Chapter 8 Section 3 -Women and Reform

Cult of Domesticity

the ideal woman was seen as a tender, self-sacrificing caregiver who provided a nest for her children and a peaceful refuge for her husband, social customs that restricted women to caring for the house

Legal rules that women had to follow

1. received less pay then men

2. could not vote or sit on juries

3. Married Woman: property belonged to their husband

4. Guardianship of Children: belonged to their husband

Activities of Woman Abolitionists

1. raised money, distributed literature, collected signatures on petitions, wrote letters to congress

Temperance Movement

effort to prohibit the drinking of alcohol

American Temperance Society

1. Founded in 1826

2. 1833: 6,000 local temperance societies across the nation

3. Held rallies and produced pamphlets

Woman and Education

few opportunities for girls to be educated beyond elementary level

Seneca Falls Convention 1848

1. convention for women's rights

2. 300 women and men gathered together

3. Approved the declaration unanimously (except suffrage)

Elizabeth Cady Stanton

A member of the women's right's movement in 1840. shocked other feminists by advocating suffrage for women at the first Women's Right's Convention in Seneca, New York 1848. Stanton read a "Declaration of Sentiments" which declared "all men and women are created equal."

Sojourner Truth

United States abolitionist and feminist who was freed from slavery and became a leading advocate of the abolition of slavery and for the rights of women (1797-1883)

Mary Lyon

in 1837 founded the first college for women, Mount Holyoke Female Seminary

Prudence Crandall

abolitionist teacher who began school for African American girls in Connecticut

Elizabeth Blackwell

First woman to receive a medical degree in the U.S.