WOMEN'S RIGHTS

WOMEN'S ROLE IN SOCIETY

• "Republican mothers"
• Purpose: educate sons about government and politics, mind children
• Considered inferior to men, had few rights as citizens

REFORM BEGINS

• Start: Revolutionary-era when
• quaker women established schools for freed slaves
• Took part in 2nd Great Awakening

KEY PLAYERS

• Catharine Beecher: took part in education reform
• Believed women could give insight and better moral guidance
• Dorothy Dix: created charity schools, wrote 7 books on science
• She also demanded mentally unstable jailers be in separate jails
• Harriet Jacobs: took part in abolitionist movement, Uncle Tom's Cabin

KEY PLAYERS CONT'D

• "Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl"
• Sarah Grimke: women can debate and be active in politics
• Bible: "The Lord Jesus defines the duties of his followers without any reference
• To sex."
• Refuted clergymen's motion to debste in front of men only

KEY ORGANIZATIONS

• questioned a woman's individuality and sated she was entitled to it
• "Female Moral Reform"' - org of only hired women devoted to
• Ending prostitution and promoting chastity for BOTH sexes
• Moral guidance for young women
• While women provided info on $ efficiency and domesticity, their roles

ORGS CONTINUED

• Became more equal to those of men
• Order of Good Templars: devoted to temperance movement

1850-

• Granted custody rights in event of divorce, husband's death
• 1860: Right to collect wages and spend money
• 1920: Right to vote