Activity
One: Republican Wives, Republican Mothers[1]
Overview:
In
this activity, you will learn two approaches to “female education” in the early
years of this nation, the first Benjamin Rush and the second by “A Matron from
Connecticut” (Judith Sargent Murray).
For this, you are required to read selections from Chapter 6 of the
textbook as well as the primary source documents included with this
activity. The specific pages of the
textbook and links to the two primary source documents are shown below.
Process:
·
Timing: See
Assignments & Due Dates
·
Assessment: 20 points – Quiz on the
material
Information from the
Textbook:
Public
Virtue: Defined
·
Public
Virtue: In response to maintain political order, those of the “revolutionary
generation” believed that political discipline “had to emerge from the
willingness of citizens to put the public good ahead of their own private
interests.” Public virtue was “essential ingredient of republican belief.
(Nash, 185).
·
Public
Virtue and the role of women in the new nation: The traditional female role—the
care and nurture of children—assumed special political resonance during the
revolutionary era. The republic would be
successful only if its citizens embarked the principles of public virtue. Women, as mothers and wives, had the
“know-how” to teach the principles
of public virtue to their children and their husbands.
Questions: Historical
Context - Textbook
A
Republican Ideology:
1.
What
were the sources of the ideology of revolutionary republicanism?
2.
What
is “basic to republican belief”?
3.
The
“Republican Ideology” supported the principle of political equality. What were
the various ways that Americans defined this “political equality?” Did “true equality” of all American citizens
become a reality in the Revolutionary Era?
Women and the Limits of
Republican Citizenship
1.
What
was the opinion of men in Revolutionary America about women participating in
public politics? What did they do? How did women react?
2.
Why
did women believe that they should be given full political equality?
3.
What
is the connection between the “traditional female role” and Republican
ideology?
Primary Source Documents:
Questions: Writings of Rush
and the “Matron” -
Make notes and/or answer
these questions for each of the documents.
1. What is the author’s
attitude regarding the value of education for women and for the future
generation?
2. What specific categories
should education for females include? Is the curriculum the same for sons and daughters? If so, why?
If not, why not?
3. What should be the major
purpose of an education for a male and female, according to the writer?
4. Why is education of women
important to the author (Rush or the Matron)?
What is the impact of this education on society and on the woman?
Female Education - Benjamin Rush, 1787[2]
Philadelphia
physician Benjamin Rush (1745‑1813), a member of Benjamin Franklin's
intellectual circle, won prominence as both a scientist and a patriot. He
served in the Continental Congress and signed the Declaration of Independence.
An enlightened spirit, he ardently supported education. A Princeton graduate
who had studied medicine in Pennsylvania and Edinburgh, Rush taught chemistry
at the University of Pennsylvania, helped found Dickinson College, and served
as a trustee of the new Young Ladies Academy in Philadelphia, opened in 1786.
There, in July of 1787, at the close of quarterly examinations, he gave an
important speech on women's education.
Criticizing European models of women's education ... Rush reasoned that the women in the new
American republic demanded that women receive a utilitarian education. Such an
education would train women to manage efficient households as well as be
"stewards" and "guardians" of a husband's property. As
mothers, they had to raise virtuous citizens, to train their sons "in the
principles of liberty and government." Thus, women's education would have
both social value and patriotic purpose. To achieve his goals, Benjamin Rush
proposed a curriculum far more academic than the offerings of other schools. It
included spelling, speaking, grammar, writing, arithmetic, bookkeeping,
geography, history, astronomy, and some natural philosophy (science). Rush
also favored instruction in singing, to lighten domestic life; dancing, at
least until Americans perfected the art of conversation; serious reading, to
replace the current passion for novels; and religion. He rejected drawing, for
which women would have no time, and, in a blast at deleterious European
influence, spurned the teaching of French.
This significant lecture, it should be noted, was directed toward men
("Gentlemen"), presumably the fathers of students and trustees of the
Philadelphia Academy. At the end of the lecture, Rush shifted briefly to the
daughters ("young ladies") in his audience. But men were his main
focus, for the address on women's education was really about men who were
educated professional men like himself and the other trustees. Such men now
found a multitude of obligations and "avocations" in public life.
They had to work full‑time for "the advancement of their
fortunes." With their exodus from family life, women had to pitch in and
take charge, a duty for which many were apparently at present too ignorant.
