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Kōrero: Women’s movement

Cleaning up politics

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Cleaning up politics

Politics was seen as a dirty business, and many people believed that when women had the vote they would clean it up. The man being thoroughly scrubbed in this 1893 cartoon wears a badge saying ‘MHR’ (Member of the House of Representatives), while the woman is saying, ‘You dirty boy!’

Te whakamahi i tēnei tūemi

Manatū Taonga – Ministry for Culture and Heritage, History Group

Reference: New Zealand Graphic, 18 November 1893

by Ashley Hunter

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Ngā whakaahua me ngā rauemi katoa o tēnei kōrero

Me pēnei te tohu i te whārang

Megan Cook, Women’s movement – The 19th-century women’s movement, Te Ara – the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, https://teara.govt.nz/mi/cartoon/27883/cleaning-up-politics (accessed 4 June 2026).

He kōrero nā Megan Cook, i tāngia i te 7 April 2011.