Transcript Women’s Movement

Women’s Movement
Women’s Movement in 1800s
 Middle class women involved in reform to help
poor, deaf, insane and victims of alcoholism
 Many became active in abolition movement
 Lucretia Mott, a Quaker involved in activities
outside the home
 Traveled in east and mid-west addressing reform
organizations
 1848 : The first women's rights convention in the United
States is held in Seneca Falls, New York. A "Declaration
of Sentiments and Resolutions" is signed. Women's rights
meetings are held on a regular basis after that.
 1851: Sojourner Truth, a former slave, delivers her "Ain't
I a Woman?" speech at a women's rights convention in
Akron, Ohio
 1859: Vulcanization of rubber provides women with
reliable condoms for the first time in history. The birth
rate in the United States continues its century-long
downward spiral. By the late 1900s, women will raise an
average of only two to three children, in contrast to the
five or six children they raised at the beginning of the
century
 Mott went to London in 1840 as delegate
to antislavery convention
 Refused seating because she was a woman
 Met Elizabeth Cady Stanton in England
Elizabeth Cady Stanton
 Daughter of a wealthy judge in New York
state
 Married abolitionist Henry Brewer Stanton
 Active in abolitionist movement
 Spearheaded 1848 Seneca Falls
Convention
 Declaration of Rights & Sentiments and 11
resolutions (right to vote)
Susan B. Anthony
 Born in MA as daughter of mill owner,
reformer and Quaker
 Well educated, encouraged to express
herself, became teacher
 Became temperance leader in 1848 as a
way to help women and children in homes
where poverty and violence were prevalent
Collaboration
 Anthony met Stanton in 1851 and began a
longstanding collaboration
 Stanton was initially teacher to Anthony
 Stanton met family responsibilities (7
children) and did much writing
 Anthony was powerhouse who spoke and
crusaded
Married Women’s Property Act
 Together fought for Married Women’s
Property Act in New York which gave
married women rights to
– Own property
– Engage in business
– Manage their incomes
– Be joint guardians of their children
 Together helped drive the movement to
persuade Congress to pass 13th
Amendment
 1866 founded Equal Rights Association
 Falling out with other abolitionists who
wanted rights for freed slaves to be priority
 1878 introduced Women’s Suffrage
amendment
 Continued work together concerning
voting rights and other reforms
 Stanton died in 1902 at age 87
 Anthony died in 1906 at age 86
 1920 19th Amendment ratified
 1912: Theodore Roosevelt's Progressive
Party becomes the first national political
party to support suffrage for women.
 Woodrow Wilson wins the election in 1913.
 Protests continue despite pressure and
arrests.
 August 26, 1920: The Nineteenth
Amendment is ratified.
 1923: The National Woman's Party proposes
the Equal Rights Amendment to eliminate
discrimination on the basis of gender.
Image courtesy of HBO films suffragette history website
March 3, 1913 -- the day before Woodrow Wilson's inauguration,
Inez Milholland, draped in flowing white robes leads a parade of
an estimated 5,000 suffragists. This image became emblematic of
the fight for women's rights in America. The marchers were
attacked verbally and physically but refused to give up.
Image courtesy of HBO films suffragette history website
1917: (left to right) Doris Stevens, Mrs. J.A.H.
Hopkins, Eunice Dana Branham, in prison clothes.
The women were arrested for protesting in front of
the White House for women’s suffrage.
Image courtesy of HBO films suffragette history website
Tennessee, 1920, Suffrage Ratification: (left to right) Banks Turner,
whose vote prevented the tabling of the suffrage resolution,
Catherine Flannagan, Anita Pollitzer, Harry Burn, who gave the last
needed vote for ratification; (in foreground): Thomas O. Simpson,
who resisted "almost inhuman pressure of anti-suffrage interests," Betty
Gram, Sue White.
Image courtesy of HBO films suffragette history website