Women's suffrage in Ecuador

This prompted a process which started with the acceptance of her voting request by the Council of State, and ended in the introduction of women's suffrage in the new constitution of 1929.

[8] The inclusion of the restriction sparked a debate about whether or not there were women who wanted to vote, with the conservative majority in the Assembly expressing their stance.

The Constitution of 1897, written by a fairly liberal Assembly, withdrew all references of gender in regards to citizenship and placed an emphasis on improving the condition of women in society.

The record of the Assembly debates includes the following note, dated June 3rd, 1897: “In the first days of the convention much has been done in order to grant women citizenship rights, including the ability to occupy any public office, such as the Department of State.” [9] However, while in theory women could exercise all citizenship rights, it was commonly accepted at this time that they could be restricted in the electoral field.

[4][2] Hidalgo made a formal request and used the Constitution of 1897 to argue that there were no restrictions regarding gender in having citizenship rights.

[4] The Council of State provided three types of arguments to accept Hidalgo’s application -- legal, social, and moral.

[10] The public debate that took place due to Matilde Hidalgo’s case was taken to the Assembly of 1928 -- which was also primarily liberal.

José María Velasco Ibarra opposed this argument and other attempts to reduce the electoral register in the Constitution.

[10] Borja’s stance was strongly rejected in the liberal circles of Guayaquil, although it was supported in Quito, with many writers and thinkers pointing out women’s lack of autonomy as a reason to forbid them from voting.