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Goldstein, Vida (1869 - 1949)

Born
1869
Portland, Victoria, Australia
Died
15 August 1949
South Yarra, Victoria, Australia
Occupation
Feminist and Suffragist

Summary

Vida Goldstein ran for the Australian Senate in 1903. Though she was not elected, she was the first woman to be nominated for the Australian Parliament.

Details

One of five children, Vida Goldstein was educated at Presbyterian Ladies College in Melbourne. As a young woman, she worked with her mother in the anti-sweating movement and developed an anti-capitalist perspective. Later, she became involved in the suffrage movement. She was a paid organiser for the United Council for Women's Suffrage, and she founded the Women's Political Association. From 1900 to 1905 she produced and edited a monthly feminist journal, Woman's Sphere. When the International Women's Suffrage Alliance was formed, Goldstein was elected as corresponding secretary. She helped to found the National Council of Women, and was the Delegate from Australia and New Zealand to the International Woman Suffrage Conference in Washington D.C. in 1902.

Vida Goldstein was nominated by the Women's Federal Political Association as a candidate for the Senate in 1903. She became the subject of heated controversy, stating her policies in feminist terms. Goldstein polled 51,497 votes but was not elected. A further four attempts before 1917 were also unsuccessful. After the award of state suffrage in 1908, Goldstein launched a new journal, Woman Voter. In 1915, she founded the Women's Peace Army alongside Cecilia John, Adela Pankhurst and Jennie Baines.

Sources used to compile this entry: Brownfoot, Janice N., 'Goldstein, Vida Jane Mary (1869-1949)', in Australian Dictionary of Biography Online, Australian National University, 2006, http://www.adb.online.anu.edu.au/biogs/A090042b.htm; http://www.nla.gov.au/guides/federation/people/goldstein.html; Heather Radi (ed.), 200 Australian Women (1988).

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Archival resources

National Gallery of Australia Research Library

  • Collection of newspaper cuttings relating to her (Vida Goldstein's) candidature for the Federal Senate in 1903, 1903, N+ 324.3 GOL; National Gallery of Australia Research Library. Details

National Library of Australia Manuscript Collection

  • Collections held by the Fawcett Library relating to Australia and New Zealand., 1858 - 1967, Mfm M2291-2314; National Library of Australia Manuscript Collection. Details
  • Industrial Workers of the World Correspondence [manuscript], 1897 - 1919, MS 3516; National Library of Australia Manuscript Collection. Details
  • Letter from Corbett Ashley to a Mr White re Vida Goldstein, 1944 - 1968, MS 907; Papers of Lorna Rudduck.; Ashley, Corbett; National Library of Australia Manuscript Collection. Details
  • Papers of Leslie Moira Henderson, 1880 - 1961, MS 1444; National Library of Australia Manuscript Collection. Details
  • Papers of Ruby Rich, 1943 - 1948, MS 2260; Rich, Ruby (1888 - 1988); National Library of Australia Manuscript Collection. Details
  • Papers of various Australian women, MS 842; Rapke, Julia; National Library of Australia Manuscript Collection. Details
  • Ruby Rich Papers, 1943 - 1948, NLA MS 2260; National Library of Australia Manuscript Collection. Details
  • Vida Goldstein 1869-1949., 1966, MS 1637; Henderson, Leslie; National Library of Australia Manuscript Collection. Details
  • Vida Goldstein correspondence, 1908, MS 590; Papers of Baron Henry Stafford Northcote; National Library of Australia Manuscript Collection. Details
  • Vida Goldstein Correspondence, MS 3516; Correspondence of the Industrial Workers of the World; National Library of Australia Manuscript Collection. Details

National Library of Australia Newspaper Microcopy Reading Room

  • Biographical cuttings on Vida Goldstein, BIOG; National Library of Australia Newspaper Microcopy Reading Room. Details

National Library of Australia, Reading Room

  • Scheme of proposed Women's Rural Industries Co., UApam 816; National Library of Australia, Reading Room. Details

Public Record Office Victoria

  • Women's Suffrage Petition (Monster Petition), 1891, VPRS 3253/P0, Unit 851; Public Record Office Victoria. Details

State Library of Victoria, Australian Manuscripts Collection

  • The Goldstein chronicle, c. 1950 - c. 1973; State Library of Victoria, Australian Manuscripts Collection. Details
  • Letters : England, to Henry Hyde Champion and Elsie Belle Champion, Melbourne., 1908 - 1949; State Library of Victoria, Australian Manuscripts Collection. Details
  • Letters, diaries and lectures, 1902 - 1919; State Library of Victoria, Australian Manuscripts Collection. Details
  • Press cuttings book presented to Edith How Martyn., 1943; State Library of Victoria, Australian Manuscripts Collection. Details

