Women In A Society Of Patriotic Ladies By Abigail Adams

Synthesis: Remember the ladies Summary: In her letter to John Adams, Abigail Adams writes about the things that have been happening during the time that he is away. She says in her letter that she has long waited the Declaration of Independence. She asks that the ladies be remembered and be favored in the new Code of Laws.

She kept herself neutral among both men and women. She always stood by her husband and extent her view on women’s rights whenever there was an opportunity. During their exchange between 1762 to 1801, over 1100 letters were sent between Abigail and John. The letters are currently remain in the Massachusetts Historical Society.

This document shows that the new world was too reliant on the old world, which meant there needed to be change so that the colonists no longer had to abide by English law. “The Correspondence of Abigail Adams on Women’s Rights” is an article published in the Harvard University Press that contains a series of letters exchanged by Abigail Adams and her Husband John Adams, as well as exchanges between Abigail Adams and Mercy Otis Warren, between March and May of 1776. Abigail Adam’s motivations behind her letters were due to the fact that men were seen has far superior to women. John Adams essentially responding saying that men should be taken more seriously than women, implies that during the time of the war, women and men were not viewed as equals. “Liberating Indentured Servants” was written on January 24th, 1784 for the New York Independent Journal.

For example, Jefferson talks about how the King of Great Britain deprived citizens from their rights of House of Representatives because the House opposed to the King’s invasion (7). Likewise, Stanton talks about how men “. . . deprived her of this first right of a citizen, the elective franchise, thereby leaving her without representation in the halls of legislation, he has oppressed her on all side” (7). Therefore, both Jefferson and Stanton explained the harsh treatment of the oppressors, so even after the independence from Britain, women were still deprived of most of their rights.

Abigail had a Code of Laws which argued that laws of the new nation should recognize women as something more than property and protect them from the arbitrary power men held over them. She spoke of these laws, urged John to “remember the Ladies” and threatened him by stating that if no attention was paid to women they would form a rebellion. John, on the committee that made the Declaration of Independence, was in a position to create change and could have advocated for women’s rights which Abigail was pointing out. She reminded him that “all men would be tyrants if they could” therefore unequal treatment was unnecessary. Although John declined her new Code of Laws, he reminded her to “be patient,” and that her letter was “the first intimation that another tribe more numerous and powerful than all the rest were grown discontented.”

Women were considered inferior to men; they had to rights and most of all no voice. Typically, as the old saying goes ‘they were to be seen and not hear’. Revolutionary Mothers, by Carol Berkin tells of the general stereotypes of women in America, the roles in which they played during the America revolution, and lastly it tells the story of the women through their own words. Stereotypes of Women In chapter one, Berkin states “God had created her to be a helpmate to man….and formed her for this purpose…to be frugal, and obedient (2005, p.4)”.

She often used her role as the first lady to support her outlook for equal rights for women. As Adams believed that women had the same role as men in society she goes on to prove this in her own house. Abigail Adams was not just the first lady to John Adams but rather his “confidante, his editor, trusted advisor and intellectual equal” (“Dear John”). Abigail often showed that she, as a woman, can do just as much as a man. Though Adams was a first lady she had no intention of letting politics slow her down.

During the war women had enjoyed the feeling being independent. The feeling of losing the little power they had during the war was devastating. As the United States was becoming a nation the ideology of separate spheres became more clear and women and men were treated completely differently, “American women never manage the outward concerns of the family, or conduct a business or take a part in political life; nor are they, on the other hand, ever compelled t perform the rough labor of the fields, or make any of those laborious exertions, which demand the exertion of physical strength. No families are so poor, as t form an exception to this rule.” (Dumenil 156).

The government of the United States indirectly suppressed women almost as much as African Americans and other minorities. Throughout the 1700’s and early 1800’s, a woman’s place was in the household and not in the work force. Women remained innocent in the mind of the public, but eventually they used this consensus to their advantage. During the Civil War, as a result of the split in the nation, women were overlooked when it came to their opinion. Women used this alienation to seek information that they wished to give to the side in which they supported.

Over the years John was separated from Abigail, they exchanged over 1,000 letters. Those letters tell us what it was like living at home during the American Revolution. One of the letters sent to John from Abigail contained a quote that helped women's rights tremendously. “Remember the ladies!” It stirred the women around the world.

One of her more famous letters would discuss how John Adams should remember the ladies in forming the new government. ”Do not put such unlimited power into the hands of the husbands. Remember all men would be tyrants if they could. If particular care and attention is not paid to the ladies we are determined to foment a rebellion, and will not hold ourselves bound by any laws in which we have no voice or representation.” Although she had great influence on her husband’s decisions, he would ultimately forget about the ladies.

Abigail Adams was extremely influential to the nation’s beginnings due to her drive to push certain decisions and debates through the status of her husband. She found the issues of women’s rights and slavery while also finding local politics to be important. As the wife of a president, Abigail Adams was able to use her status in a way to push and bring to life her political agenda. Abigail Adams was able to provide her husband with information and insights of the political situation in Boston during his decade long trip through numerous letters that had been exchanged for so long. Her letters regarding the political situation “included commentary on the American struggle for independence and the political structure of the new republic.”

Education was a big factor that Abigail urged women to have more of a passion for. An educated woman is a strong woman. She promotes that women are just as capable as men, and intellectual thinkers who want their voices to be heard. Since women had little rights for themselves, some women were against slavery, especially Abigail Adam’s, they saw how little to no rights slaves were given and saw a comparison of the situations and wanted to be that voice for them and those that joined her. John Adams had complete trust in her to be able to handle all that was going on in the household while he was gone.

The life of Women in the late 1800s. Life for women in the 1800s began to change as they pushed for more rights and equality. Still, men were seen as better than women, this way of thinking pushed women to break out from the limitations imposed on their sex. In the early 1800s women had virtually no rights and ultimately were not seen as people but they rather seen as items of possession, it wasn’t until the late 1800s that women started to gain more rights. The Civil War actually opened opportunities for women to gain more rights, because with many of the men gone to war women were left with the responsibilities that men usually fulfilled during that time period.

The American Revolution was a political upheaval that brought many changes to America by greatly altering the popular understanding of women’s partisan status and creating a widespread debate over the meaning of women’s rights. White women had large, essential roles in America’s victory in the American Revolution creating new opportunities for women to participate in politics and support different parties. Women were able to take advantage of these opportunities until a conservative backlash developed by 1830 that stopped any political advancement of women. In Rosemarie Zagarri’s book, Revolutionary Backlash, the author talks about the many things that played a part in causing a backlash against women in the early republic starting when women’s