She fought to give women the right to divorce. She campaigned for civil partnerships and against slavery. She was a passionate feminist who died for her ideals – and all this in the late 18th century. Now one of France's greatest honours could be bestowed on Olympe de Gouges, a woman considered by many to be one of the world's first feminist campaigners.

De Gouges is one of a handful of women being considered for membership of the Panthéon, France's secular necropolis. Kickstarting a national campaign, the feminist movement Osez le féminisme (Dare to be a feminist) has just launched an e-petition to put pressure on President François Hollande to admit more women to the Panthéon.

Being the first French president to achieve a perfect gender equality in his government only a few days after his election, in May 2012, Hollande now seems bound to bow to the feminists' most symbolic of pressures. He may indeed soon decide on the names of a couple of women to keep company with the only woman (among 71 men) resting at the Panthéon: Marie Curie.

In a kind of X-Factor exercise in national glory, France's National Monument Centre, in a joint effort with feminist groups, has invited the public to name possible candidates to the Panthéon before 22 September. It will then deliver its final recommendation to Hollande a week later. Osez le féminisme has already drawn up a list and made it public: among them are the anarchist and Paris Commune activist Louise Michel, the resistance fighter Germaine Tillion, the writer and philosopher Simone de Beauvoir ... and De Gouges, who would make a particularly good candidate as she shares a common revolutionary history with the building.

Designed in the late 1740s on Louis XV's request, Paris's Panthéon, originally designed as a church, was completed a few months after the revolution started. The consecration never took place. Instead, revolutionaries decided to dedicate the impressive building perched on top of the Latin Quarter's hill, just south of the Sorbonne, to the great men and women who have contributed to France's grandeur. The first to be admitted were Voltaire and Rousseau.

Born Marie Gouze in 1748, the feminist reinvented herself as Olympe de Gouges in her 20s when she arrived in pre-revolutionary Paris. Opposed to religious marriage, which she deemed "love and trust's grave", she preferred companionship.

She chose the theatre, which was at the forefront of avant-garde politics, to express her radical ideas. Performed by her own theatre company, her play The Slavery of the Blacks made her famous. In it she denounced the economics behind slavery and supported its abolition.

She also edited a newsletter, Lettre au Peuple (Letter to the People), in which she developed a series of social reforms. She wrote the Declaration of the Rights of Women, in which she stated: "A woman has the right to be guillotined; she should also have the right to debate." She campaigned for the right for women to divorce and obtained it. She campaigned in favour of a system of civil partnerships that would replace religious marriage.

However, her audacity proved too much for some – and Robespierre in particular, whom she had publicly accused of tyranny. She was arrested and sentenced to death in 1793. As she walked up to the guillotine, she declared: "Children of the fatherland, you will avenge my death."

Throughout the 19th century and France's many changes of political regimes, the Panthéon was renamed. It was once known as the Temple of Glory, later as the Temple of Humanity, but it was also, at times, reconsecrated as a Catholic church.

Napoleon was the most active "Pantheoniser". During his time in power, he allowed 43 men, often his most talented generals, to be buried in the Panthéon's crypt. During the short Bourbon restoration during the 1820s, King Louis XVIII was asked whether the notorious anticlerical Voltaire's remains should be moved out. He famously replied: "Why don't we leave him there. He's punished enough as it is: he has to listen to masses all day long!"

In an attempt to distinguish themselves from Napoleon, consecutive regimes refrained from passing decrees on who should follow in the steps of Voltaire and Rousseau. It was not until the Third Republic and Victor Hugo's entombment there in 1885correct, at the end of a 5km procession followed by two million people, that the Panthéon was re-established as the nation's secular necropolis.

Every French president likes overseeing the "Pantheonisation" of great French figures. It is a time of national communion, a solemn and moving moment. Many French people still remember vividly when the French resistance fighter Jean Moulin's ashes were transferred to the Panthéon on a bitterly cold December afternoon in 1964. General de Gaulle's culture minister, the writer and resistance leader André Malraux, wrote and read the ceremony speech, which still echoes in many French ears.

François Mitterrand approved the admission of Jean Monnet, "Europe's first citizen" in 1988, but also notably in 1995 of the first woman buried there: Marie Curie, alongside her husband, Pierre. In 2002 Jacques Chirac approved the transfer of writer Alexandre Dumas's remains. However, things do not always go to plan. In 2009 Nicolas Sarkozy wished to see Albert Camus buried in the Panthéon, but Camus's children chose to turn down the offer, which was seen as a humiliation for the president.

In a few weeks' time, Hollande will have the opportunity to admit a remarkable woman to the Panthéon. Whether he chooses Olympe, Simone, Louise or Germaine, he will make history and, as the Panthéon's motto says, the nation will certainly be grateful.