Lori D. Ginzberg. Untidy Origins: A Story of Women's Rights in Antebellum New York. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2005. xiv + 222 pp. $22.95, paper, ISBN 978-0-8078-5608-6.

Lori D. Ginzberg. Untidy Origins: A Story of Woman's Rights in Antebellum New York. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2005. xiv + 222 pp , , .

Sherry H. Penney, James D. Livingston. A Very Dangerous Woman: Martha Wright and Women's Rights. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 2004. 288 pp. $22.95, paper, ISBN 978-1-55849-447-3.

Judith Wellman. The Road to Seneca Falls: Elizabeth Cady Stanton and the First Woman's Rights Convention. Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 2004. xii + 297 pp. $55.00, cloth, ISBN 978-0-252-02904-2.

Reviewed by Carol Lasser

Published on H-SHEAR (December, 2005)

New works by Judith Wellman, Lori Ginzberg, deserve the attention of all historians of politics and, jointly, Sherry Penney and James D. Liv‐ and culture in what was once called "the middle ingston revise--and revitalize--the story of the be‐ period." Returning to the well-tilled soil of the ginnings of the woman's rights movement; they Burned Over District, these recent publications H-Net Reviews have unearthed new evidence and reignite now which the antebellum period serves chronologi‐ smoldering embers to cast new light on the multi‐ cally and teleologically as the time of beginnings, plicity of forces at work in the women's rights setting the stage for the achievement of women's confagrations of the antebellum years. More than enfranchisement and full citizenship in the twen‐ this, they suggest ways to synthesize narratives all tieth century. Instead, I want to resituate them in too often marked of into the separate spheres of the "master narrative" of antebellum politics. The women's history and political history. volumes under review make clear the centrality Nineteenth-century political historians tend of questions of property and representation, and to address Seneca Falls in passing, connecting the of religious orientation and family networks, not emergence of women's rights to the incubation of only for their gendered subjects, but also for a egalitarian ideas within the antislavery move‐ more complete understanding of the rising ten‐ ment; once having recognized the emergence of sions of the 1850s and the collapse of the union this formation, however, they relegate it to the pe‐ that resulted in the Civil War. riphery, to return to a political narrative, with Ginzberg and Wellman both position their women's rights reappearing only much later in work as revisions of the canonical origins story the nineteenth century, when temperance advo‐ promulgated by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and her cates and reformers push for women's electoral allies through Stanton's self-conscious biographi‐ presence. Historians of women celebrate Seneca cal writings and the magisterial authoritative His‐ Falls, but then frequently follow a path that es‐ tory of Woman Sufrage.[1] Neither Ginzberg nor chews the sectional crisis of the 1850s, pushing Wellman is satisfed to tell the story as that of the through the antebellum conventions to reach the frustrated young matron who, with the help of formation of Women's National Loyal League dur‐ Lucretia Mott, came to comprehend the assault on ing the Civil War; they only return to political ref‐ their status as women sustained at the World's erents to explain the split in the movement in Anti-Slavery Convention in London in 1840, and 1869 over questions of the relationship of African- who deferred her action until she fnally found American and women's enfranchisement. Thus herself driven to a "women's rights convulsion" political and gender historians follow their own eight years later in revolt against the drudgery of trajectories, with little attention to how they inter‐ small town domesticity.[2] Each author appreci‐ sect. These new works, however, suggest how ates that "the ideas expressed at Seneca Falls did heretofore divergent historiographies might be not burst full-grown upon the scene"[3], and that brought together to create a new interpretation, Stanton did not single-handedly will the meeting placing questions about gender and political rep‐ into existence. Ginzberg expertly explains how six resentation centrally within the larger study of unknown women in the relative isolation of the political culture for the antebellum period. "North Country" brought together their experi‐ This review essay will not so much critique ences and the "world of ideas" they encountered the individual works under review--books already in reading newspaper accounts of the debates at perceptively reviewed separately here on H-NET the New York State constitutional convention to and elsewhere--as it will suggest how they con‐ formulate their demand for woman sufrage in tribute to an understanding of the critical role August 1846, nearly two full years before the played by gender dynamics in the sectional ten‐ Seneca Falls gathering. Likewise, Wellman maps sions that resulted in national upheaval and Civil the "converging paths" that came together in Stan‐ War. In so doing, I deliberately remove the works ton and her newly adopted hometown in 1848 to from the traditional women's history narrative in make a local story with national import. For Well‐ man, fve forces came together at the 1848 con‐

