Women mock q Flashcards
6
The impact of the Gilded Age on the position of women in the USA - improvement
The Seneca Falls Convention in 1848 can be seen as the start of the campaign for female suffrage & the issue was taken up in later years by female activists like Elizabeth Cady Stanton Susan B Anthony & Lucy Stone.
Jane Addams set up Hull House in Chicago in 1889 as a social centre to support the settlement of newly arrived immigrant families & campaigned tirelessly for better accommodation for them. By 1890 around 400 centres like Hull House, staffed by middle class white women, had been established across the USA. This Settlement House Movement, as it was called, gave such women opportunities to gain positions of leadership denied to them in government or business & a chance to get involved in politics by campaigning against poverty, slum housing & child labour.
By 1865 29 states had passed acts protecting married women’s rights to own property & by 1887 2/3 of the states had given married women control of their earnings.
By 1900 half of high school graduates were female.
The number of women employed in domestic service halved 1870-1900 while the number in better paid clerical work (e.g. working in an office or as a telephone operator) increased tenfold.
Shop work & teaching also expanded so by 1900 about 950,000 US women worked as teachers, secretaries, librarians & telephone operators.
Women became increasingly active in trade unions: by the mid 1880s there were over 100 female trade unions & women like Mary Harris Jones (nicknamed “Mother Jones”) organised miners’ wives to oppose strike breaking & campaigned against child labour.
B/c of increased employment, reduced infant mortality & greater awareness of birth control the birth rate amongst white US women fell from 5.4 to 3.6 1850-1900.
The divorce rate doubled 1880-1900 from 1 out of 21 marriages to 1/12, due to changes in the divorce law & the fact that as women became better educated & more financially independent they became more assertive.
8
The impact of the Gilded Age on the position of women in the USA - limitations
Most women in 19th century America were not politically active & women did not gain the vote nationally until 1920. The women active in the suffragist movement were mainly educated, white & middle class & most working class or ethnic minority women took little interest in the issue.
Until 1890 the suffragist movement was divided between NWSA & AWSA over whether to campaign at state or federal level & whether white women should support the enfranchisement of black men.
The “separate spheres” idea that the world of work & politics belonged to men while women’s role was in the home as mothers & housewives remained dominant & was accepted by most women themselves. Women workers often suffered sexual harassment from employers & foremen & increasing numbers in the big cities were forced into prostitution to make ends meet.
As late as 1887 1/3 of US states had still not given married women control of their own earnings. All marriage laws were determined at state rather than federal level so the federal govt. was powerless to intervene. Divorce was very difficult & divorced women would normally lose their children & property.
Female employment increased but only in junior low paid roles: managers were invariably male & the expectation that single women would give up their jobs when they married denied them any opportunity for career development.
Even educated white women gained no real access to better paid professions like law & medicine which remained male dominated.
Female immigrant factory workers had on average to work 70 hours to earn $5. Women were invariably paid less than men, not just b/c they were barred from higher paid jobs but also even if they did the same work.
The prevailing “laissez faire” philosophy meant that workers had no legal protection, especially in terms of health & safety, so working conditions were often dangerous.
Male trade unions were unsympathetic & by 1900 only 2% of union members were female.
The Comstock Laws in 1873 banned the marketing, sale & distribution of contraceptives (like rubber condoms & diaphragms). This meant contraceptives could only be obtained on the black market, making them unaffordable for working class women.
6
TO WHAT EXTENT DID WOMEN BENEFIT FROM THE NEW DEAL 1933-41? - benefits
The National Recovery Administration (NRA), created in 1933, reduced working hours, banned child labour & established a legal right of all workers to belong to a trade union (this especially benefited women b/c it had previously been difficult for them to join a union).
The Social Security Act 1935 introduced welfare benefits for poor families.
Aid to Dependent Children, introduced in 1935, helped single mothers who were unable to work b/c they had to care for their children.
