WOMEN AND CRIME
UNIT ONE
HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT
EIGHTEENTH CENTURY
1776 Abigail Adams
Wife of John Adams
“remember the ladies”
(husband president-was drafting
constitution)
Constitution does not include the
word woman
Declaration of Independence (all men
created equal)
Women not included in
principle/concept
American Constitution founded on
English law
Women not recognized citizens
Women did not have legal rights
Women considered as property
Women did not have right to vote
FIRST FEMINIST MOVEMENT
1848-Seneca Falls, New York
Marked beginnings of first organized
feminist movement
Brought attention to the patriarchal
rule of men over women
Patriarchal-male dominance
FIRST MOVEMENT CONT’D
Brought attention to inequality
between genders in criminal justice
system
Focus of !848 meeting
Property and suffrage
Adopted on Declaration of
Independence (see page 5)
LEGAL SYSTEM
Focus of Seneca Falls
Property rights established by
Blackstone (legal scholar)
19th Century Laws
Husband had right to utilize corporal
discipline
LEGAL SYSTEM CONTD
RULE OF THUMB LAW
Husband could hit wife with object no
larger than (wider) than thumb
Federal Equal Rights Amendment
First Introduced in Congress 1923
introduced continuously-failed in 1972
FEDERAL EQUAL RIGHTS
AMENDMENT
Three basic sections
(1) Equality of rights shall not be denied
based on sex
(2) Congress has power to enforce the
Amendment
(3) Amendment would take effect two
years after date of ratification
Above did not occur
LEGAL PITFALLS CONT’D
Married women lacked legal capacity
to contract or convey real property
Money earned by wife became
property of husband
Punishment for killing husband more
severe than for husband killing wife
(husband may or may not be
punished for killing wife)
Wife killing her husband considered
to have denied husband conjugal
affection
SENECA FALLS RESULTS
(1)
(2)
Married women in some states
gained rights to inherit and
bequeath property same as single
women
Gained right to have certain rights
regarding property of husband
without will (intestate)
RESULTS CONTD
(1)Challenge
to patriarchal system
thought to be act of treason by some
(males and females)
(2)Challenge-thought not criminal was
deviant act for the times
(1)
Some women imprisoned for civil
disobedience
RESULTS CONTD
(1)Prior
(1)
to Seneca Falls convention
Oberlin College first to admit women in
1833
(2)Women
could take only shortened
literary course until 1841.
(1)
Believed women’s highest calling was to
be mother
FIGHTERS FOR LEGAL
EQUALITY
(1)Elizabeth
Blackwell-first women in
US to get medical degree
(1849) had applied to 21 medical
schools
(2) Bradwell b Illinois (1873)
(1)
(1)
Denied female lawyers from practicing in
state courts.
(1)Married
(1)
Women’s Property Act-1860
Attempt to give women property she
owned as her sole and priv0ate property
after marriage (had allowed husband to
assume property rights of property
owned by wife before marriage
(1)Nineteenth
amendment granted
women right to vote
(see page 8 for technicalities)
BLACK WOMEN’S FIGHT FOR
EQUALITY
(1)
SoJourner Truth-Ain’t I a Woman
(infamous 1815 speech in Ohio)
(1)Jane
Merritt and Mary A. Shadd
Openly voiced disapproval of denying
Negro women seats to annual
abolitionists movement
(2) Successful in gaining admission for
women into the 1849 Ohio Convention
and 1855 Philadelphia Convention
(1)
BLACK WOMEN’S FIGHT FOR
EQUALITY CONT’D
(1)Combined
efforts to abolish slavery
and combat patriarchy in black
community
(1)
Harriet Tubman ‘Black Moses”
(1)
(2)
Underground Railroad Activity
Mary Elizabeth Browser-Union ally
(2)Former
slave-able to secure written
and oral information as a servant in
the home of Jefferson Davis
SALEM WITCH INCIDENT
(1)
(2)
http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects
/ftrials/salem/SALEM.HTM
Situation of mass hysteria
(1)
(2)
Results from nonconformity to male
dominance
Most threatening offense i1n Puritan
community
SALEM WITCH INCIDENCE
CONTD
Circle of Girls
(1)
(1)
(2)
(3)
Future forecasted by Pharris’ cook
Girls began to exhibit behavior from story
telling of Tituba
Girls accused of having been bewitched
(1)
Girls identified Tituba and others.
Central of Girls
(1) First
victims
(2) Ten circle of girls (ages 9 to 20)
(3) Mary Warren (20) A Circle of Girls
accused of being witch
(4) Two other members of Central of Girls
also accused
THE ACCUSED
(1)Middle-aged
unmarried women
(2)Susanna Martin
Accused by Circle of Girls ( mimicked fits
and irrational behavior in presence of
Martin
(2) Martin (72 years old) laughed at antics
(1) Did not help case
(1)
(1)Martin
charged with assaulting
girls.
