03-31 TABLE of CONTENTS:
Abigail Adams reveals an awareness of sexual inequality...
DATES, ANNIVERSARIES, and
EVENTS
QUOTE by
John Adams.
Abigail Adams
In a letter, dated March 31, 1776, Abigail Adams
reveals an awareness of sexual inequality and even warns her husband what
his course of action will bring about. It is obvious that Abigail is speaking
for other women as well as herself as she uses we in her threat,
indicating that woman's rights advocates were alive and well in the U.S.
at least 200 years before the period of the 1970s that HIStorians erroneously
named the second wave of feminism.
Abigail wrote: "I long
to hear that you have declared an independency. And, by the way, in the
new code of laws which I suppose it will be necessary for you to make,
I desire you would remember the ladies and be more: generous and favorable
to them than your ancestors. 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.
"That your sex are naturally tyrannical is a
truth so thoroughly established as to admit of no dispute; but such of
you as wish to be happy willingly give up - the harsh tide of master for
the more tender and endearing one of friend.
"Why, then, not put it out of the power of the
vicious and the lawless to use us with cruelty and indignity with impunity?
Men of sense in all ages abhor those customs which treat us only as the
(servants) of your sex; regard us then as being placed by Providence under
your protection, and in imitation of the Supreme Being make use of that
power only for our happiness."
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03-31 DATES, ANNIVERSARIES, and
EVENTS
Event: 03-31-1776, Abigail Adams wrote her husband when he was
in Philadlphia helping plan the Declaration of Independence:
"Remember the Ladies, and be more generous and
favourable to them than your ancestors. Do not put such unlimited power
into the hands of 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."
(The Abigail's
Rebels listserve is named after her.)
B. 03-31-1889, Muriel Hazel Wright, historian, writer, helped
organize the Choctaw Advisory Council, 1934, and fought for just recompense
for Native Americans following Oklahoma's statehood.
B.: 03-31-1895, Lizzie Miles, popular black singer in New Orleans
and Los Angeles in the 1920's and 30's, developed a style known as "gumbo
French" jazz.
B. 03-31-1914, Mildred Buchwalder Beck, director of the Child Study
Association of America. Her widowed mother took in foster children
to support her own children and Beck had to earn her own money for college.
B. 03-31-1929, Liz Claiborne, founder, president, CEO and chair as
well as fashion designer of Liz Claiborne, Inc., a billion-dollar corp.
Her mother taught her to sew and Liz says instilled ambition in her.
B. 03-31-1934, Shirley Jones, actor. After a very successful
stage career in such musicals as Oklahoma! which she brought to the screen
in 1955, she won the Academy Award for best supporting actress in Elmer
Gantry (1960). Best known to a generation for her TV work in The
Partridge Family.
Event: 03-31-1966, the U.S. Department of Health, Education, and
Welfare approves distribution of contraceptives and birth control information
under a number of federal programs.
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QUOTES DU JOUR
ADAMS, JOHN:
"Depend upon it, we
know better than to repeal our masculine systems."
--
John Adams' reply to Abigail Smith Adams' letter. At the time married women
did not have title to the clothes they wore and had no legal say in the
custody, raising, or education of their children who belonged exclusively
to the man.
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