2 H-Net Reviews vention: the market revolution that repositioned gifted to her by Wright's friend and neighbor, the towns and villages along the Erie Canal; the William Seward. Wellman and Ginzberg analyze upheavals in the Society of Friends that brought as well the economic conditions that shaped wom‐ some egalitarian-minded Quakers into worldly re‐ en's attitudes and action. Documenting gender as form; the transformations of the abolitionist a factor in the ownership of land and real proper‐ movement in which gender issues interplayed ty, they both explore how its control was mediat‐ forcefully with changing ideas about political en‐ ed by and through family networks on farms and gagement; the discussions of legal reform perme‐ in fedgling commercial centers. Women and legal ated by "rights talk" for both women and African reformers in antebellum New York, as they make Americans; and the dynamic personality of Eliza‐ clear, connected questions of gender, rights, citi‐ beth Cady Stanton. Penney and Livingston too zenship, and sufrage. want to broaden the narrative, in their case to Taken together, these authors identify the write into it the signifcant role of the talented complex and intertwined social forces and ideas and witty Martha Cofn Wright, long overshad‐ that ignited the struggle for women's rights. Yet owed by her better-known sister, Lucretia Cofn the implications of their work have signifcance Mott, the formidable and long-lived Quaker femi‐ for studies well beyond these individuals and this nist-abolitionist. Their meticulous research pro‐ region, and for periods both before and after the vides a long-overdue biography of this "founding fateful days of July 19 and 20, 1848. Can we, for mother," revealing how, in her life, politics, reli‐ example, fnd similar dynamics at work propel‐ gion, and social change came together to empow‐ ling interest in woman's rights in Jane Swis‐ er this birthright Quaker woman, living in the shelm's Pittsburgh? In Jane Elizabeth Jones's rapidly transforming region of upstate New York, Salem, Ohio? In Lucy Stone's West Brookfeld, to nurture and maintain her strong family net‐ Massachusetts? Can we tease out genealogies and works while engaging in abolitionism and wom‐ kinship for these locales and for these individuals en's rights. that reveal the importance of religious communi‐ As these authors are aware, however, social ties in shaping ideas and orientation? Can we doc‐ forces alone do not make for human action. Well‐ ument the impact of print culture, educational in‐ man, like Ginzberg, seeks to answer the question: stitutions and transportation networks to trace "what ideas were available in the language of the the possible sources for their ideas about race and day" (p.45); and both anchor their inquiries in, as the revolutionary tradition? Can we fnd evidence Wellman defnes it, "the perspective of families, of contact with nonhegemonic alternatives among communities, and the larger context of reform" to Native Americans, free thinkers, and communi‐ reveal why some individuals began to articulate tarians that shaped their preparation for engage‐ the seemingly radical ideas about women's rights ment? in property and in political participation (p. 13). The volumes under review here locate and Wright's biographers place her centrally in this contextualize the multiple origins of women's context, detailing how she imbibed ideas of anti‐ rights talk as they revise our understanding of slavery and gendered power from her sister's where--and with whom--woman sufrage agita‐ Philadelphia Quaker milieu, and transported this tion began. But, equally important, Wellman and knowledge into her life in Auburn. There, it Ginzberg, along with Penney and Livingston, are shaped not only her lifelong participation in the part of a discourse that is encouraging historians women's rights movement, but also her eforts on to rethink the larger question of the relationship behalf of antislavery, including her ongoing work of women to the male-defned polis of the antebel‐ with Harriet Tubman, who settled nearby on land