Benjamin Rush, in short, directed his argument toward the male members of a
specific social class those who would assume leadership roles and set social
standards in the new republic. He presented not only a plan for "a
peculiar and suitable education" for women, but a response to a major
social development: the emergence of American elite.
Gentlemen,
I
have yielded with diffidence to the solicitations of the Principal of the Academy,
in undertaking to express my regard for the prosperity of this seminary of
learning by submitting to your candor a few thoughts upon female education.
The first remark that I shall make upon this subject is that female education
should be accommodated to the state of society, manners, and government of the
country in which it is conducted.
This
remark leads me at once to add that the education of young ladies in this
country should be conducted upon principles very different from what it is in
Great Britain and in some respects different from what it was when we were a
part of a monarchical empire.
There
are several circumstances in the situation, employments, and duties of women in
America which require a peculiar mode of education.
I
The
early marriages of our women, by contracting the time allowed for education,
renders it necessary to contract its plan and to confine it chiefly to the more
useful branches of literature.
II
The
state of property in America renders it necessary for the greatest part of our
citizens to employ themselves in different occupations for the advancement of
their fortunes. This cannot be done without the assistance of the female
members of the community. They must be the stewards and guardians of their
husbands' property. That education, therefore, will be most proper for our
women who teach them to discharge the duties of those offices with the most
success and reputation.
III
From
the numerous avocations to which a professional life exposes gentlemen in
America from their families, a principal share of the instruction of children
naturally devolves upon the women. It becomes us therefore to prepare them, by
a suitable education, for the discharge of this most important duty of mothers.
IV
The
equal share that every citizen has in the liberty and the possible share he may
have in the government of our country make it necessary that our ladies should
be qualified to a certain degree, by a peculiar and suitable education, to
concur in instructing their sons in the principles of liberty and government.
V
In
Great Britain the business of servants is a regular occupation, but in America
this humble station is the usual retreat of unexpected indigence; hence the
servants in this country possess less knowledge and subordination than are
required from them; and hence our ladies are obliged to attend more to the
private affairs of their families than ladies generally do of the same rank in
Great Britain. . . . This circumstance should have great influence upon the
nature and extent of female education in America.
The branches of literature most essential for a young lady in this country
appear to be:
I
A
knowledge of the English language. She should not only read but speak and spell
it correctly. And to enable her to do this, she should be taught the English
grammar and be frequently examined in applying its rules in common
conversation.
II
Pleasure
and interest conspire to make the writing of a fair and legible hand a
necessary branch of female education. For this purpose she should be taught not
only to shape every letter properly but to pay the strictest regard to points
and capitals....
III
Some
knowledge of figures and bookkeeping is absolutely necessary to qualify a young
lady for the duties which await her in this country. There are certain
occupations in which she may assist her husband with this knowledge, and should
she survive him and agreeably to the custom of our country be the executrix of
his will, she cannot fail of deriving immense advantages from it.
IV
An
acquaintance with geography and some instruction in chronology will enable a
young lady to read history, biography, and travels, with advantage, and
thereby qualify her not only for a general intercourse with the world but to be
an agreeable companion for a sensible man. To these branches of knowledge may
be added, in some instances, a general acquaintance with the first principles
of astronomy and natural philosophy, particularly with such parts of them as
are calculated to prevent superstition, by explaining the causes or obviating
the effects of natural evil.
V
Vocal
music should never be neglected in the education of a young lady in this
country. Besides preparing her to join in that part of public worship which
consists in psalmody, it will enable her to soothe the cares of domestic
life....
VI
Dancing
is by no means an improper branch of education for an American lady. It
promotes health and renders the figure and motions of the body easy and
agreeable....
VII
The attention of our young ladies should
be directed as soon as they are prepared for it to the reading of history,
travels, poetry, and moral essays. These studies are accommodated, in a
peculiar manner, to the present state of society in America, and when a relish
is excited for them in early life, they subdue that passion for reading novels
which so generally prevails among the fair sex. I cannot dismiss this species
of writing and reading without observing that the subjects of novels are by no
means accommodated to our present manners. They hold up life, it is true, but it is not yet life in America.
