1. Chapter 16 Section 2 The Progressives Riddlebarger
Women and Public Life
Chapter 16
Section 2
The Progressives
Riddlebarger

2. Opportunities for Women

3. Opportunities for women
By the late 1800’s, women find more opportunity in education & employment
Leads to greater desire for opportunity in community
Some work for social reform
Seek to make life better for them and others
Become stronger political force

4. Higher Education
Limited opportunities for women throughout early 1800’s
Oberlin College in 1833 starts admitting women and men
Late in 1800’s, more colleges begin admitting both genders
By 1870, 20% of college students are women
By 1900, over ⅓ are women
Most are upper or middle class background
Most professional jobs still deny women
American Medical Association didn’t start admitting women until 1915
Therefore, many women put talents to use in various reform efforts

5. Employment and Opportunities
Job opportunities for educated middle class women expand in late 1800’s
“Caring professions”: teachers and nurses
Bookkeepers, typists, secretaries and shop clerk
Artists and journalists
Working class women find jobs in industry
Garment industry; paid less than men
Assumption is that they are single and are supported by fathers
Also assume males are supporting a family
These are reasons given for less pay to women

6. In 2014, the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) published a report with statistical information pertaining to income across a wide field of variables. Compared to her male counterpart, an American female worker makes $0.82 for every $1 an American male worker makes.

7. Gaining Political Experience

8. Reform Movements
Women become the backbone of many reform movements during the Progressive Era.
Learn:
Organization skills
Persuasion skills
Publicity skills
Realize the power they have to improve their lives & others

9. Children’s Health and Welfare
Many campaign for the rights of kids
Efforts to end child labor
Children’s health
Promote education
Lillian Wald campaigns for more government oversight of children’s lives
Leads to creation of Federal Children’s Bureau (1912)

10. Prohibition Many women participate in the Prohibition movement
Ban on making, selling, distributing alcohol
Many felt it was the cause of crime, poverty and violence against women & children
2 major organizations lead crusade for Prohibition:
Woman’s Christian Temperance Union (WCTU)
Becomes powerful force for temperance and women
Anti-Saloon League
Message spread in protestant churches

11. Carrie Nation
Evangelist takes hatchet in one hand and bible in another and smashes up saloons in Kansas
Urges others to do the same
Her fiery speech & actions make her a national figure
18th Amendment (1920): prohibits sale, manufacture and distribution of alcohol

13. Civil Rights
African-American women fight for many of the same issues: end of poverty, child welfare, better wages & working conditions, alcohol abuse
Additionally, they wage their battles in an atmosphere of discrimination
African-American women are unwelcome in many reform organizations
So, they form their own
National Association of Colored Women (NACW) had over 100,000 members by 1916
Fights poverty, segregation, Jim Crow laws, women’s suffrage, temperance, and lynchings

14. Rise of the Women’s Suffrage Movement

15. the right to vote in political elections.
Suffrage
the right to vote in political elections.

16. 15th Amendment
After Seneca Falls Convention in 1848, few imagined it would take another 72 years of work to win the right to vote
After the Civil War, suffragists who supported abolition called for giving women the right to vote along with African-American men.
Many were not satisfied with ratification of the 15th Amendment
It prohibited denying the right to vote “on account of race, color; or previous condition of servitude.”

17. Women Organize New suffragists emerge in late 1800’s
Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony form National Women Suffrage Association in 1869
Campaign for constitutional amendment to give women the right to vote
American Woman Suffrage Association (AWSA) was founded in 1869 and focused on winning the right to vote on a state-by-state basis
Aligned with Republican Party
In 1869, Wyoming Territory is the first to grant women the right to vote.
Before women nationwide get the right, 12 states grant women voting rights.

18. Susan B. Anthony tests the law
Anthony was a tireless campaigner
She wrote pamphlets, gave speeches and testified before Congress from
1872: She stages a dramatic protest:
She (and 3 others) register to vote
They go vote on Election Day
Arrested 2 weeks later
She was not allowed to testify at her trial, found guilty & fined $100
She refused to pay; hoped to appeal through courts
1875: Supreme Court says it’s up to each state

19. Anti-Suffrage Arguments
Why people were against giving the women suffrage:
Some feared it would interfere with women’s duties at home
Fear it would destroy families altogether
Women lack the education or competence to vote
Some believe the notion that most women don’t want to vote
Unfair for suffragists to force the vote upon women
Many major businesses also opposed suffrage for women
Liquor feared women support for Prohibition; in general, more regulation
Some churches & clergy are against it saying marriage is a sacred bond & entire family is represented by the man

20. Two organizations merge
In 1890, the NWSA and AWSA merge:
National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA)
Formed by Elizabeth Cady Stanton
Susan B. Anthony is president from
Her last public statement (she dies in 1906):
“Failure is impossible.”
Most earlier suffragists will die before 1920 (only one signer of Seneca Falls Declaration was still alive).