3 H-Net Reviews lum North, a question that weaves through their property and religion.[5] And, as Wellman, revisions of the origins story, and one that sug‐ Ginzberg, Penney and Livingston document, anti‐ gests ways to reunite the histories of women and slavery remained central to them. Women were political culture. Antebellum gender, we now present at the very beginnings of the politiciza‐ know, was not a simple, private matter. Focusing tion of antislavery, and they remained within all on state-level discussions of legal reform, Nancy segments of the movement through its various Isenberg has already challenged "the linear pro‐ electoral campaigns. Women brought this political gression from benevolence to antislavery" and knowledge to their work for woman's rights. As then to women's rights, exploring longstanding Wellman notes, the majority of participants at the debates over sufrage, citizenship and consent. Seneca Falls Convention came from Free Soil fam‐ Anne Boylan has demonstrated how even wom‐ ily networks. Similarly, Ginzberg's six Depauville en's organizations based on notions of "True women had Liberty party ties even as they wrote Womanhood" ultimately contested the exclusion their remarkable petition. In documenting how of women from the political public. New studies connections to party politics preceded entry into of abolitionist women, including books by Julie woman's rights work, Wellman and Ginzberg sug‐ Roy Jefrey and Deborah Von Broekhoven, have gest yet another "untidy origin" of the women's located women in the very center of the abolition‐ rights movement--and the necessity to interrogate ist movement, in both its reform and political women's partisan afliations as a part of the larg‐ variants. Elizabeth Varon uncovered women's er political landscape on which the electoral bat‐ participation in electoral campaigns by 1840, and tles of the antebellum years were fought. Michael Pierson has argued for the centrality of Unfortunately, historians focusing on tradi‐ gender politics in the rise of antislavery third par‐ tional politics may be put of by the ways in which ties. Melanie Gustafson and Rebecca Edwards these volumes tell their stories. Ginzberg, for ex‐ have situated women as partisan political actors ample, compares her work to a "mystery story" before the Civil War. All argue that antebellum (p. 11), and unabashedly confesses in the end that women's history spilled over into the political cul‐ "so much of this conversation must be left to our ture.[4] imagination" (p. 161), while Wellman opens her The books at hand push this emerging inter‐ volume with "an imaginative re-creation" (p. 1) of pretation to a new level, revealing how women Stanton's walk to the Wesleyan Methodist Chapel themselves understood and translated into their on July 19, 1848, later attempting to enter into own lives the politics they learned through their Stanton's mind as she approached the tea-party at interest and participation in third parties and in which the idea for a convention was hatched (p. state-level constitutional issues. As Lori Ginzberg 186), and her mental state as she presented the has already argued, theirs was not simply a gen‐ Declaration of Sentiments (p. 195). Penney and dered politics of moral suasion. When we imagi‐ Livingston make use of the prerogative of the bi‐ natively loosen these works from their teleologi‐ ographer to think for and through their subject, cal tethers to the march of women's rights, they speculating on how Wright interwove family con‐ speak to us of the signal importance of antebel‐ cerns with her activism. General readers, espe‐ lum women's political engagement. "The school of cially those of us who are fans of Miriam Grace anti-slavery" not only trained women in the arts Monfredo's Seneca Falls detective novels, may of organizing and petitioning, preparing them for take pleasure in attention to the material culture later agitation on behalf of woman sufrage and and terrain of the daily lives in Ginzberg's and gender equality, it was a venue which sharpened Wellman's accounts, but political historians may their understandings of rights and citizenship, of see such attention to context as gratuitous distrac‐

4 H-Net Reviews tion.[6] Yet, as Ginzberg reminds us, interpola‐ legal and political struggles, and they joined men tions and substantiated inventive leaps are neces‐ in the partisanship of politics in Liberty, Free Soil, sary for both scholars and general readers who and Republican parties. Elizabeth Cady Stanton is seek to comprehend context, and to hear the "un‐ but perhaps the most notable example; on Sep‐ speakable." Women's history sources, after all, re‐ tember 11, 1860, twelve years after the Seneca main diferent in kind and in number than those Falls Convention, and the day after delivering a available in other felds. banner to the local Wide Awakes, she stood beside If they persist, historians of political culture her husband Henry on their porch to receive the will fnd much that should lead them to re-evalu‐ young Republican party men who had marched to ate their own stories. Creating dialogue between their home and cheered, frst for her, then for her political historians and historians of women need husband, and fnally for the seven "little Stan‐ not mean relegating the history of women's rights tons."[7] Even while immersed in women's rights to an epiphenomenon in the general political up‐ work, Elizabeth Cady Stanton never forsook her heavals of the antebellum years. Rather, it sug‐ engagement in antislavery politics, a commitment gests the need for synthesis. We need to look she shared with her family. We are only begin‐ again at the evidence of women's rights struggles ning to learn more about how petitioners and within the political narrative. The conventions of partners, spouses and siblings, pressured elec‐ the American Anti-Slavery Society from 1837 to toral politics in the era in which sectional contro‐ 1840 were riven with controversy that demon‐ versy took shape in local and national contests. strates the "thinkability" of woman's rights even Perhaps, therefore, it is time to suggest an end to before the London Convention of 1840. The splin‐ the separate historiographic spheres of the ante‐ tering of the antislavery movement into "old" and bellum era--one addressing the origins of wom‐ "new" organizations hardly removed the question en's rights and the other interrogating the coming of women's political identity from issues con‐ of the Civil War. Historians of antebellum gender fronting Liberty party leaders who pushed aboli‐ and politics might consider forming a broader tionists from moral suasion to electoral engage‐ kinship network based on mutual interest, or ment. Partisans in various antebellum political even a marriage uniting those too often seen as battles, particularly at the state level, continued to diferent by nature. To do so is not to suggest that see gender--and women themselves--as critical to the rights talk of women was some sideshow to the development of both local strategies and larg‐ the emergence of politicized sectional controver‐ er issues. Women within antislavery family net‐ sy; nor is it to argue that gender issues obsessed works did not remain merely symbolic presences, senators and congressmen as they debated the but became participants themselves, acting on question of Kansas. It is instead to propose that their understandings not only of sufrage rights, political culture encompasses a terrain which but rights to property and social representation as women understood, and in which they participat‐ well. ed, as mobilized citizens making deliberative de‐ mands on the public, shaping not only their own Wellman, Ginzberg, Penny and Livingston separate sphere, but the openly public one as demonstrate that the women at Seneca Falls, well. those up in Jeferson County and the indomitable Martha Wright did not compartmentalize their Notes causes. Schooled in both antislavery and women's [1]. Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, rights, women were embedded in the networks Matilda Joslyn Gage, et al., History of Woman Suf‐ that challenged religious bodies; they engaged in frage, 6 vols. (Rochester, 1887-1892).

