In the United Kingdom, as in other countries, feminism seeks to establish political, social, and economic equality for women. The history of feminism in Britain dates back to the very beginnings of feminism itself, as many of the earliest feminist writers and activists—such as Mary Wollstonecraft, Barbara Bodichon, and Lydia Becker—were British.

19th century

The first organised movement for British women's suffrage was the Langham Place Circle of the 1850s, led by Barbara Bodichon (née Leigh-Smith) and Bessie Rayner Parkes. They also campaigned for improved female rights in the law, employment, education, and marriage.

Property-owning women and widows had been allowed to vote in some local elections, but that ended in 1835. The Chartist Movement of 1838 to 1857 was a large-scale demand for suffrage-however, it only gave suffrage to men over 21. In 1851 the Sheffield Female Political Association was founded and submitted an unsuccessful petition calling for women's suffrage to the House of Lords. This probably inspired British feminist Harriet Taylor Mill to write the pro-women's-suffrage The Enfranchisement of Women (1851). On 7 June 1866 a petition from 1,499 women calling for women's suffrage was presented to the Parliament, but it also did not succeed.

Upper-class women could exert a little backstage political influence in high society. However, in divorce cases, rich women lost control of their children.

Careers

Ambitious middle-class women faced enormous challenges when they proposed entering suitable careers, such as nursing, teaching, law, and medicine, and the loftier their ambition, the greater the challenge. Physicians barred admission to the medical profession; there were a few opportunities for women lawyers, but none as clerics. White collar business opportunities outside family-owned shops were few until clerical positions opened in the 20th century. Florence Nightingale demonstrated the necessity of professional nursing and warfare, and set up an educational system that tracked women into that field in the second half of the nineteenth century. Teaching was not quite as easy to break into, but the low salaries were less of the barrier to the single woman than to the married man. By the late 1860s a number of schools were preparing women for careers as governesses or teachers. The census reported in 1851 that 70,000 women in England and Wales were teachers, compared to the 170,000 who comprised three-fourths of all teachers in 1901. The great majority came from lower middle class origins. The National Union of Women Teachers (NUWT) originated in the early 20th century inside the male-controlled National Union of Teachers (NUT). It demanded equal pay with male teachers, and eventually broke away. Both Oxford and Cambridge minimized the role of women, allowing small all-female colleges to operate. However the new redbrick universities and the other major cities were open to women.

Medicine was the greatest challenge, with the most systematic resistance by the physicians, and the fewest women breaking through. One route to entry was to go to the United States where there were suitable schools for women as early as 1850. Britain was one of the last countries to train women physicians, so 80 to 90% of the British women departed to America for their medical degrees. Edinburgh University admitted a few women in 1869, then reversed itself in 1873, leaving a strong negative reaction among British medical educators. The first separate school for women physicians opened in London in 1874 to a handful of students. Scotland was more open. Coeducation had to wait until the World War.

By the end of the nineteenth century, women had secured equality of status in most spheres – except for the vote and the holding of office.

Child custody

Under traditional common law, children were considered to belong to their father, who had full legal rights over them, both during and after the dissolution of a marriage. Before 1839, after a divorce, women lost control of their children, as those children would continue to live in the family unit with the father, who, as head of the household, continued to be responsible for them. Caroline Norton was one such woman; her personal tragedy where she was denied access to her three sons after a divorce led her to a life of intense campaigning which successfully led to the passing of the Custody of Infants Act 1839 and paved the way for the tender years doctrine for child custody arrangement. The act gave women, for the first time, a right to their children and gave some discretion to the judge in child custody cases. The Custody of Infants Act 1839 permitted a mother to petition the courts for custody of her children up to the age of sevenAlthough it is sometimes claimed that the Custody of Infants Act 1839 represents an example of the 'tender years doctrine' (a concept which favours mothers of young children in custody cases) this act in fact only allowed mothers to petition for the custody of children under seven, without any guarantee of obtaining such custody, especially since at the time the (very few) divorces granted were granted (by act of parliament) to husbands on the ground of the wife's adultery, therefore depriving her of rights to the children. According to Pinchbeck and Hewitt: "It could be said that the Act was not so much concerned with the welfare of the child as with the punishment of the mother proved 'guilty' in separation or divorce proceedings .... But in 1839, the Custody of Infants Act constituted an immense and startling innovation: the absolute right of the father was now subject to the discretionary power of the judge .... Under the Act the practice of the courts was to decide if possible in favour of paternal right rather than against it, and to exercise discretion against the mother even as to young children. Nevertheless, despite its limitations, this piece of legislation has a special importance since it was the first statutory intervention in the common law rights of a father in this country." and for access in respect of older children, maintaining the responsibility for financial support to the father.

The Custody of Infants Act 1873, passed by the Parliament due to additional pressure from women, extended the maternal right to petition for custody to children under sixteen. The doctrine spread in many states of the world because of the British Empire.

In divorce cases in the 19th century, a woman found guilty of adultery lost not only custody but also access (visitation) to her children. This is exemplified by a ruling by Sir C. Cresswell in 1862, stating that: "It will probably have a salutary effect on the interests of public morality, that it should be known that a woman, if found guilty of adultery, will forfeit, as far as this Court is concerned, all right to the custody of or access to her children."

The Guardianship of Infants Act 1886 made it easier for mothers to become guardians of the children after their father's death.

A slightly less punitive approach towards adulterous mothers was made possible by Mozley Stark v Mozley Stark and Hitchins (1910, Court of Appeal).

Before 1923, male and female adultery were legally treated differently (see section below).

Custody rights were relevant not only with regard to divorce, but also with regard to the legal rights of parents who were married (regarding decisions about children, which included the right of a father to separate a child from the mother, for example by the father sending the child to live abroad). Originally, the father alone had such rights, as the common law gave only the father the right to make decisions about the upbringing of a legitimate child. Mothers' rights gradually improved, especially with the passage of the Guardianship of Infants Act 1925, but it was only in 1973 that full equality was obtained.

Divorce

In Britain, before 1857, the dissolution of a marriage was nearly impossible, being de facto restricted to the very wealthy, as it demanded either a complex annulment process or a private bill leading to an act of Parliament, with great costs for either. The latter entailed sometimes lengthy debates about a couple's intimate marital relationship in public in the House of Commons.Getzler, J. S. (2004) "Cresswell, Sir Cresswell (1793–1863)", Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, accessed 12 August 2007 Obtaining a divorce was very difficult, and there were only 314 divorces between 1700 and 1857, corresponding to a rate of two divorces a year. Traditionally, poor people used desertion, and (for poor men) even the practice of selling wives in the market, as a substitute for divorce.

The first key legislative change came with the Matrimonial Causes Act 1857. It passed over the strenuous opposition of the highly traditional Church of England. The new law made divorce a civil affair of the courts, rather than a Church matter, with a new civil court in London handling all cases. The process was still quite expensive, at about £40, but now became feasible for the middle class. A woman who obtained a judicial separation took the status of a feme sole, with full control of her own civil rights. Additional amendments came in 1878, which allowed for separations handled by local justices of the peace. The Church of England blocked further reforms until the final breakthrough came with the Matrimonial Causes Act 1973.

Before the Matrimonial Causes Act 1923, a man could divorce on the ground of a wife's adultery, but a woman could only divorce by proving a husband's adultery aggravated by other misconduct (eg. adultery and cruelty).

The Matrimonial Causes Act 1937 broadened the grounds for divorce, adding additional reasons for which a divorce could be granted.

The Divorce Reform Act 1969 was the first divorce law to allow no fault divorce (on the ground of having lived separate and apart).

Limitations to women's rights in family law