Description
Book SynopsisGendered Citizenship explores how the original ERA conflict served as the vehicle through which Americans not only forged new conceptions of citizenship, but also renewed the justification for sex-specific treatment.
Trade Review"
Gendered Citizenship sheds important light on the mid-twentieth-century ERA conflict, exposing some of its forgotten dimensions."—Katherine Turk,
American Historical Review"The great contribution made by Rebecca DeWolf in
Gendered Citizenship: The Original Conflict over the Equal Rights Amendment, 1920–1963 lies in the granular detail she provides about the way the amendment evolved in the early 1920s and why it took the shape it did."—Glenna Matthews,
California History"This book's substantial strength lies in its detailed and lucid accounting of the myriad actors, organizations, institutions, laws, and court rulings that shaped the ERA's fortunes in the period from 1920 to 1963, an era given less attention by historians. DeWolf's prodigious research reveals both the complexity and the extent of activism surrounding the Era and situates its trajectory solidly within wider historical contexts."—Lynne Curry,
Journal of American History"DeWolf's well-researched history emphasizes the ongoing significance of the conflict a century ago for politics today and will be of interest for graduate students and scholars of the subject, as well as educated readers with a passion for legal and political history."—Nancy Elizabeth Baker,
Southwestern Historical Quarterly"
Gendered Citizenship is a must-read for history lovers, policy wonks, women's rights activists, and anyone else interested in how the U.S. government can support gender equality."—Rebecca Brenner Graham,
Society for U.S. Intellectual History"Although this book is on the ERA, it does go into other laws that affected women, especially their employment opportunities. Read it as a general review of public policy on women, especially at the federal level up to 1963. Then imagine how different things would have been if the ERA had been ratified several decades ago."—Jo Freeman, seniorwomen.com
“Like the sun peeking through the clouds, Rebecca DeWolf’s groundbreaking book clears the fog that has long surrounded the Equal Rights Amendment. . . . Anyone who wants to understand why the ERA is not yet law would be well advised to read this book.”—Johanna Neuman, author of
Gilded Suffragists: The New York Socialites Who Fought for Women’s Right to Vote“By tracing the origins of the ERA from the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment to 1963, DeWolf offers a deep legal and judicial review of the debate around what constitutes equality under the law and the very nature of citizenship.”—Page Harrington, former executive director of the National Woman’s Party at the Belmont-Paul Women’s Equality National Monument
“Rebecca DeWolf has brought us a meticulously researched and vividly detailed account of the original ERA conflict that provides readers with rich context to trace how the arguments against gender equality of nearly a century ago continue to shape our cultural attitudes about the role and duties of women in the domestic sphere today.”—Betsy Fischer Martin, executive director of the Women and Politics Institute at American University
“Rebecca DeWolf has given us a book we desperately need—perhaps now more than ever. In
Gendered Citizenship DeWolf peels back the layers of conflict surrounding the Equal Rights Amendment . . . to the core question regarding the true scope of American citizenship that arose in the wake of the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment securing women’s suffrage in 1920.”—Angie Maxwell, author of
The Long Southern Strategy: How Chasing White Voters in the South Changed American PoliticsTable of ContentsAcknowledgments
List of Abbreviations
Introduction: The Equal Rights Amendment and American Citizenship
1. The Radical Nineteenth Amendment: Masculine Citizenship and Women’s Status
2. “The Right to Differ”: The Power of Protectionism, 1920–1932
3. “To Be Regarded as Persons”: Emancipationism on the Move, 1933–1937
4. “We Women Want to Be Persons Now”: The Rise of Emancipationism, 1938–1945
5. “Motherhood Cannot Be Amended”: The Return of Protectionism in the Postwar Era
6. “Socially Desirable Concepts”: The Triumph of Protectionism, 1947–1963
Epilogue: The Legacy of Protectionism
Notes
Bibliography
Index
