Women’s Rights
11.11.3, 11.10.7
EQ: What led to the rise of the women’s movement, and what
impact did it have on American society?
Women’s Rights
• Feminism
• political equality for men and
women
• 1840s – 1920 suffrage
• “glass ceiling” blocked
women’s achievement
• 1920s – 1970s ERA
• breaking down stereotypes of
gender in society
• mail carrier instead of mailman
• study herstory instead of history
Feminine Mystique, 1963
• women sought more in
life than being a
housewife
• happiness outside
marriage and
motherhood
• career, hobbies
• started the women’s
rights movement
• Betty Friedan
National Organization for Women (NOW)
• formed to use politics
to get equality
• focuses on women’s
issues today
• domestic abuse, abortion
rights
Equal Rights Amendment (ERA), 1972
• tried to change the
Constitution to make
men and women equal
• it had a 7-year deadline and
needed 38 states to ratify
• 35 states ratified, 5 tried to
take their ratification back
• 21 states have ERA
language in their state
constitutions
Gloria Steinem
• radical feminist who
thought NOW didn’t go
far enough
• started Ms. Magazine
in 1972
• invented Ms. so women’s
names weren’t dependent
on marriage (Miss vs. Mrs.)
• banned Miss America
pageant
Phyllis Schlafly
• argued that ERA would
hurt families
• military service, sexsegregated bathrooms,
dependent wife benefits
• conservative backlash
against ERA made it
fail by three states
Title IX
• Title VII of Civil Rights
Act, 1964 bans
discrimination by
gender
• Title IX of Higher
Education Act bans
discrimination in
classroom and
activities
Roe v. Wade, 1973
• most states banned or
restricted abortion
• the Supreme Court created
one national standard
• in 1st trimester, abortion is
legal
• in later trimesters states
may make restrictions
• waiting period, parental consent,
ban of certain types of abortion
• all states must allow abortion if the
life of the mother is threatened
Compare/Contrast the level of support by
each woman. List examples WHY.
Gloria Steinem Phyllis Sclafley
NOW
ERA
ROE V. WADE
Women’s Rights
• Has the women’s rights
movement been successful?
• 30% of workforce in 1950
• 60% of workforce in 2000
• new careers have opened up in
medicine, law, politics, and
accounting
• however, the majority of the
poor are single women
• ERA failed
• Roe v. Wade passed
EQ #7:
• What led to the rise of the women’s
movement, and what impact did it
have on American society?