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[2]. Stanton's use of this phrase actually came Star Conspiracy (1994); Blackwater Spirits (1995); several years later in a letter to Susan B. Anthony, Through a Golden Eagle (1996); and The Stalking April 2, 1852, as published in Elizabeth Cady Stan‐ Horse_ (1998). More recently, her novels have ton, As Revealed in Her Letters, Diary and Remi‐ moved into the Civil War period. niscences (New York: Harper & Brothers Publish‐ [7]. Gustafson begins her Women and the Re‐ ers, 1922), 2: p. 38. publican Party with this anecdote; Stanton's letter [3]. On page 9, Ginzberg quotes Wellman's ar‐ to her sons about this event appears in Gordon, ticle, "Women's Rights, Republicanism, and Revo‐ ed., Papers of Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan lutionary Rhetoric in Antebellum New York State," B. Anthony, 1: pp. 441-444. New York History 69 (July 1988): pp. 354-355. [4]. Nancy Isenberg, Sex and Citizenship in Antebellum America (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1998); Anne M. Boylan, The Origins of Women's Activism: New York and Bos‐ ton, 1797-1840 (Chapel Hill: University Of North Carolina Press, 2002); Julie Roy Jefrey, The Great Silent Army of Abolitionism: Ordinary Women in the Antislavery Movement (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1998); Deborah Bingham van Broekhoven, The Devotion of These Women: Rhode Island in the Antislavery Network (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 2002); Elizabeth R. Varon, We Mean to Be Count‐ ed: White Women and Politics in Antebellum Vir‐ ginia (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1998); Michael D. Pierson, Free Hearts and Free Homes: Gender and American Antislavery Politics (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2003); Melanie Gustafson, Women and the Republican Party, 1854-1924 (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2001); and Rebecca Edwards, An‐ gels in the Machinery: Gender in American Party Politics from the Civil War to the Progressive Era (New York: Oxford University Press, 1997). [5]. This is the term used by Ann D. Gordon to refer to the years 1840-66. See The Selected Papers of Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony, vol. 1: In the School of Anti-Slavery, 1840-1866 (New Brunswick, N.J: Rutgers University Press, 1997). [6]. Monfredo has written at least fve popular mystery novels based in antebellum Seneca Falls including: Seneca Falls Inheritance (1992); North

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Citation: Carol Lasser. Review of Ginzberg, Lori D. Untidy Origins: A Story of Women's Rights in Antebellum New York. ; Lori D. Ginzberg. Untidy Origins: A Story of Woman's Rights in Antebellum New York. ; Penney, Sherry H.; Livingston, James D. A Very Dangerous Woman: Martha Wright and Women's Rights. ; Wellman, Judith. The Road to Seneca Falls: Elizabeth Cady Stanton and the First Woman's Rights Convention. H-SHEAR, H-Net Reviews. December, 2005.

URL: https://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=10995

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.

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