VIII It will be necessary to
connect all these branches of education with regular instruction in the
Christian religion. For this purpose the principles of the different sects of
Christians should be taught and explained, and our pupils should early be
furnished with some of the most simple arguments in favor of the truth of
Christianity. A portion of the Bible (of late improperly banished from our
schools) should be read by them every day and such questions should be asked,
after reading it, as are calculated to imprint upon their minds the interesting
stories contained in it....
IX
If the measures that have been recommended for
inspiring our pupils with a sense of religious and moral obligation be adopted,
the government of them will be easy and agreeable. I shall only remark under
this head that strictness of
discipline will always render severity unnecessary
and that there will be the most instruction in that school where there is the
most order....
It
should not surprise us that British customs with respect to female education
have been transplanted into our American schools and families.... It is high
time to awake from this servility—‑to study our own character—to examine
the age of our country—and to adopt manners in everything that shall be
accommodated to our state of society and to the forms of our government. In
particular it is incumbent upon us to make ornamental accomplishments yield to
principles and knowledge in the education of our women.
A
philosopher once said, "let me make all the ballads of a country and I
care not who makes its laws." He might with more propriety have said, let
the ladies of a country be educated properly, and they will not only make and
administer its laws, but form its manners and character. It would require a
lively imagination to describe, or even to comprehend, the happiness of a
country where knowledge and virtue were generally diffused among the female
sex. Our young men would then be restrained from vice by the terror of being
banished from their company.... A double-entendre
in their presence would then exclude a gentleman forever from the company
of both sexes and probably oblige him to seek an asylum from contempt in a
foreign country.
The
influence of female education would be still more extensive and useful in
domestic life. The obligations of gentlemen to qualify themselves by knowledge
and industry to discharge the duties of benevolence would be increased by
marriage; and the patriot‑the hero‑and the legislator would find
the sweetest reward of their toils in the approbation and applause of their
wives. Children would discover the marks of maternal prudence and wisdom in
every station of life, for it has been remarked that there have been few great
or good men who have not been blessed with wise and prudent mothers....
To
you, therefore, young ladies, an important problem is committed for solution;
and that is, whether our present plan of education be a wise one and whether it
be calculated to prepare you for the duties of social and domestic life. I know
that the elevation of the female mind, by means of moral, physical, and
religious truth, is considered by some men as unfriendly to the domestic
character of a woman. But this is the prejudice of little minds and springs
from the same spirit which opposes the general diffusion of knowledge among
the citizens of our republics. If men believe that ignorance is favorable to
the government of the female sex, they are certainly deceived, for a weak and
ignorant woman will always be governed with the greatest difficulty.
A
Matron of Connecticut, 1801
The
outspoken author of The Female Advocate (1801), who identified herself only as
"a matron" of Connecticut, was arguably the most impressive defender
of women's rights in the new republic. In her brief but impassioned pamphlet,
she assaulted sexual inequality, mocked male superiority, and demanded female
empowerment. She also showed how republican ideology might be used to transform
women's lives.
Asserting that both sexes
had been equally endowed with "quality of genius, of talent, of morals,
as well as intellectual worth," the Connecticut matron complained that
"men engross all the emoluments, offices, honors, and merits of church
and state." She assaulted her readers with a torrent of rhetorical questions
("Why ought the one half of mankind, to vaunt and lord it over the
Other?" "But why is the fair book of knowledge hidden from our
research?"). In the fashion of her day, the matron placed her faith in
education as the basic prerequisite for equality. Only a "well‑informed
mind," she contended, would enable women—hitherto powerless, vulnerable,
and demeaned—to "possess some command over ourselves." In the
following excerpts, she explores some of the social inequities (from the perils
of seduction to the "extreme wretchedness" of widowhood) that women's
access to education might remedy.
Much
and often has the world exclaimed against masculine women. Before I offer any
sentiment on this exclamation, I would wish to hear the word properly and
fairly defined. If by the epithet "Masculine," be meant a bold,
assuming, haughty, arrogant, all sufficient, dogmatic temper and spirit, I
would wish totally and entirely to discard it from the society of the fair sex.
