Continuity And Variation In Reform Movements

Continuity and variation in reform movements in America 1840-2000 There are a striking number of similarities between the reform movements for women and African Americans that span the mid-nineteenth century to the end of the twentieth century in America. The reform movements began with the anti-slavery movement. In the anti-slavery movement, women started to speak out against the evils of slavery and found a confidence that allowed them to first question whether they were enjoying the rights of equality and justice for which the were advocating for slaves.
To begin the analysis of the movements, general categories can be used to sort similarities. These categories include similarities in leadership, in goals and strategies, and in the challenges
Jane Addams used this final strategy in “If Men Were Seeking the Franchise,” as did Jennifer Baumgardener and Amy Richards in their prologue, A Day without Feminism and epilogue a Day with Feminism in Manifesta.
The final similarity to explore is the challenges each movement faced. An unavoidable condition of change is the existence of resistance. Each reform movement faced a degree of resistance. In some cases, the resistance was good because it served as fuel for more people to support the injustices that occur in society. The challenges each movement faced came in the form of individual attacks from peers not part of the movement, as well as group infighting, and unfavorable government laws or roadblocks.
Personal attacks were often made not against the character of a leader, more so the ideology held by an individual. This is true when Catherine Beecher challenged Angelina Grimkee’s position of speaking in public in front of males. Beecher believed a woman’s influence should be in the private sphere, while Grimke challenged socially accepted practices by speaking in front of mixed
Flexner describes in chapter ten of A Century of Struggle, the first woman’s suffrage only group was founded in a split. The split took place in May 1869 directly following a convention of the Equal Rights Association called to discuss the issue of woman suffrage. Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony organized the National Woman Suffrage Association. Later that year, in November, a second organization was set up, calling itself the American Woman Suffrage Association. (Flexner 145) “Except for one or two abortive attempts at reconciliation, the two suffrage associations continued to operate independently for twenty years.” (Flexner