The Works Progress Administration (WPA), begun in 1935, gave work to single women, making clothing and bedding to be given away to charities and hospitals. Women also were hired for the WPA’s school lunch programme. At its peak in 1936 460,000 women (nearly ¼ of the number of unemployed women in 1933) were employed on WPA programmes.
The Fair Labor Standards Act 1938 set new minimum wage levels.
Women’s maximum working week was set at 48 hours & the She-She-She Camps (the female equivalent of the CCC camps) were created to give work to unemployed young women.
Eleanor Roosevelt, the President’s wife, hosted a “White House Conference on the Emergency Needs of Women” in 1933 & ensured that the Federal Emergency Relief Administration (FERA) had a special women’s division with a qualified woman employed full-time in every state to organise relief programmes for women.
Frances Perkins became chairman of the Industrial Board of New York in 1924 & used this position to secure a reduction in the working week for women. When President Franklin D Roosevelt (FDR) made her Labor Secretary in 1933 she became the USA’s first ever female Cabinet minister & went on to become the USA’s longest serving Labor Secretary ever.
5
TO WHAT EXTENT DID WOMEN BENEFIT FROM THE NEW DEAL 1933-41? - limitations
New Deal started from the assumption that men were the breadwinners in each family & therefore govt. aid should be focused on them. It was the social norm for women to give up jobs when they married & it was rare for both husband and wife to have a relief job on the WPA. This prevailing social norm of the male breadwinner failed to take into account the numerous households in which women were the breadwinners either b/c they were single or divorced or their husbands were unemployed.
B/c of this attitude, only 7% of the jobs created by the Civilian Works Administration went to women.
Despite the New Deal, 42% of US families in the 1930s lived at or below subsistence level.
This forced many young single women to leave home, like Stella Nowicki who at the age of 17 left a family home with no electricity or toilets “because there was not enough money to feed the family in 1933 during the Depression”. Many such women had to sleep rough: as Meridel LeSueur wrote, “It’s one of the great mysteries of the city where women go when they are out of work and hungry”.
Despite the Fair Labor Standards Act, women still earned less than men for the same work, e.g. in 1939 a female teacher still earned 20% less on average than a male. Female office workers earned less even than male manual workers. Despite the Labor Secretary being a woman (Frances Perkins), the NRA assumed that women should be paid less than men for the same work.
Black & Hispanic women benefited least from the New Deal. The social security programme deliberately excluded domestic servants & agricultural labourers, precisely the jobs such women were most likely to have.
Only 9 women had entered federal politics by 1939 & Perkins was the only female Cabinet minister. Male politicians, businessmen & trade unionists were still hostile to the idea of women exercising political power & influence, which may explain why in 12 years as Labor Secretary Perkins accomplished so little which specifically benefited women.
2
BLACK POWER & WOMEN - African American Women & 1960s Feminism
Most black women felt they suffered more b/c of their race than their gender, so they felt they had more in common with black men than with white women; as Fleming has put it, “race loyalty undoubtedly overshadowed gender issues in the minds of most African American female civil rights activists … they did not wish to assert themselves at the expense of their men”.
For this reason black women had little involvement in the “New Feminism” of the 1960s b/c it was so dominated by white middle class women like Betty Friedan. Kathleen Cleaver of the BPP stated that “the problems of black women and the problems of whites are so diverse that they cannot possibly be solved in the same type of organisation nor met by the same type of activity”. In particular female Panthers criticised middle class white feminists for ignoring the economic dimension of women’s disadvantage (the BPP called for the abolition of capitalism which middle class white feminists didn’t). They also criticised extreme white lesbians who advocated complete separation from men: “you can’t solve the problem apart from the problem. You can’t be liberated from male chauvinism if you don’t even deal with it – if you run away from it”.
7
Evidence that “Black Power” benefited African American Women.
Some women were active in “Black Power” type campaigns even before 1966, e.g. Gloria Richardson led the Cambridge Movement in Cambridge, Maryland in the early 1960s which sometimes used violence in self defence against the police & white racists.