I would wish the term to be applied, where I think it is appropriate, by long
established custom. I am quite willing that the other sex should share it
altogether to themselves. But if by the word "Masculine," be meant a
person of reading and letters, a person of science and information, one who can
properly answer a question, without fear and trembling, or one who is capable
of doing business, with a suitable command over self, this I believe to be a
glory to the one sex, equally with the other. The sole reason why the epithet
is disgraceful, in the estimation of many, is because custom, which is not
infallible, has gradually introduced the habits of seeing an imaginary
propriety, that all science, all public utility, all superiority, all that is
intellectually great and astonishing, should be engrossed exclusively by the
male half of mankind. But may I not securely say, that it is a point of great
consequence, that we should have an equal share in science, of that degree of
education, at least, which enables us, in some measure, to have command over
ourselves, and become superior to those base artifices of the many, by which
numerous females, through the want of suitable privileges in education, have
been the dupes of men inferior to themselves, in every other respect but this
single advantage, of education.
Are
we not sensible, my female friends, and have we not often heard it observed, by
the other sex, as an objection to our possessing peculiar advantages for
scientific improvements, that they cannot so easily command the ascendancy over
us; but why should we wish them to have this dominion, if we are not sensible
that that is often, and may I not say, almost always, the reason and
foundation of our ruin. A young lady of the greatest purity of mind, yet
uneducated, is frequently a victim to the arts of seduction: differently
advantaged by knowledge, the seducer would have respected her virtues, and
conducted with becoming deference. Thus, a second advantage would be the
consequence of female education. It would reform the men, or at least prevent,
or restrain, many of those artifices, which are now too successfully used, with
innocent, uneducated, and unsuspecting females....
But
why is the fair book of knowledge hidden from our research? Why it is no
farther disclosed to our view? Do we deserve the reproach of those men, who, in
all the pride of scholastic literature, depreciate our natural talents? ...
Plutarch, speaking of the sexes, says, "The talents and virtues are
modified by the circumstances, but the foundation is the same.". . .
Why
then may not all the seeming difference between the sexes, be imputed solely
to the difference of their education and subsequent advantages? Here let us
draw a just and plain parallel between the education of a sister and her
brother. Perhaps they are sent to the same school, till the age of ten, or
twelve years. Here the advantages of their improvement are the same, and their
actual augmentation of mind is equal, unless there be a real superiority of genius,
in the female youth, which is a case not unusual. Behold the arbitrary distinctions
where are, next, made between them. The brother is taken from a common school,
and transmitted to an academy, or a collegiate life; next becomes a divine, a
lawyer, or physician; the whole term of time including usually from seven to
nine years. But how is the time of his sister occupied, after she is taken from
her early school? Immediately she is removed from every mean of literary
improvement, and almost as effectually immured in a house, as a Roman Catholic
Nun. She is admitted to walk in no road of preferment, and has before her, no
incentive to aspire to public utility, by superior enlargement of mind. No!
That is not the path for her to walk. Science and public utility are exclusively
appropriated to the males. See the invariable sister's fate! If she be not sent
to a nunnery, she is at least confined to domestic labor, and utterly secluded
from all public concerns.
If
not thus limited, she must have what the world calls a polite education: such
as dancing, music, embroidering, altering and adjusting the fashion of her
apparel. I have heard it, and I think very justly, observed, as an apology for
females when frequently conversing, and being more disposed than the men, to
talk of fashion, dress, amusements, and the polite customs of the fair world,
that the former were precisely following the natural and almost necessary effect
of their appropriate education. A young Miss is taught to esteem it of the
utmost consequence to her success in life, that she be dressed fashionably, and
observe the external graces. It requires but a small share of sagacity for her
to discern, that unless she pay more attention to outward ornaments, than intellectual
endowments, she will not be noticed by the other sex, on whom is her dependence
for a partner, or, shall I say, "master," for life. For high intellectual
endowments, she would rather be avoided, in the view of a connection for life,
as these would be qualities incompatible with that arbitrary sovereignty, which
the man would wish to have fully established in his domestic empire. To such a
man, when she is united by the dearest ties, how are the best of her days, and
the prime of her life to be devoted? In a way truly, which I acknowledge to be
highly beneficial; in the employments of the house and the nurturing of
children, and imbruing their tender minds with the early precepts of true
wisdom. But beneficial as it may be, does not this confined mode of living, and
devoting our rolling years, afford sufficient arguments, why females do not
advance in literary acquisitions, and the knowledge of men and manners, and the
concerns of more public utility so far as the other sex....
