Quick Facts
Biography
Carolina Beatriz Ângelo (1878–1911) was a Portuguese physician and the first woman to vote in Portugal. She used the ambiguity a law that issued the right to vote to literate head-of-households over 21 to cast her vote in the election of the Constituent National Assembly in 1911. Shortly thereafter, on July 3, 1913, a law was passed to specify the right to vote was only for male citizens, literate and over 21. Her act was widely reported on throughout Portugal and among feminist associations in other countries.
Life
Angelo was a medical doctor practicing in Lisbon. She was a feminist and suffragette who participated in multiple women's associations. She was a leader of the Portuguese Women's Republican League and in 1911 she and Adelaide Cabete founded the Portuguese Association of Feminist Propaganda (Associação de Propaganda Feminista) of which Ana de Castro Osorio became the head.
Vote
On May 28, 1911 Angelo cast her vote for deputies of the Constitutional Assembly in the first elections after the fall of the monarchy. Because she was both a widow and a mother of a daughter, she was considered head-of-household.