In this paper I will be going over issue 17, “Has the Women’s Movement of the 1970’s Failed to Liberate American Women?”. Sara M. Evans and F. Carolyn Graglia each voice their opinions about the issue. They talk about the history of the women’s movement throughout time and the effects it had in our country. F. Carolyn Graglia writes about how she agrees the movement has failed to liberate American women. Her views on feminism concluded that the feminist movement of the 1960’s and 1970’s was a reasonable but a faulty idea, in that it was based on a worthy opinion (that all men and women should be equal).
Review of Why ERA Failed: Politics, Women’s Rights, and the Amending Process of the Constitution By Mary Frances Berry The struggle for women’s rights has been a long, hard fought battle in American history. The fight for even the most basic of rights, such as the right to vote or control property, often takes decades for a victory to be had. One such initiative that sought a widening of women’s rights was the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) of the 1970s. The ERA sought to put women on equal legal footing as men, and to no ones surprise the movement failed.
Her leadership and ERA draft would become a key part of the battle for women’s rights as her work would be revised and modified many times during the women’s rights and suffrage movement of the 1960s to better address the social norms and gain more support. On the opposing end of the battle, Phyllis Schlafly was a conservative activist who founded the STOP ERA organization to fight against the ratification of the ERA. “Under Schlafly’s guidance, conservative era opponents seized a moral high ground by claiming that while ERA backers wanted to topple traditional values, they—the amendment opponents—were the true supporters of the American family” (Dewolf, pg. 228, 2021). Schlafly believed the ratification of the ERA would remove traditional gender roles which would harm the American family structure and the entire movement was “opposing Mother Nature herself”(Schlafy, 1981). This opinion was led by the belief that under the ERA, women would pursue careers of their own which would increase divorce rates, leave children home alone, and disrupt traditional family life.
Dear Joshualy, As a woman, I enjoyed your analyst of the events that changed the countries perception of how women should be treated. Prior to World War II women’s role in society was homemakers and mothers. The need for women in the workforce because most of the men were at war proved that women were capable of doing as good and even better than men. This created the Women’s Right Movement in 1950’s and 1960’s.
Since there was many educational opportunities for women it began to lead more and more women to find their potential meaningful of their individual professional career. Also women 's salaries increased but not to the amount that men received. Even though women did not quite make as much as men do, it still felt like a huge accomplishment because it was much better circumstances than they had before. In 1972 the Equal Rights Amendment passed which lingered around congress for nearly fifty-five years. The wording of the ERA was simply understood: “Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.”
The decades of the 70s was a time of often in fits and starts. They were the years when the women’s movement became a recognizable political force. In 1972 years after the campaigning of feminists, Congress passed the Equal Right Amendment (ERA) to the Constitution. The 1970s, many groups of Americans continued to fight for expanded social and political right. President Richard Nixon passed the Education Amendment in 1972.
The Equal Rights Amendment (ERA), once known as the Lucretia Mott Amendment, was supposed to guarantee equal rights between men and women (The Learning Network). The ERA covered many issues that women faced during its time. Abortion rights were included so that women could choose whether or not they would have a child. The ERA included women in the military drafts as one of their topics to make sure that men and women both had the same obligations. When the Constitution was first being formed, it was stated that “All men are created equal”, but they forgot one vital piece of America —women (“Equal Rights Amendment”).
The boomers pushing through this movement pointed out issues including of domestic violence and marital rape, began rape-crisis centers and women's shelters. The boomers also brought changes in custody laws and divorce law. As the boomer generation continued to fight there were events like Eleanor Roosenvelt reading the open letter to the women of the world pushed women to involve themselves in national and international affairs. Leading the woman fighting for the rights to equal pay and equal job positions, finalizing with the equal pay act in 1963 ("America's Baby"). The boomers pushed women into winning the rights to sit within a jury and having a bank account to having the right to have an abortion.
A constant battle has been going on to fight for the legal rights of equality of the sexes because of the countless times Americans were discriminated because of their sex. Women would have the greatest issue with the discrimination they faced in their daily lives and would find their own ways of addressing this issue, like the National Women’s political party that was formed in 1923. On March 22, 1972, the attempt to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment was was sent to the states for ratification. The amendment needed 38 states to approve its ratification, but only had convinced 35 states. The Equal Right Amendment (ERA) was a proposed amendment that wanted to guarantee equal legal rights for all American citizens.
By outlawing sex discrimination, Title VII made a path for greater opportunities for all in the workforce, allowing them to attain greater economic capability. As more and more women entered the workforce and gained economic independence/improvement, they gain a better position in the fight for equality in other areas of American society. This made the Civil Rights Act of 1964 a critical turning point for the feminist movement and for further advancements in women's rights and other aspects of
Despite the historic expansion of women choosing to enter the workforce and go beyond the role of homemaker, they soon discovered that significant differences remained between the genders regarding important job and occupational issues. These differences often persisted despite the enactment of state and federal laws designed to close the gender gap and promote equal treatment in education and the workplace. Creation of the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, passage by Congress of Title IX legislation mandating equal treatment of genders in education, as well as many other efforts, helped lessen but did not eliminate discrimination. For example, women found that the long-standing
In the 1960s, magazines, such as “The American Home”, littered coffee tables filled with articles about the socially acceptable standards of parenting. Today, thanks to the ease of accessibility to social media and the nature of media consumption in the US, Instagram and Facebook have replaced magazines and become the new version of “The American Home”. While the media has been helpful to many new parents, it also plays a significant role in defining parenthood. By encouraging and advising housewives in the ‘60s, the media created families that produced co-dependent children, who turned into co-dependent adults. The media played a role in setting expectations for mothers/parents and affecting the development of children in the 1960s through
Societal change occurs when one person or a group of people decide it's time to stand up against a norm, to engage in deviant behavior in order to change the pace of time. These deviances become known as social movements. Some of the biggest social movements include The Civil Rights Movement, The Women's Rights Movement, and The Environmental Movement. All of these have had a significant impact on society as a whole, after all, neither black persons nor females would have near the rights they do now had these movements not taken place. But, how and why do social movements become so big?
The concept of women’s social movement is one of the arguable social movements in the twentieth century due to its influence on all levels of the societies. In general the movement argues that women are treated unequally only because they are women living in a society that is ruled by men. The women’s movement embraces directly women’s international struggles for citizenship and equality through demonstrations that started in the “Enlightment” phase to increasing the political demands all over Europe and United States. It should be noted that the cultural analysis that prevailed after World War two, highlighted the political, economic and institutional qualities for postmodern communities. Moreover it spawned new forms of social movements.
This instruction comes directly from the Bible, and in essence, solidifies the belief that women should be subordinate to their husbands. This idea was to be carried on for centuries later, until at least the 1800s, where women were finally afforded certain rights with the emergence of the Women’s Movement in 1848. The Movement is a political and social movement that sought for the equal rights and opportunities for men and women in areas such as politics, economics, and especially in areas such as their personal lives (Burkett, 2015). It also gave rise to the ideology of feminism and a second-wave movement of feminism in the latter part of the second half of the 20th century. Prior to this, women’s positions remained undermined in a largely