Ella Baker played a leading role in setting up SNCC in 1960 & Cynthia Griggs Fleming has written of it, “so many of these student activists had grown up in families with strong black women who worked outside the home and exercised authority inside the home, that black female authority figures seemed quite normal”.
Black women did not need either black men or white women to show them how to campaign for their rights; in fact they played the leading role in the community activities of the Black Panther Party (free breakfasts, freedom schools & medical clinics) which Tracye Matthews has described as “the lifeblood of the organisation and as such should be understood more accurately as forms of political leadership … these activities took on an explicitly political and public function and were often the sites of intense struggle with state authorities”. 2/3 of Black Panthers were women.
The FBI acknowledged this: its Director J Edgar Hoover described the free breakfast programme as “the best and most influential activity going for the BPP”. They also targeted female activists like Janet Cyril, who organised the free breakfast programme throughout New York, b/c they knew she was effective & therefore from their point of view dangerous.
Malcolm X celebrated the beauty of black women, condemning the prejudice (shared by white racists & some black men) that black women were “ugly” simply b/c they were black. He also said, “I am proud of the contributions women have made in the struggle for freedom and I’m one person who’s for giving them all the leeway possible because they’ve made a greater contribution than many of us men”.
Black Panther thinking progressed over time, from an initial emphasis on reasserting “black manhood” to official support for the Women’s Liberation movement from 1970 onwards. By then “do not take liberties with women” was one of its “8 Points of Attention” to be recited & memorised by recruits.
Tracye Matthews argues that the experience of interacting with strong female activists changed the views of male leaders like Huey Newton on this. Connie Matthews of the BPP claimed, “women had very, very strong leadership roles and were respected as such”.
4
Evidence that “Black Power” did not benefit African American Women.
Male Black Power activists often had blatantly sexist views. Imamu Amiri Baraka wrote, “Nature … makes woman submissive, she must submit to man’s creation in order for it to exist”. Ron Karenga (who was accused of sexually torturing some of his female followers) agreed: “What makes a woman appealing is femininity and she can’t be feminine without being submissive”. He openly stated his belief in male supremacy & called gender equality “the devil’s concept”. According to Fleming, “the teachings of these cultural nationalists clearly implied that black women who refused to submit to male authority could prevent their men from properly developing a strong male personality”. E Francis White has argued that this kind of cultural nationalism “can be radical and progressive in relation to white racism and conservative and repressive in relation to the internal organisation of the black community”.
Some male Black Power activists argued that black women should not use birth control devices since having children was their main service to the black race; they even said birth control for blacks was a form of “genocide”. The Nation of Islam condemned the “deadly pill”.
Kathleen Cleaver complained that in the Black Panther Party her ideas were often rejected whereas ideas suggested by a man were much more likely to be implemented.
The BPP experimented with the idea of communal living & communal sexual relationships (“socialistic fucking”), which in practice often meant that female members were pressurised into having sex with male leaders. Janet Cyril was expelled from the Party for refusing to agree to this.
4
WHY DID WOMEN’S RIGHTS MAKE MORE PROGRESS IN THE USA 1941-92 THAN 1865-1941? - Employment
WW2 gave women opportunities to join armed forces, work in war industries & earn higher wages. This gave them more independence & challenged traditional views of women’s role.
BUT:
For most women this effect was only temporary.
Arguably the improved employment opportunities for women, especially in middle class professions like law medicine, the civil service & politics were the result of long-term economic changes which started before the war.
Most black, Hispanic & working class women did not benefit from these opportunities b/c of their lack of educational qualifications; they remained in low-skilled, low paid & non-unionised jobs.
3
WHY DID WOMEN’S RIGHTS MAKE MORE PROGRESS IN THE USA 1941-92 THAN 1865-1941? - Education
The expansion of education, especially at university level, gave women the qualifications to aspire to middle class careers & the intellectual assurance to challenge male supremacy.
During the post-war period cultural attitudes gradually changed among both men & women from the “separate spheres” idea to acceptance of equal opportunities.