But
to return from this digression to the importance and justness of admitting the
idea of an equality between the sexes; how greatly doth a man of science
misjudge in choosing a companion for life, if he selects one from the class of
ignorant and untaught, that he may, by this mean, the more securely retain his
favorite supremacy. Is it not a total blindness to the ideas of refined
happiness, arising from a reciprocity of sentiments and the exchange of
rational felicity, as well as an illiberal prejudice, thus to conduct? Shall
the woman be kept ignorant, to render her more docile in the management of
domestic concerns? How capable is such a person of being a companion for a man
of refinement? How miserably capable of augmenting his social joys, or managing
prudently the concerns of a family, or educating his children? Is it not of
the utmost consequence, that the tender mind of the youth receives an early
direction for future usefulness? And is it not equally true, that the first
direction of a child necessarily becomes the immediate and peculiar province
of the woman? And may I not add, is not a woman of a capacious and well stored
mind, a better wife, a better widow, a better mother, and a better neighbor;
and shall I add, a better friend in every respect? ...
...
When women, no longer the humble dependent, or the obsequious slave, but the companion
and friend, is party to an attachment founded on mutual esteem, then, and not
till then, does man assume his intended rank in the scale of creation. Why
should women be called the weaker sex, when it is acknowledged, that they take
much more care of their reputation, than the men?
As
I observed before, that a woman of information, and one viewed by her husband
as a companion, made the better wife and better widow, I beg leave to state a
supposition, as I imagine to the point. Suppose one who has from her youth been
indoctrinated and habituated to sentiments of female inferiority, one who has
never been suffered to have an opinion of her own, but on the reverse, has been
taught, and accustomed to rely, and implicitly believe, right or wrong, on her
parents, guardians, or husband. What will be the consequence of all this, in a
situation when deprived of the counsel of either or all of them, she is necessitated
to act for herself, or be exposed to the fraudulence of an unfriendly world?
Perhaps she is left a widow, with a large property, and a flock of small
dependent children? But where have they to look for protection, or on whom to
rely, but on their insufficient, helpless mother? How poorly capable is she to
fill the vacancy, and act to her tender babes and orphans, in their bereaved
situation, as is absolutely necessary, both as father and mother? How incapable
also is she of assisting in the settlement and adjustment of the estate; how liable
to fraud, and how probable to be injured by unreal or exaggerated debts.
...
No less unhappy is the consequence that follows the unfortunate wife, who has
been kept in her leading strings all her days, and has no idea of taking the
management of any business upon her unassisted self. Her husband views himself
her guide and protector, treating her more as a child, or riper servant, than
as a companion and friend. The good‑hearted woman has lived all her days
in ease and affluence, having never tasted the bitter cup of poverty, nor
affliction. She thinks that her mountain stands strong, and she shall never be
moved. But perhaps through her ignorance, or her husband's extravagance, they
live far beyond their abilities.... The consequence is that the unhappy family
is left destitute of the comforts, yea, of the very necessaries of life. Alas,
the unhappy woman! What a sudden transition from affluence to poverty, from
prosperity to extreme wretchedness. All this, not infrequently ends in a state
of insanity, as well as total ruin....
Perhaps
these lines may chance to meet the eye of one, whose soul may yet be troubled,
not withstanding all his stock of science, with spleen of criticism, and
prejudiced jealousy against our sex. Surely she will say what miserable
language is this! What bad grammar! Surely she does not round her periods! She
had better been at her needle work, or the distaff! Friend, I will spare you
all this labor of criticism. I acknowledge all my want of literary improvement;
but yet I am not willing to ascribe it to want of mental powers, but the
disadvantages attending my education. . . . Should any presume to say, that
some man of letters has hidden behind the curtain, to guide the movements of my
pen, this I shall positively deny, and subjoin with the Authoress of the
"Gleaner."* My "nearest friend is totally ignorant of this
performance, and is an utter stranger to every line, till he may see it from
the press."
[1]Created:
1/9/2006; updated: 8/24/2010
[2]
Benjamin
Rush, "Thoughts upon Female Education, Accommodated to the Present State
Of Society,
Manners, and Government. . . “In Frederick Rudolph, ed., Essays on Education in The
Early Republic (Cambridge: Harvard
University Press, 1965), pp. 27‑40.
[3] The Female Advocate, Written by a Lady (New Haven, CT: Thomas Green & Son, 1801)