Issue link: https://www.e-digitaleditions.com/i/988313
Heritage Matters 4 This $10 bill, issued in 2017 to commemorate Canada 150, features Sir John A. Macdonald, Sir George-Étienne Cartier, Agnes Macphail and James Gladstone "Akay-na-muka." Photo courtesy of the Bank of Canada. This was a time of great change and upheaval in Canadian society. During the war years, women were called to serve in what were traditionally male roles in offices, factories and public service; they volunteered for home defence and service organizations and raised funds. Their contribution to the Canadian war effort and society as a whole was crucial. Coming out of that experience, women would no longer be ignored. On April 12, 1917, female Ontarians obtained the right to vote in provincial elections. It would be 1943 before Ontario elected a female MPP to join the Legislature – Agnes Macphail and Rae Luckock both won that year and Macphail was the first sworn in. Macphail had considerable experience by that time. On December 17, 1921, some 500,000 women voted for the first time in a federal election, which was won by Borden's coalition government. Four women ran, and Agnes Macphail was elected to serve as Grey-Bruce MP, a position she held until 1940. Her first speech called for greater equality for women in Canadian legislation and society: "Mr. Speaker, women don't want to be deemed to be part of the goods and chattel of men. Women want to be individuals as men are individuals. No more, no less – and I would like to see that principle embodied in law." Following her defeat in 1940, Macphail was elected to the Ontario legislature in 1943 and 1948 and was responsible for Ontario's first equal pay legislation, passed in 1951. At the time of her death in 1954, she was being considered for appointment to the Canadian Senate. "We are convinced that: 13. Women's empowerment and their full participation on the basis of equality in all spheres of society, including participation in the decision-making process and access to power, are fundamental for the achievement of equality, development and peace; 14. Women's rights are human rights." Excerpt, Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, The Fourth World Conference on Women, Beijing, September 1995 "Every citizen of Canada has the right to vote in an election of members of the House of Commons or of a legislative assembly and to be qualified for membership therein." Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, 1982, Section 3