BUT the Servicemen’s Readjustment Act 1944 gave preference to ex-servicemen over women in terms of access to higher education after the war.
2
WHY DID WOMEN’S RIGHTS MAKE MORE PROGRESS IN THE USA 1941-92 THAN 1865-1941? - Marriage and childbirth
Women gained increased educational & job opportunities & more freedom generally as a result of the increased availability of divorce & birth control (especially the introduction of the contraceptive pill in the 1960s) & the Roe v Wade judgement on abortion.
BUT these trends predated 1941 (e.g. Margaret Sanger had been advocating birth control since 1911).
2
WHY DID WOMEN’S RIGHTS MAKE MORE PROGRESS IN THE USA 1941-92 THAN 1865-1941? - Legislation
The federal government was generally sympathetic to women’s rights after 1941, especially in the 1960s with the passage of the Equal Pay & Civil Rights Acts.
BUT this also happened before 1941, with Congress voting for female suffrage in 1919 & New Deal legislation which helped women in the 1930s, e.g. the Federal Emergency Relief Administration (FERA) & later the Works Progress Administration (WPA) created jobs for unemployed women.
3
WHY DID WOMEN’S RIGHTS MAKE MORE PROGRESS IN THE USA 1941-92 THAN 1865-1941? - Female activism
The women’s movement made more impact after 1941, especially in the 1960s with Betty Friedan, NOW & the campaign for the Equal Rights Amendment which made far more impact from the 1960s onwards than after WW1.
This was due not only to more assertive campaigning & inspirational leaders like Betty Friedan but also due to a changed cultural climate, more media coverage (though this in turn was at least partly due to publicity raising tactics like bra burning) & an increased awareness of minority rights resulting from the success of the black civil rights movement.
BUT women had campaigned successfully before 1941 for Prohibition (1919) & the vote (1920).
4
How united were American women in support of the issue of gender equality in the period from 1865 to 1992? - Political right
Women were divided on whether they wanted equality with men, e.g. Schafly opposed the ERA on the grounds that it would endanger women’s privileges like the right to separate toilets & schools, exemption from military combat & maternal preference in divorce cases.
Different groups had different priorities, e.g. during the Progressive Era the NAWSA focused on the right to vote while the Women’s Christian Temperance Union campaigned for Prohibition.
There were also differences within the suffrage movement between NSWA & AWSA (e.g. NSWA opposed giving black men the vote while AWSA supported it); even though they merged to form the NAWSA in 1890, differences remained over whether to campaign at federal or state level. In 1913 the formation of the radical Congressional Union made the split wider; the CU (which became the National Women’s Party in 1917) did not support the USA’s involvement in WW1 while the more conservative NAWSA did.
NSWA & AWSA merged in 1890 to campaign together for the vote.
The suffrage groups were sufficiently united to ensure the passage of the 19th Amendment in 1920 giving women the vote.
3
How united were American women in support of the issue of gender equality in the period from 1865 to 1992? - sex and birth control
Feminists in the late 20th century campaigning were divided on pornography, whether to prioritise sexual freedom for women or protection from sexual exploitation by men.
The abortion issue, highlighted by Roe v Wade in 1973, divided secular feminists who insisted on women’s right to choose from socially conservative women, both Protestant & Catholic, who regarded abortion as a sin.
BUT most women since the 1960s have supported the right to use contraception & abortion.
4
How united were American women in support of the issue of gender equality in the period from 1865 to 1992? - social and economic issues
As the failure of Prohibition became increasingly clear in the 1920s women were divided over whether to retain or repeal it, e.g. Pauline Sabin formed the Women’s Organisation for National Prohibition Reform in 1929 to campaign for repeal.
Suffrage groups were white dominated & excluded black & immigrant women. White women took little interest in black issues like lynching & many joined the KKK in the 1920s.
There was also a religious division between the middle class Protestant evangelicals who campaigned for temperance & the urban working class women who were often Catholic immigrants with socially conservative views little interested in the right to vote.
