Women's Suffrage

important to them provided protection for her. When a woman is not married and her father is still alive, he controls her. If he is deceased, an uncle, a brother, or any other male guardian was in control of her and her property. When she is married, all of her belongings under her father's reign then belong to her husband. The government felt that if women were given independence, they would not know what to do with the freedoms they had. If a woman owned land that she inherited from her father, once she got married, that land no longer belonged to her. The wages she received by working outside of the home went straight to being owned by of her husband or father. After a woman got married, she was no longer a separate individual but property of her husband. Though men are given control of their wives, some could not handle all of that responsibility. Some men cracked under the pressure and became drunk, abusive, and were foolish with the family's money. Like Abigail Adams said in a letter to her husband, "Do not put such unlimited power into the hands of the husbands. Remember, all men would be tyrants if they could...If particular care and attention is not paid to the ladies, we are determined to foment a rebellion, and will not hold ourselves bound by and laws in which we have no voice or representation." (Stevenson, 28). If a woman wanted a divorce from her husband, she would be blamed and looked down shamefully even if she had done nothing wrong. Custody of her children was a very slim chance even if her former husband was at fault. To change these ways, women wanted to be able to vote. They wanted influence in order to change the laws and make their position more powerful.
             Leaders to every cause are needed so that in the end the cause they were pursuing is brought out. Since the fight for voting rights for women took such a long time until the nineteenth amendment actually happened, many strong leaders pas...

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Women's Suffrage. (1969, December 31). In MegaEssays.com. Retrieved 16:14, March 28, 2024, from https://www.megaessays.com/viewpaper/2522.html