights increases  Urbanization (more moving to cities)

 Strikes › After Russian revolution that began with labour unrest and general strikes (Cause)  Unions were forming (pg. 156 Figure 6-9)  Economic unrest  Cycles of rising wages and prices  Veterans (PTSD (shell shock), no services to support soldiers, disabilities)

 May 1919  Employers refused to negotiate wages  More and more employees in Winnipeg joined  Within days strikers = 30,000 basically shutting down the city  RCMP brought in  Things get violent, 1 dead, 100 injured  Strikers return to work on June 25 because feared would lose their jobs  Some forced to sign agreements not to join a union

 Many jailed  Some deported  Union membership drops  Unemployment rises  Law made for employers to recognize right of workers to bargain collectively through a union  Began new political involvement for workers  Sparked strike leaders to pursue political positions › J.S. Woodsworth elected to HOC and later helped create what we now know as NDP

 Blamed for social problems › Crime › Public drunkenness, family violence, poverty  Result = temperance movement encouraging people to abstain  Thought was no alcohol = less family problems (historical perspective)  Actually was enacted during War Measures Act in 1918 and continued after war

 Not everyone wanted prohibition  Illegal trade developed  Criminals became rich selling illegal liquor  1921 govt repeals prohibition and replaced with govt controlled sales  Prohibition in US continued longer allowing profitable business opportunity for Canadians  “ rum-runners” sold illegal alcohol to Americans  And women played a role as well……

 1917 – Some women receive right to vote (Suffrage) › Had to have a relative (Father, Brother, Husband) who was a soldier  1921 – First election where ALL women could vote, Agnes Macphail elected  1929 – “Person’s Case”  1931 – Cairine Wilson appointed first female Senator in Canada

 Politics is too corrupt for women  Allowing women to vote will cause arguments in the home  Women will vote the same way as their husbands  It is not “womanly” to express political opinions It is not “womanly” to express political opinions  Women are too emotional to vote

 First woman elected to the House of Commons, 1921  Fought for Senior’s pensions and worker’s rights  Also worked at reforming the corrections system in Canada Also worked at reforming the corrections system in Canada

 Up until this point, women’s clothing had been very conservative.  Some women (mostly young women) began to rebel against old ideas of how they should behave

 Wore radical new dresses, which came down to just below their knees.  cut their hair in “bobs” or “shingles”.

 Many of these “flappers” were also challenging gender stereotypes by going to jazz clubs, smoking, and drinking alcohol.

 At the beginning of the 20s, men had the right to divorce if their wives had an affair.  Women, on the other hand, could not divorce their husband no matter how many affairs he had.

 In 1925 this law was changed so that women could also ask for divorce in the case of adultery.  In 1930, women would also gain the right to divorce if their husband had abandoned them for over 2 years.

 Forget it!  Birth Control was illegal, as was the selling, advertising or publication of any medicine, drug, or article intended to aid in preventing conception or causing an abortion.  Women like Nellie McClung begin to draw attention to this issue, but it would go unresolved for a long time.

 You cannot get married or keep company with men.  You must be at home between 8 pm and 6 am unless at a school function  You cannot loiter downtown in ice cream parlours  You cannot smoke or drink any alcohol  You cannot ride in any carriage or automobile with any man except your brothers or father  You cannot dress in bright colours or wear dresses more than 2 inches above the ankle

Emily Murphy Nellie McClung Louise McKinney Irene ParlbyHenrietta Muir Edwards

 Emily Murphy › eritage-minutes/emily-murphy eritage-minutes/emily-murphy  Nellie McClung › eritage-minutes/nellie-mcclung? eritage-minutes/nellie-mcclung  Agnes MacPhail › eritage-minutes/agnes-macphail? eritage-minutes/agnes-macphail

 The Persons Case: The Persons Case › The Famous Five were fighting for the right for women to sit in the Canadian Senate › While women now had the vote, they were still not legally deemed “persons” and therefore could not sit on the Senate › The Famous Five sent a petition to Ottawa asking if the word “persons” in the laws included female persons in 1927

 The Supreme Court decided that, in fact, under Canadian law, women were not persons.  The Five appealed this decision to the Privy Council in London, supported by William Lyon Mackenzie King  The London Court agreed with the Five and ruled that women were included in the term “persons” 1929.

59:30-1:04:40

 "The Canadian-American frontier point, where artful dodgers of both sexes sometimes take points (and pints) past the officials." We see a woman from the waist down. The customs official shows how women can hide bottles inside their dresses. He says "The women are about as bad offenders as the men." A man models a device which fits around his waist and can hold 6 quarts of alcohol. The customs official turns the device upside down and the booze pours out. buffalo/query/CANADIAN+WOMEN