Women’s Rights

1. Women’s Rights Thinking Skill: Identify the goals and purposes of the Women’s Movement

2. Women’s Issues Questions • Why do you think the United States has still not had a woman President in this day and age? • Do you think Americans are ready for a woman President? • What other issues should we discuss regarding women today? • What were some advances won for women during the Progressive era? • What was the main goal of women’s rights activists during the Progressive era? Why?

3. Women’s Efforts: • Margaret Sanger- crusade for birth control • Florence Kelly- child labor protection, workers’ strike fund • Maximum 10-hour work day • Carrie Nation- Temperance movement to ban alcohol- Women’s Christian Temperance Union (WCTU) • Ida B. Wells – daycare centers and aid for African-American women

4. Suffrage Leaders Elizabeth Cady Stanton Susan B. Anthony Anthony and Stanton, NAWSA

5. Women’s Suffrage Movement • Started in 1848 at Seneca Falls • The Declaration of Sentiments (primary source interpretation) • Does any of the language sound familiar? • List some specific grievances mentioned • Diverted by Civil War (1861-1865); many abolitionists unsupportive of women’s movement • DVD – Susan B. Anthony arrested in 1872 for voting (primary source interpretation) • Explain some of her strongest arguments. • Do you agree that unjust laws must be violated? • Question: Why were so many people opposed to women’s suffrage?

6. The Work of NAWSA in the 1900s Carrie Chapman Catt Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton start NAWSA Carrie Chapman Catt succeeds Anthony as President when she retires

7. The Work of NAWSA in the 1900s • Carrie Chapman Catt focused on women’s special role; needed to vote to protect their role as homemakers and educators • “Winning Plan”- grassroots rallies from state to state; push for national amendment and state laws • “Society Plan” recruit wealthy, educated women • By 1910, women had suffrage in Wyoming, Utah, Colorado, and Idaho; By 1918, added NY, MI, OK

8. The National Woman’s Party • Alice Paul felt NAWSA’s focus was too slow; formed NWP in 1913 • focused on national woman’s suffrage amendment • More radical – protest marches, first group to picket White House, hunger strikes

9. The Vote: At last • Nineteenth Amendment- gave women voting rights, passed in 1920 • Passed because many felt women earned right to vote because of service in WW I • Question: Which group … • …was more controversial? • …was more effective? • …would you have joined? • Closure Question: What cause would you make sacrifices for?

10. Margaret Sanger and the Birth Control Movement • Founded Birth Control League • Why did Margaret Sanger think birth control was such an important issue for women? • “Do you know that 300,000 babies under one year of age die in the US every year from poverty and neglect, while 600,000 parents remain in ignorance of how to prevent 300,000 more babies from coming into the world the next year to die of poverty and neglect?” • Do you agree or disagree that it is an important women’s issue?

11. What were the arguments against birth control? • “Solicitude for woman’s morals has ever been the cloak Authority has worn in its age-long conspiracy to keep woman in bondage…” • Belief that birth control would cause women (and men) to be immoral

12. How did Margaret Sanger respond? • “Our present laws force women into one of two ways: celibacy….or abortion…” • “Is woman’s health not to be considered? Is she to remain a prod ucing machine? Is she to have time to think, to study, to care for herself?” • QUESTION: Should schools teach birth control methods, or abstinence only today?