Post American Revolution Essay

Kaleigh Zellner

Early US History

11 November 2015

The Fight for Women: Post American Revolution Women’s rights today are often taken for granted. Women in past years had to fight hard for the great privileges we have today. The American Revolution laid the groundwork for the addition of women’s rights and slowly instilled in women the idea that they should be able to vote, have a voice, and have rights. One might argue that women were the reason the American Revolution was so successful. The American revolution transformed the role of women by setting into action the idea of women’s rights, initiated by several key women such as Abigail Adams, and more freedoms to the American woman. The American Revolution transformed the roles

Their roles in the family were different than they are today. Women were not business women or have any job outside the home. Women had certain tasks and specific responsibilities in Colonial America. Women took care of the household and the children. They cooked, cleaned, maintained the duties of the slaves and supported her husband. Women aided in the moral upbringing of their children. It was their duty to make them spiritual beings like she was. Women were to respect and honor their husbands. Her possessions were his. Women could be seen as the property of the man. Advice to women: "Offences against Common Sense in the Ladies, Particularly Wives," The South Carolina Gazette (June 27th, 1748) begins to address the stereotypes and attitudes towards women. The document whose author is not listed gives various examples of women and how they behave in the home and society. This is all explained in the quote. “I desire by these few Examples, to shew the Fair what kind of Foibles are Offences against Common Sense. That they may know that, to be a Wife of Common Sense, is not to be merely a virtuous Wife, bur something more” (261). The women listed include Florida; who “shines in all the elegance of dress and gaiety of behavior abroad” (260). Cleora is the nice woman who pampers those who come into her house. Her husband is “perpetually teased with her insignificant Prudence”

Women have been seeking to define normal and gender roles since the 18th and 19th century. In Harriet Robinson on the Lowell Mills (1898), she describes her life in the factory. The female worker was the lowest on the spectrum. The work was hard and the hours were long. She was viewed as a slave and was often pushed around by her male superiors. Robinson was bold and took a stand, becoming a leader. She worked hard in a factory which was not the common occupation of women. We see her contesting the norms when she “walked out” on her job due to a strike. She had courage where other women did not. She describes her role in the “turn out” in this way: “I am going to turn out, whether any one else does or not;" and I marched out, and was followed by the