DV - Revolution - Facts, Vocab

Question 1

l’impossibilité de limiter le droit de vote sur la base de l’appartenance ethno-raciale

Answer 1

prohibits the federal government and each state from denying or abridging a citizen’s right to vote “on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.”

Question 2

une défaite majeure du suffragisme

Answer 2

major defeat of suffragism

Question 3

the Supreme Court case Minor v. Happersett

Answer 3

l’arrêt Minor v. Happersett

Question 4

obtain the right to vote

Answer 4

obtenir le droit de vote

Question 5

newspapers, organizing conventions, petition campaigns, parades, and demonstrations

Answer 5

journaux, l’organisation de conventions, campagnes de pétitions, les parades, et les manifestations

Question 6

mis en oeuvre

Answer 6

implemented, executed

Question 7

the absence of women’s in armed struggle

Answer 7

l’absence de participation des femmes aux conflits armés

Question 8

rational decision-making

Answer 8

la prise de décision rationnelle

Question 9

educated suffrage

Answer 9

droit de vote lié à l’éducation

Question 10

white supremacy in the south at the turn of the 20th century

Answer 10

la suprématie blanche dans le Sud au tournant du XXe siècle

Question 11

prevent uneducated whites from voting

Answer 11

empêcher les droits des les blancs non-étudués

Question 12

coverture

Answer 12

la coverture, une doctrine juridique selon laquelle la personnalité juridique d’une femme était suspendue au moment de son mariage et se fondait avec celle de son époux. Elle abandonnait alors le statut de femme sole pour celui de femme covert.

Question 13

poll tax

Answer 13

la capitation

Question 14

republican wife

Answer 14

18th-century term for an attitude toward women’s roles present in the emerging United States before, during, and after the American Revolution. It centered on the belief that the patriots’ daughters should be raised to uphold the ideals of republicanism, in order to pass on republican values to the next generation. In this way, the “Republican Mother” was considered a custodian of civic virtue responsible for upholding the morality of her husband and children. Although it is an anachronism, the period of Republican Motherhood is hard to categorize in the history of feminism. On the one hand, it reinforced the idea of a domestic women’s sphere separate from the public world of men. On the other hand, it encouraged the education of women and invested their “traditional” sphere with a dignity and importance that had been missing from previous conceptions of women’s work.

Gave them influence, despite their lack of political power; “naturalness” of gender difference used to justify different political roles

Question 15

remember the ladies letters

Answer 15

ambivalent exchange between abigail and john adams;

in first letter, A urges John to “remember the ladies,” i.e., keep tyrannical, male nature in check and allow women to pursue liberty.

“I desire you would remember the ladies and be more generous and favorable to them than your ancestors. Do not put such unlimited power into the hands of the husbands. Remember, all men would be tyrants if they could. If particular care and attention is not paid to the ladies, we are determined to foment a rebellion, and will not hold ourselves bound by any laws in which we have no voice or representation.”

Letter 3:

“We have it in our power not only to free ourselves but to subdue our masters”

Letters are ambivalent, because while they confront the unequal distribution of political power, they do so by relying on essentialist notions of womanhood

John to A, in Letter 2:

“We have only the Name of Masters, and rather than give up this, which would compleatly subject Us to the Despotism of the Peticoat, I hope General Washington, and all our brave Heroes would fight.”1

Question 16

Judith Sargent Murray, On the Equality of the Sexes, 1790

Answer 16

Argues against the idea that women are not mentally equal to men in all areas; fashion slander, gossip are “proofs of a creative faculty, of a lively imagination” shared by both women and men
–> Novel in that it challenges essentialism, towards a universalism

Argues that despite the fact that “nature” endowed men and women with equal intellectual capacities, male and female children receive different types of education, “one is taught to aspire, and the other is early confined and limitted”.

Moreover, she argued for universalism on the basis of equal physical ability, observing that some some men are effeminate and that some women are robust.

Question 17

Mary Wollstonecraft, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman: with Strictures on Political and Moral Subjects (1792)

Answer 17

Argues against educating men and women differently, writing, “taught from their infancy that beauty is woman’s sceptre, the mind shapes itself to the body, and, roaming round its gilt cage, only seeks to adorn its prison”,[22] implying that without this damaging ideology, which encourages young women to focus their attention on beauty and outward accomplishments, they could achieve much more.

Yet Wollstonecraft does not make the claim for gender equality using the same arguments or the same language that late nineteenth- and twentieth-century feminists later would. For instance, rather than unequivocally stating that men and women are equal, Wollstonecraft contends that men and women are equal in the eyes of God, which means that they are both subject to the same moral law.[30] For Wollstonecraft, men and women are equal in the most important areas of life. While such an idea may not seem revolutionary to twenty-first-century readers, its implications were revolutionary during the eighteenth century. For example, it implied that both men and women – not just women – should be modest[31] and respect the sanctity of marriage.[32] Wollstonecraft’s argument exposed the sexual double standard of the late eighteenth century and demanded that men adhere to the same virtues demanded of women.

