[2][4] A committed suffragette, she, together with fellow west country woman and lifelong friend Clara Neal (1870 -1936), joined the Women's Freedom League in 1908,[7] following an anti-suffrage meeting in Swansea which was attended by the Welsh Liberal Party politician Lloyd George.

[8] Like many other members of the Women's Freedom League, Neal and Phipps, together with two training college lecturers and a business woman, staged a boycott on the night of the 1911 Census,[3] staying overnight in a sea cave on the nearby Gower Peninsula.

All the women candidates were heavily defeated, but she retained her deposit in a straight contest (with a low turnout) with the sitting Conservative MP, Sir Samuel Hoare.

[2] Following this, she gave up her teaching position and moved from Swansea to London, but although increasing ill health prevented her from practising in the courts for long, she remained as standing counsel to the National Union of Women Teachers.

In the entry on Emily Phipps in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Hilda Kean describes her versatility, "Known for her sparkling personality, wit and strong tongue she inspired a generation of women teachers.

"[4] In 1990 Phipps was chosen with three others, Agnes Dawson, Theodora Bonwick and Ethel Froud, to be featured in Hilda Kean's book, 'Deeds Not Words: The Lives of Suffragette Teachers'.