(2)Several statements of deviant
behavior demonstrated by Martin
(3)Note statements on pages 22 and 23
of text
(1) Girls
thought to have made pack with
devil
(2) June through September of 1692,
nineteen men and women hanged
(1)
all convicted of witchcraft
(1)
Began Spring of 1692
CAUSES
combination of ongoing frontier war war,
economic conditions, teenage boredom,
and personal jealousies.
(2) Illness of Betty Pharris and behavior
mimicked by other teenagers
(3) Behavior similar to that described as
behavior of witches.
(1)
(1) Doctor
suggested behavior may be
supernatural
(2) Some accused of possessing
:poppets” small rag dolls in the image
of an enemy.
(3) Thought
harm could be projected through
“poppets”
(1) Others
thought to own “familiars”-small
animals (dogs, cats, …) sent by devil to
aid in doing evil (read p. 21)
WITCH BELIEFS OF PURITANS
(1) Inherited
hierarchical monotheism
(2) (Fear of heresy
(3) Persecutions validated new patriarchal
religion
BLACK WOMEN’S FIGHT FOR
EQUALITY
(1)Mary
Fields-
Tennessee born
(2) Hauled and id heavy freight work for
Ursuline nuns
(1)
(2)Ida
B. Wells-Memphis Journalist and
Activist
(1)
Anti-lynching campaign
(1)Ellen
Craft
Run-away slave with spouse
Duped authorities by passing as white
slave owner traveling with her slave
(2) Harriet Jacobs
Stow-away
BLACK WOMEN’S FIGHT FOR
EQUALITY
(1)Slave
women responded to particular
social conditions, masters’ values
and norms
(2)Reacted to stresses and strains
stemming from slave status
(1)
(How does this relate to Harriet Jacobs
Story? Be Specific.
(1)Slave
Resistance
Overt means-Rebellions, revolts,
runaways
(2) (Subtle-feigning illness, conscious
laziness
(1)
DEVIAND AND BLACK
FEMALE CRIMINALITY
(1)
Stealing –most widespread practice of
resistance
Appropriation or reappropriation of
forbidden goods.
(2) Whites perceived theft as normal feature of
plantation living.
(3) Thieving Negro? One who stole more than
the average
(1)
(2) Homicide and Assaults
Overt Resistance
Most common type occurred as outcome of
altercations bet3ween slave owners and/or
overseers.
Threats of whipping
IONFANTICDE AND
ABORTION
Killing female child to prevent life of bondage
(infanticide)
Abortion
Performed in secret in slave quarters
Beyond control of males (master or black slave)
Effective means for gaining power over
masters and control over part of their lives.
Slave Oppression
(1)Two
Categories
Economic Exploitation
(2) Sexual Oppression
(1)
Slave Oppression
Equal treatment between slave men and
women
(2) Poor Quality of Food
(3) Harsh Rules & Punishment
(1)
Rules usually strictly enforced
(2) Punishment ranged from mutilation to
selling the slave
(1)
(1)Punishment
Meted to female slaves regardless of
motherhood or physical activity
(2) Inflicted by Master (the slave owner) or
Mistress
(1)
Examples from Incidence
(2) in Life of Slave Girl
(3) Ways in which female slave(s) attempted
avoid punishment
(1)
ECONOMIC EXPLOITATION
Characteristic of patriarchal and
capitalistic society
Performed same type of field labor as men
Worked for plantation then returned to
work for own home
How was the grandmother of Harriet
economically exploited? Or was she?
SEXUAL EXPLOITATION OR
OPPRESSION
Control of reproduction essential to slave
perpetuation
Valued for fertility
“breeder” rather than mothers
Expected to bear children frequently
Victims of forced “breeding”
Subjected to violent and non violent rape
Was Harriett Jacobs sexually exploited?
How?
Prostitution type of sexual exploitation
(Forms of )
(1) Regularly providing sexual services for
profit for master
(2) concubinage
(3) acceptance of trinkets after relinquishing to
forced sex
Free women of color
Entered system termed Placage system
Arranged live in between white slave owner and a
quadroon.
DEVIANT WOMEN OF THE
WEST
(1)Grace
Newton
Led gang of cattle rustlers
(2) Used explicit fouled language.
(1)
(2)Mary
Jane Canary-became active in
crime at age of 16
Changed name to Calamity Jane
(2) Displayed non feminine behavior for
time
(1)
(1)Floira
Quick-brothel owner
“Tom King”
(2) Arrested for horse stealing
(1)
(2)Etta
Place-female companion of
“Sundance Kid”
(1)
Assumed leadership of “all-male gang”
after death of Kid
(1) Belle
Star-charged with horse stealing
Pursued criminal activities disguised as a
man
(2) Fatally shot in back
(1)
(2) Ella
Watson
“Cattle Kate”
(2) Hung on assumption of being cattle thieves
(1)
