Stormi Nyx

September 19, 1893, Wellington. The governor, Lord Glasgow, signed the Electoral Act. New Zealand became the first country in the world where all women could vote in a parliamentary election.

What passed it was a roll. Women signed more than 500 sheets, joined into one petition over 270 metres long: nearly 32,000 names, about a quarter of the country's adult European women. John Hall carried it into Parliament on 28 July, and staff unwound a section across the whole length of the debating chamber. You can't argue with a thing that long. You can only count it.

Supporters pinned white camellias on the MPs who backed it. The liquor lobby, sure women would force prohibition, pushed the Upper House to kill it. Premier Richard Seddon needed one more vote, so he wired a councillor named Thomas Kelly and got him to switch. It incensed two councillors who had been against it. They switched the other way. It passed 20 to 18.

Māori women were included. That year Meri Te Tai Mangakāhia became the first woman to speak before Te Kotahitanga, the Māori parliament, arguing Māori women had always owned land and colonial law was taking it.

Seddon needed one vote. He got it. It cost him two.

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