BUT Women have always been united on issues like property rights, divorce, & access to education & the professions. Both the suffrage reform campaigners of the Progressive Era & later feminist groups like the National Organisation of Women formed in 1966 demanded the removal of discrimination in these areas.
3
“THE REASONS FOR OPPOSITION TO GENDER EQUALITY REMAINED THE SAME THROUGHOUT THE PERIOD 1865-1992”. HOW FAR DO YOU AGREE? - political equality
Under the “separate spheres” idea, politics was men’s sphere & women should concentrate on being mothers & housewives. It was also argued that women were too moved by emotion & not capable of rational analysis as men were. These ideas were used to delay giving the women the vote from 1848 (when they started to campaign for it) until 1920.
Some states like Wyoming in 1869 & Utah in 1870 gave women the vote long before this but this was purely to attract female migrants & there was no general acceptance that women were entitled to equal political rights as men until they proved their resourcefulness & patriotism in WW1.
Naturally these arguments appeared to disappear when women got the vote in 1920 but Friedan argued as late as 1963 that the “Feminine Mystique” inhibited women from political engagement & that they were less politically active then than they had been during the Progressive Era (1890-1920) when they agitated for the vote, Prohibition, reform of working conditions etc. She argued that the “Feminine Mystique” was simply the old “separate spheres” idea dressed up in the “shiny new clothes” of fashionable psychological & sociological theories.
4
“THE REASONS FOR OPPOSITION TO GENDER EQUALITY REMAINED THE SAME THROUGHOUT THE PERIOD 1865-1992”. HOW FAR DO YOU AGREE? - economic equality
There was a growing recognition that single women had to maintain themselves but it was assumed that married women should rely on their husbands as the breadwinner. As late as 1887 1/3 of US states had still not given married women control of their earnings & it wasn’t until 1969 that married women could get credit in their own name as opposed to their husband’s.
The New Deal was designed by middle class men whose wives could afford not to work; it didn’t occur to them that working class & ethnic minority women had to work out of financial necessity, or that many families had to rely on the mother as the main breadwinner if her husband was unemployed due to the Depression.
Although both world wars resulted in a significant increase in female employment, this was regarded as a strictly temporary measure to help the war effort; the Servicemen’s Readjustment Act 1944 (which promised returning soldiers their jobs back) reflected this.
Employers often discriminated against female employees for business reasons: until the 1964 Civil Rights Act air stewardesses were required to be single & to retire at 32 so they would appear sexually attractive & available to male passengers.
4
“THE REASONS FOR OPPOSITION TO GENDER EQUALITY REMAINED THE SAME THROUGHOUT THE PERIOD 1865-1992”. HOW FAR DO YOU AGREE? - birth control
Part of the “separate spheres” idea was that women (especially white middle class women) must be virgins before they married, whereas it was accepted that young men would need to “sow their wild oats” & gain some sexual experience before marriage, usually with working class prostitutes.
This idea that women should be given less sexual freedom than men was reflected in the Comstock Laws (1873) being used to ban the marketing, sale & distribution of contraceptives on the grounds that it was “obscene” (b/c it would encourage women to have sex without fear of getting pregnant). Margaret Sanger was arrested under the Comstock Laws in 1916 & the first legal birth control clinic was not opened until 1923.
The federal ban on birth control was not lifted until 1938 & many states continued to ban it until they were finally prevented from doing so in 1972. This reflected both disapproval of female sexual activity on religious grounds & the constitutional doctrine of “states’ rights”.
Even when contraception was legalised as a federal right in 1965 it only applied to married women due to religious disapproval of sex before marriage; not until 1972 was it applied to all women.
Until 1973 most states banned abortion except in cases where the mother’s life was in danger; feminists had to take the Roe v Wade case to the Supreme Court to establish abortion as a federal constitutional right.