She argues that women who succumb to sensibility are “blown about by every momentary gust of feeling”; because these women are “the prey of their senses”, they cannot think rationally. Not only do they do harm to themselves but they also do harm to all of civilization: these are not women who can refine civilization – these are women who will destroy it.

Raises questions about how to reconcile the apparent differences of gender with ideals of equality and universality

YET: Her essay presented only a brief and tentative discussion of women’s political rights.

Despite this, Wollstonecraft’s assertion that both
sexes enjoyed the same natural rights implied that their rights might well extend to the political realm.

Question 18

New Jersey, 1776-1807

Answer 18

All Inhabitants of this Colony, of full Age, who are worth Fifty Pounds proclamation Money, clear Estate in the same, and have resided within the County in which they claim a Vote for twelve Months immediately preceding the Election, shall be entitled to vote for Representatives in Council and Assembly; and also for all other publick Officers, that shall be elected by the People of the County at Large.

Question 19

Gap between principles and reality

Answer 19

Feminine ideals vs. active political voice

Question 20

The franchise before the American Revolution

Answer 20

Property qualifications accorded the right to vote to freeholders and deprived paupers of it (in line with British

Question 21

The franchise and the American Revolution

Answer 21

Debates took place positing its status as a privilege, not a right; because it was not natural right, there were taxing requirements

“Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors, equal to the whole Number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress: but no Senator or Representative, or Person holding an Office of Trust or Profit under the United States,shall be appointed an Elector”

Section 1, article 2, Constitution of the United States

Therefore, The Revolution failed to impose “a national conception of voting rights” [Keyssar,
2000, p. 24].

Question 22

US Constitution on Poll Tax

Answer 22

“Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within this Union, according to their respective Numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole Number of free Persons, including those bound to Service for a Term of Years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other Persons”

Section 2, Article 1, Constitution of the United States

Question 23

Rights given to electors by the PA Constitution

Answer 23

“Every freemen of the full age of twenty-one years, having resided in this state for the space of one whole year next before the day of election for representatives, and paid public taxes during that time, shall enjoy the right of an elector: Provided always, that sons of freeholders of the age of twenty one years shall be intitled to vote although they have not paid taxes.”

Question 24

States where Black men were free (to vote) after the ratification of the US Constitution in 1789

Answer 24

North Carolina
Massachusetts
New York
Pennsylvania
Maryland
Vermont

Question 25

Women and the American Revolution

Answer 25

Women as political beings:

“rehabilitation of femininity” [Jan Lewis 1994, p. 24-25]
“female politicians” [Rosemarie Zagarri, 2007]
Republican Motherhood [Linda Kerber, 1980]
The Republican Wife [Jan Lewis, 1987]

Question 26

Republican Motherhood = Women as political beings (Kerber)

Answer 26

The place to display female political consciousness would be, naturally enough, on their own turf, at home, in the woman’s domain. We understand, the activist women said, that if we live in safety, it is because the army protects us.

In the words of the New Jersey broadside, women in
the Revolution “have born the weight of the war, and met danger in every quarter. . . . they have with Roman courage and perseverance suffered.”

It was time, the Philadelphians said, “to display the same sentiments which animated us at the beginning of the Revolution, when we renounced the use of teas, .. . we placed former necessaries in the rank of superfluities, when our liberty was interested; when our republican and laborious hands spun the flax, prepared the linen entended for the use of our soldiers; when exiles and fugitives we supported with courage all the
evils which are the concommitents of war.”

For all its limits, this call to action was a novel formulation. Western political theory had provided no context in which women might comfortably think of themselves as political beings. The major theorists of the Enlightenment, the Whig Commonwealth, and the republican revolution had not explored the possibility of including women as part of the people. The man of Enlightenment theory was literal, not generic. The only reference to women in The federalist Papers would be to the dangers that the private intrigues of courtesans and mistresses pose to the safety of the state.

(Linda Kerber, p. 105-6, Women of the Republic: Intellect and Ideology in Revolutionary America)

Question 27

“rehabilitation of femininity” [Jan Lewis 1994, p. 24-25]

Answer 27

–sees a restriction in women’s lives because of the increased importance assigned to virtue in women and their perceived supremacy in this over men. It gave them a greater responsibility and made them more susceptible to judgment.

– claims that ‘[t]he rehabilitation of femininity was so
radical and so rapid that by the turn of the century, some held out the hope that virtuous womanhood would redeem the entire nation.’

From “Women and the American Revolution,” 1994

Question 28

“female politicians” [Rosemarie Zagarri, 2007]

Answer 28

A highly visible, if relatively small, number of women, however,
embraced a more radical alternative. They assumed their political role with an independence of spirit and an intellectual assertiveness that impressed some people and alarmed others.

