The Women’s Rights Movement

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IAH 201: U.S. & The World (D) The Women’s Rights Movement Starting In the early 1800s women began to question their general role in society and how it is unjust and unfair. Interestingly the educated radicals and working class women in early 1800s were still concerned with the roles and rights of women, they did not classify suffrage as being the prominent issue. The idea of women’s suffrage did not become the primary goal of the Women’s rights movement until around the 1850s, and then remained the primary goal up until 1920 when women finally achieved the right to vote. Further, there were many significant male and female figuresthat played crucial roles in the Women’s rights movements that eventually led to, but didn’t stop at, the achievement of women’s right to vote in 1920. It was in the early 1800s when women began to question various issues such as their roles in society and their rights as a woman, or their lack of rights and unjust inequality in comparison to males. Interestingly though in 1792Marry Wollstonecraft, who was a significant driving force in the women’s right movement, wrote “A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792). In her book she argued that women were rational beings who should be able to be educated, earn their own livings, and develop their characters “regardless of the distinction of sex” (pg 24 Alison M Parker). Then in 1820 the activist Frances Wright went on to further publicize her work. At the time Frances Wright was best known for being a early proponent of the notion that marriage was a form of cohesive bondage for women, who there thereby denied the right to inheritances, wages, and joint guardianship of their children. Marriage was a legal institution, a religious commitment, and a powerful site of human emotions. Interestingly Wright never once explicitly applied the argument that women and men should have equal and

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