3
TO WHAT EXTENT DID THE POSITION OF US WOMEN IMPROVE 1865-1992? - political rights
Female activism had an increasing political impact during the Gilded Age & Progressive Era, influencing the gaining of the vote in 20 states before 1920 & the passage of Prohibition & social reforms like the banning of child labour & the limitation of female working hours.
By 1940 234 members of state legislatures were women.
During the New Deal more women occupied posts in the federal government than ever before, including the first female Cabinet minister (Frances Perkins).
The number of congresswomen nearly quadrupled 1970-92.
There were 7 female state governors by 1990.
By 1992 19 of the USA’s 100 biggest cities had female mayors.
3
TO WHAT EXTENT DID THE POSITION OF US WOMEN IMPROVE 1865-1992? - not political rights
The suffrage campaign was of little interest to working class & ethnic minority women: in any case black women in the South could not vote until 1965.
Women were generally less engaged in politics in the 1945-60 period than earlier (partly b/c growing prosperity meant there was less to complain about, partly b/c they married earlier & had more children, partly b/c of the “feminine mystique”).
In 1970 only 2% of congressmen were women, less than in the 1950s; by 1992 it was still only 6%.
4
TO WHAT EXTENT DID THE POSITION OF US WOMEN IMPROVE 1865-1992? - education, employment and pay
During this period women gained more access to higher education & by 1900 at least half of female graduates were delaying marriages so they could prolong their careers in professions like teaching & social work.
The number of women employed in domestic service halved 1870-1900 while the number in better paid clerical work (e.g. working in an office or as a telephone operator) increased tenfold.
Both world wars created employment opportunities for women: 1 million US women worked in industry by 1918 & WW2 created 5 million jobs for women.
The 2 world wars & the Great Migration between them enabled millions of black women to move from poorly paid domestic or agricultural work to better paid clerical or industrial jobs. By 1945 less than half of black women worked in domestic service compared with 75% in 1941.
The New Deal benefited women, e.g. 460,000 were employed on WPA programmes.
4
TO WHAT EXTENT DID THE POSITION OF US WOMEN IMPROVE 1865-1992? - not education, employment and pay
The “separate spheres” idea remained socially predominant until challenged by Betty Friedan in the “Feminine Mystique” in 1963 & was revived by Phyllis Schlafly in the 1970s.
The New Deal discriminated agt. women, assuming that all households depended on a male breadwinner: only 7% of jobs created by the CWA went to women & female teachers earned on average 20% less than men.
Until the 1970s even educated women had little access to well paid professions like law & medicine & even in professions in which women dominated like nursing, social work & teaching they were almost always subordinate to male managers.
The boost in female employment during both world wars was temporary: the Servicemen’s Readjustment Act 1944 prioritised men returning from the armed forces, resulting in 2 million women losing their jobs in the first year after the war ended.
4
TO WHAT EXTENT DID THE POSITION OF US WOMEN IMPROVE 1865-1992? - reproductive rights
Margaret Sanger founded the American Birth Control League in 1921 &, despite the Comstock Laws, established the first US legal birth control clinic in 1923. The fact that white middle class women were having fewer children suggests increased awareness of birth control.
The federal ban on the promotion of birth control was lifted in 1938.
The invention of the contraceptive pill in the 1960s gave women far more sexual freedom & the ability to plan their family around their career.
They gained the legal right to contraception in 1972 & to abortion in 1973 (Roe v Wade).
3
TO WHAT EXTENT DID THE POSITION OF US WOMEN IMPROVE 1865-1992? - not reproductive rights
The Comstock Laws in 1873 banned the marketing, sale & distribution of contraceptives. This meant contraceptives could only be obtained on the black market, making them unaffordable for working class women.
Ethnic minority & immigrant women generally had more children than whites, partly b/c of ignorance of birth control, partly b/c of higher infant mortality & partly religion (most immigrants in the early 20th century were Catholic).
Several states continued to forbid contraception even after 1938 & working class women often had to resort to illegal abortion b/c of the lack of affordable contraceptives.