These women even gained their own designation: ‘‘female politicians.’’ Although such women neither sought nor held public office, they were known for their deep interest in and passion about party and electoral politics. In contrast to ‘‘republican wives’’ and ‘‘republican mothers,’’ female politicians saw themselves—and were seen by others—as political actors in their own right. For their supporters, the women’s intense politicization represented a means of extending the political opportunities opened up by the American Revolution. Their actions reflected women’s increasing competence in a realm that had previously been closed to them. For their detractors, however, female politicians represented a threat. Such women violated the bounds of feminine modesty, challenged male
authority, and eroded the essential distinctions between the sexes.

(Revolutionary Backlash: Women and Politics in the Early American Republic)

Question 29

The Republican Wife [Jan Lewis, 1987]

Answer 29

(From: Family, Slavery, and Love in the Early American Republic: The Essays of Jan Ellen Lewis)

Question 30

Republican Motherhood vs. Female Politicians (Zagarri)

Answer 30

Female power became a realistic possibility:

“Republican motherhood, however, also limited the scope of women’s political possibilities. It did not expand their role beyond that of wives and mothers or extend their potential as independent political beings. Their actions had efficacy primarily because of women’s influence over their husbands and sons—the future soldiers, voters, and statesmen of the republic—rather than by means of women’s own agency. Republican motherhood thus represented a moderate, non-threatening
response to the challenge of the Revolution for women.”

Yet

“Young men too felt compelled to address the subject. In college
debating societies and private clubs, they explored what must have seemed like a shocking proposition to their elders: that women might be men’s equals and hence entitled to share certain political privileges.

“On at least three occasions in the 1780s and two times in the 1790s, the Brothers in Unity at Yale College discussed variations on the question of ‘‘Whether Women ought to have a share in Civil Government’’ or ‘‘Whether Females ought to be excluded from a share in Civil Government.’’ At least five times between 1788 and 1800, the Belles-Lettres Society of Dickinson College discussed issues relating to women, including: ‘‘Ought women to participate in the government of a state or not?’’; ‘‘Whether it is the design of nature that women be entirely excluded from civil and ecclesiastical preferments’’; and whether ‘‘women ought not to be legislators.’’ A University of North Carolina debating organization, the Dialectic Society, asked its members in 1803 and 1804 to consider whether ‘‘females ought to be upon equal footing with us in education and power.’’

(Revolutionary Backlash: Women and Politics in the Early American Republic)

Question 31

Jan Lewis on New Jersey, 1776-1807

Answer 31

Not an accident of wording; the term inhabitant is consistent with New Jersey’s generally liberal construction of the franchise.

Franchise had a “low threshold” and included “blacks and aliens”

Question 32

Property requirement in NJ in 1776 for woman voters

Answer 32

Fifty-pound threshold in either possessions
or cash, rather than the more restrictive landownership requirement

Question 33

Accident of wording?

Answer 33

Women of property are known to have voted in several elections in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries until the right was rescinded in 1807.

Question 34

“Essex” in NJ in 1776, explicitly argued for liberalized qualifications for voting, declaring that…

Answer 34

…“widows paying taxes [should] have an equal right to a vote, as men of the same property.”

Question 35

The underlying assumption was republican:

Answer 35

the ownership of property in one’s own name made for the independence that was thought necessary for citizens of a republic.

(Jan Lewis)

Question 36

Rescinding New Jerseyan woman suffrage in 1807

Answer 36

Related to corruption:

Men usually honest seemed lost to all sense of honor, so completely were they carried away by the heat of the strife. Women vied with the men, and in some instances surpassed them, in illegal voting. Only a few years ago there were living in Newark two ladies, who, at the time of the election in their ‘teens, voted six times each. Married women, too, indignant, perhaps, at being placed on the same political level as children and idiots, in defiance of the law, cast their ballots. Governor
Pennington is said to have escorted to the poles “a strapping negress.” Men and boys disguised themselves in women’s attire, and crowded about the polls to assist in winning the day for Newark.”

Though most voting fraud was committed by white men,

“Whereas doubts have been raised, and great diversities in practice obtained throughout the state in regard to the admission of aliens, females, and persons of color, or negroes to vote in elections, as also in regard to the mode of ascertaining the qualifications of voters in respect to estate;—and whereas, it is highly necessary to the safety, quiet, good order and dignity of the state, to clear up the said doubts
by an act of the representatives of the people, declaratory of the true sense and meaning of the constitution, and to ensure its just execution . . . according to the intent of the framers thereof.”

From Jan Lewis, “Rethinking Women’s Suffrage in New Jersey” in Family, Slavery and Love in Early America

Question 37

Timeline in NJ for woman franchise

Answer 37

• 1776 constitution
• 1790 statute for 7 counties refers to voter as “he or she”
• 1797 statute uses “he or she” in all NJ counties
• 1807 statute restricts the vote to “free, white, male citizens”

Question 38

Mary Philbrooke

Answer 38

• lobbied in the New Jersey legislature to allow women to practice law
• admitted to the bar in 1895
• used her legal training for the advancement of women’s rights, the social settlement movement in Jersey City, and the gender-free writing of the New Jersey Constitution of 1947
• known as a prominent New Jersey woman in the fight for equal rights