Antebellum Reforms: A Women's Rights Movement

Reading Analysis Essay In the journal, Mobilizing Women, Anticipating Abolition: The Struggle Against Indian Removal in the 1830s, the author Mary Hershberger describes the unprecedented acts of benevolent women participating in abolishment of the removal of Indians introduced by President Andrew Jackson. The Indian Removal Act was signed into law in 1830 coercing Cherokee Indians to move beyond of the Mississippi River. The failure of the attempt of abolishing the removal of the Indians, the experience gave way to the support of other campaigns. President Jackson wholeheartedly favored the removal of the Cherokees west of the Mississippi.

In a time where suffering took place to gain suffrage, women were willing to make any sacrifice necessary to achieve equality. In America during the 20th century, tensions were high between many societal groups and classes. During that time, justice and equality were familiar yet misunderstood concepts to many Americans, and change was forthcoming. Societal change is the shift from night to day, and from day back to night; unavoidable and frequent. One such unavoidable change was the suffrage for all genders, races, religions, and free peoples in the United States of America.

In the early 19th century, a wave of social reform movements swept across the nation, seeking to cleanse society of social evils. During the early 19th century, women joined the workforce in mills giving them a taste of independence and allowing them to defy the Cult of Domesticity. Women also joined antebellum reform movements such as abolition and temperance allowing them to expand their influence outside of the private sphere and realize the similarity between the strife of African slaves and their own struggles. Women in this time period desired to not only better their society but also themselves and sought to do this by reforming education for women and in order to gain more opportunities. The women in the movement sought to provide

The movements during and shortly after the Reconstruction Era focused on African Americans civil rights and integrating them into society successfully6. President Lincoln started the integration of African Americans by issuing the Emancipation Proclamation during the Civil War. The Emancipation Proclamation focused specifically on African Americans, and ignored the women’s civil rights movement, which was growing rapidly during the Civil War. Many people during the Reconstruction Era, such as Fredrick Douglass, viewed the issue of getting rights for newly freed slaves more important than getting females new rights. As a matter of fact, most court cases that were brought in front of courts during and shortly after the Reconstruction Era dealt

The Failures of the 1800’s Reform Movements America was a country created for democracy, equality, and freedom. However, in the 1800’s these ideals were still far from reality. Because of this, many reform movements arose to change the United States to include really represent these ideals. Andrew Jackson, a man of the people, got more people to vote. Women like Lucretia Mott or Elizabeth Cady Stanton argued for women’s voting rights.

The Antebellum period is characterized by many different reform movements. The most successful of these movements were temperance and abolition, but the women’s rights movement was also an important Antebellum movement. These women were instrumental in moral education and temperance. They fought for education and prison reform. They challenged separate spheres and cultural norms.

In doing so, it also set the agenda for equality reforms in politics, education access, women’s suffrage, economic liberty, and an equal role in religious life. The Seneca Falls Convention and its major document made public to the nation the problem of the oppressive rules that placed women in a largely uncontested role of subservience. It is clear to note that Stanton’s declaration and the unprecedented convention from which it arose has carried other important implications for women’s status in American life. While it was not initially received well, this public assembly could still inspire others to organize similar functions throughout the country. Another place of consideration would be the role of men in the feminist movement as a considerable amount of them participated in the convention.

Women's issues suddenly became so prominent in American culture because things were changing. People were forming new opinions and women saw an opportunity. In the 1800's transcendentalism came into the picture. Transcendentalism was an intellectual movement led by Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau (Henretta, G-13). They believed that they needed to examine individuality and self reliance closely.

Reformation is an essential part of American history. It is the abiltiy to change ineffective or outdated structures of society. Reform movements during the Antebellum Movement,and the Civil Rights Movement are examples of reactions to injustices. Social Conservatives that are complacent attempt resist these changes. Reform movements have led to the Government to have more active role in society.

There were many major movements and goals of the antebellum reform. Before the Civil War, almost 100 reform communities were instituted. Some were democratic, others were ruled over by an interesting leader. Most of them were motivated by religion, but some had desires to reverse social and economic changes. Almost all of these communities wanted to have a cooperative society, to revive social harmony in an individualistic society and to close the growing space between the rich and the poor.

The role of females in society has often been limited to being a traditional housewife tasked primarily with the upbringing of children. In the United States, however, women have steadily rose to prominence ever since the ratification of the Woman’s Suffrage Amendment, which prohibited citizens from being denied the right to vote on the basis of sex, in August of 1920. In less than one hundred years, females have slowly closed the gap between their male counterparts in the workplace, and have garnered more attention on a political and social level. The result has given more freedom to women, who are no longer chained down to traditional social expectations like housecleaning, cooking, childcare, shopping, and running errands. Furthermore, with

At the beginning of the nineteenth century, American society began to focus on the welfare of minority groups. Women’s suffrage and abolition were rooted as deeply as the history of America, but asylum and prison reform sprouted with the Second Great Awakening, a movement that occurred in the early 1800s. The Second Great Awakening was led by religious leaders who advocated for changes in American society through the unity of the American people (Doc. Due to the Second Great Awakening, reform movements were established between 1825 and 1850 in order to represent the changes the people sought for in the issues of slavery, suffrage, and asylum and prison reform. The social aspect of the abolition movement led to the visible democratic changes in society and politics.

The women of this movement were fighting for something they believed they deserve. Because of the Seneca Falls Convention and the Declaration of Sentiments and Resolution, women were able to express their own opinions. The women’s rights movement led to many different events, impacted other countries, and created a new amendment. The feminist efforts in the mid 1800s were successful enough to allow women to take on occupations and educations they weren’t able to obtain

During the early 1800 's, the American society common to the time period was radically changed. These changes took place primarily after the War of 1812. These changes occurred in the form of political rights, multiple reform movements, and religious revivals. During this time, women were still the “submerged sex.” As the decades unfolded, women increasingly surfaced to the breathe the air of freedom and self-determination (Kennedy, 305).

After the Civil War, women were willing to gain the same rights and opportunities as men. The war gave women the chance to be independent, to live for themselves. Women’s anger, passion, and voice to protest about what they were feeling was the reason of making the ratification of the 19th amendment, which consisted of giving women the right to vote. One of the largest advancement of that era was the women’s movement for the suffrage, which gave them the reason to start earning