Women’s Rights

I

Introduction

Women’s Rights, rights that establish the same social, economic, and political status for women as for men. Women’s rights guarantee that women will not face discrimination on the basis of their sex. Until the second half of the 20th century, women in most societies were denied some of the legal and political rights accorded to men. Although women in much of the world have gained significant legal rights, many people believe that women still do not have complete political, economic, and social equality with men.

Throughout much of the history of Western civilization, deep-seated cultural beliefs allowed women only limited roles in society. Many people believed that women’s natural roles were as mothers and wives. These people considered women to be better suited for childbearing and homemaking rather than for involvement in the public life of business or politics. Widespread belief that women were intellectually inferior to men led most societies to limit women’s education to learning domestic skills. Well-educated, upper-class men controlled most positions of employment and power in society.

Until the 19th century, the denial of equal rights to women met with only occasional protest and drew little attention from most people. Because most women lacked the educational and economic resources that would enable them to challenge the prevailing social order, women generally accepted their inferior status as their only option. At this time, women shared these disadvantages with the majority of working class men, as many social, economic, and political rights were restricted to the wealthy elite. In the late 18th century, in an attempt to remedy these inequalities among men, political theorists and philosophers asserted that all men were created equal and therefore were entitled to equal treatment under the law. In the 19th century, as governments in Europe and North America began to draft new laws guaranteeing equality among men, significant numbers of women—and some men—began to demand that women be accorded equal rights as well.

At the same time, the Industrial Revolution in Europe and North America further divided the roles of men and women. Before the Industrial Revolution most people worked in farming or crafts-making, both of which took place in or near the home. Men and women usually divided the numerous tasks among themselves and their children. Industrialization led male workers to seek employment outside of the home in factories and other large-scale enterprises. The growing split between home and work reinforced the idea that women’s “rightful place” was in the home, while men belonged in the public world of employment and politics.

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Organized efforts by women to achieve greater rights occurred in two major waves. The first wave began around the mid-19th century, when women in the United States and elsewhere campaigned to gain suffrage—that is, the right to vote (see Woman Suffrage). This wave lasted until the 1920s, when several countries granted women suffrage. The second wave gained momentum during the civil rights movement of the 1960s, when the struggle by African Americans to achieve racial equality inspired women to renew their own struggle for equality.

II

Origins

The struggle for women’s rights began in the 18th century during a period of intense intellectual activity known as the Age of Enlightenment. During the Enlightenment, political philosophers in Europe began to question traditional ideas that based the rights of citizens on their wealth and social status. Instead, leaders of the Enlightenment argued that all individuals were born with natural rights that made them free and equal. They maintained that all inequalities that existed among citizens were the result of an inadequate education system and an imperfect social environment. Enlightenment philosophers argued that improved education and more egalitarian social structures could correct these inequalities.

Such radical ideas about equality and the rights of citizens helped inspire both the American Revolution in 1775 and the French Revolution in 1789. However, the ideas of the Enlightenment initially had little impact on the legal and political status of women. Most Enlightenment thinkers had little to say about the position women held in society, and many of their followers assumed that the concepts of liberty, equality, and political representation applied only to men. For example, one of the most influential writers from this period, French philosopher Jean Jacques Rousseau, claimed that women were sentimental and frivolous. Rousseau argued that women were naturally suited to be subordinate companions of men.

In response to Rousseau and others who belittled the role of women in society, English writer Mary Wollstonecraft wrote A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1791). In this book, Wollstonecraft argued that, like men, women were naturally rational but their inferior education often taught them to be silly and emotional. Education, she believed, should cultivate the natural reasoning capacity in girls. She also claimed that the best marriages were marriages of equals, in which husband and wife were friends as well as legal partners. Wollstonecraft argued that equality in marriage would only come about with equality of education.

In the early 19th century, the vast majority of married women throughout Europe and the United States still had no legal identity apart from their husbands. This legal status—known as coverture—prohibited a married woman from being a party in a lawsuit, sitting on a jury, holding property in her own name, or writing a will. In custody disputes, courts routinely granted permanent custody of children to the father.

III

Early Struggles for Equal Rights in the United States

In the United States, widespread religious revivalism at the beginning of the 19th century inspired the early women’s rights movement. Large numbers of middle-class women joined evangelical societies whose efforts centered on religious conversion and on moral and social reform. These women campaigned to improve the lives and save the souls of prostitutes, increase the wages of working women, and expand employment opportunities for women. They also campaigned to abolish alcohol, an effort that became known as the temperance movement. Temperance workers considered alcohol to be a primary cause of sexual violence, prostitution, promiscuity, adultery, and the destruction of working-class families. Many prominent early American activists for women’s rights, including Susan B. Anthony, Lucretia Mott, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Lucy Stone, and Elizabeth Blackwell, gained important organizational and political experience in the temperance movement.

American women became involved in many social and moral reform campaigns in the 19th century, but it was their efforts in the movement to abolish slavery that led most directly to the organized campaign for women’s rights. Many of the earliest female abolitionists came from Quaker backgrounds, and drew on Quaker traditions of equality for all people as inspiration for their political work (see Society of Friends). In some areas, women formed independent abolition societies. Under the leadership of Quaker minister Lucretia Mott, they began demanding that women be admitted as active members to male abolition organizations. By 1850 the majority of members in northern abolition societies were women.

Some of the most influential female abolitionists were Sarah and Angelina Grimké, daughters of wealthy slave-owners and converts to Quakerism. In 1836 they held a series of lectures at women’s abolition societies in which they described their personal experiences of the horrors of slavery. By speaking frankly before both women and men, the Grimké sisters caused a public furor over the right of women to speak publicly. Ministers condemned the sisters for assuming “the place and tone of man as a public reformer” and charged that by speaking publicly, the sisters had adopted an “unnatural character.” In response, the Grimkés drew analogies between the plights of white women and African Americans, both of whom were regarded as intellectually inferior and denied access to a decent education. Sarah Grimké maintained that men and women were created equal and that “whatever is right for a man to do, is right for a woman to do.”

In 1840 Lucretia Mott and Elizabeth Cady Stanton traveled to London to attend the World Anti-Slavery Convention. Upon arrival, however, the women were barred from participating in the conference and forced to sit behind a curtain. This experience of discrimination inspired them to organize the first women’s rights convention. This convention met in Seneca Falls, New York, on July 19 and 20, 1848. The Seneca Falls Convention attracted more than 200 women and approximately 40 men. For the convention, Stanton, Mott, and several others wrote a Declaration of Sentiments and Resolutions, often considered the founding text of the American women’s rights movement. Based on the Declaration of Independence, the Declaration of Sentiments stated that men and women were created equal and that, like men, women were born with certain natural rights. The document criticized men for denying women the right to vote, the right to hold property, equal terms in a divorce, and custody of children. It also criticized men for blocking women’s access to higher education, the professions, and “nearly all the profitable employments.” The declaration also faulted the church for excluding women from the ministry.

IV

U.S. Legislation for Women’s Rights

In the 19th century, state and federal laws that discriminated against women posed some of the most significant obstacles to securing women’s rights. The earliest campaigns to improve women’s legal status in the United States centered on gaining property rights for women. Women also led legislative efforts in the 19th and 20th centuries to ensure their voting, employment, and reproductive rights.

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