Published resources

Audiovisual materials

  • Sue Fabian and Morag Loh, Vida Goldstein 1869-1949 [slide], Equality Press, Gardenvale, Vic. Details

Books

  • The Australian Woman's Sphere, Vida Goldstein, Melbourne, 1900-1905. Details
  • Bomford, Janette M., That dangerous and persuasive woman : Vida Goldstein, Melbourne University Press, Carlton, Vic., 1993, 264 pp. Details
  • Henderson, Leslie M. (Leslie Moira), The Goldstein Story, Stockland Press, Melbourne, 1973, 189 pp. Details
  • Vida Goldstein, Woman Suffrage in Australia, The Woman's Press, London, 1910?. Details
  • Women's Political Association, The Life and work of Miss Vida Goldstein, Australasian Authors' Agency, Melbourne, ca. 1913, 15 pp. Details

Book Sections

  • 'Vida Goldstein and the struggle for women's rights', in National Archives of Australia (ed.), Voices for democracy : teachers resource kit, National Archives of Australia, Canberra, c1998. Details
  • Bomford, Janette, 'The lady politician: Vida Goldstein's first Senate campaign', in Irving, Helen (ed.), A Woman's Constitution? Gender and History in the Australian Commonwealth, Hale and Iremonger, Sydney, 1996, p. 179. Details

Edited Books

  • Ruth Teale (ed.), Colonial Eve : sources on women in Australia, 1788-1914, Oxford University Press, Melbourne, 1978. Details

Journal Articles

  • Caine, Barbara, 'Vida Goldstein and the English militant campaign of the Women's Social and Political Union', Women's History Review, vol. 2, no. 3, 1993, pp. 363-376. Details

Reports

  • Vida Goldstein, Report ot the National Council of Women of New South Wales of an Informal Conference with Mrs May Wright Sewell, President of the International Council of Women, Norman Bros, Melbourne, 1902, 8 pp. Details
  • Vida Goldstein, Recommendations in favour of voluntary methods of dealing with venereal diseases: as agreed upon by the Women's Political Association and the Women's Convention, Fraser & Jenkinson, Melbourne, 1916, 1 pp. Details

Online Resources

See also

  • Australian Suffragettes, Australian Broadcasting Corporation, 1998, http://www.abc.net.au/ola/citizen/women/women-home-vote.htm. Details
  • Australian Electoral Commission, 'List of Electoral Divisions Named After Women', 10 May 2002, http://www.aec.gov.au/history/women/women3.htm. Details
  • Eidelson, Meyer, Nation builders : great lives and stories from St Kilda General Cemetery, Friends of St Kilda Cemetery Inc., St Kilda, Vic., 2001, 120 pp. Details
  • Gillison, Joan M, A History of the Lyceum Club Melbourne, The Lyceum Club, Melbourne, 1975, 118 pp. Details
  • Grimshaw, Patricia, 'A white woman's suffrage', in Irving, Helen (ed.), A Woman's Constitution? Gender and History in the Australian Commonwealth, Hale and Iremonger, Sydney, 1996, p. 179. Details
  • Lake, Marilyn and Kelly, Farley (eds), Double Time: Women in Victoria - 150 Years, Penguin Books Australia Ltd, Ringwood (Vic.), 1985, 476 pp. Details
  • Lees, Kirsten., Votes for women : the Australian story, Allen & Unwin, St. Leonards, N.S.W., 1995, 206 pp. Details
  • Oldfield, Audrey, Woman suffrage in Australia : a gift or a struggle?, Cambridge University Press, Melbourne, 1992, 263 pp. Details
  • 1891 Women's Suffrage Petition, with Royal Historical Society of Victoria, Genealogical Society of Victoria, League of Women Voters Victoria, Public Record Office Victoria, WCTU, Parliament of Victoria, http://www.parliament.vic.gov.au/womensPetition/. Details
  • Radi, Heather (ed.), 200 Australian Women: A Redress Anthology, Women's Redress Press, Sydney, 1988, 258 pp. Also available at http://nla.gov.au/nla.arc-78644. Details
  • Smart, Judith, 'Modernity and mother-heartedness : spirituality and religious meaning in Australian women's suffrage and citizenship movements, 1890s-1920s', in Fletcher, Ian Christopher, Laura E. Nym Mayhall and Philippa Levine (eds), Women's Suffrage in the British Empire: Citizenship, Nation, and Race, Routledge, London, 2000, pp. 51-97. Details
  • Sparrow, Jeff and Sparrow, Jill, Radical Melbourne : a secret history, the vulgar press, Carlton North, Vic., 2001, 223 pp. Details
  • Suzane Fabian and Morag Loh, The Changemakers : Ten Significant Australian Women, Jacaranda Press, Milton, Qld., 1983, 190 pp. Details

Clare Land and Jane Carey

Created: 9 December 2001, Last modified: 17 November 2009

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