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Brianne Heinz

American Civilization
12 April, 2015
Jessica Feveryear
Womens Rights
In the 1800s money heavily equaled status, and increased status opened more
doors of opportunity for the upwardly mobile. The home was the perfect location to
display the wealth. The husband had to be out in the public sphere creating the wealth,
but his wife was free to manage the private sphere, called the women's sphere.
Together, a successful husband and wife created a picture of perfect harmony. As he
developed skills for business, she cultivated a complementary role. This recipe for
success was so popular that all who could adopted it. In short order the newly created
roles for men and women were thought to reflect their true nature. A true man was
concerned about success and moving up the social ladder. He was aggressive,
competitive, rational, and channeled all of his time and energy into his work. The
woman's role , on the other hand, was virtuous. Her four chief characteristics were piety,
purity, submissiveness and domesticity. She was the great civilizer who created order in
the home in return for her husband's protection, financial security and social status.
As long as women functioned flawlessly within the domestic sphere and never

ventured from it, women were held in reverence by their husbands and general society.
But this was carried to ridiculous extremes. To protect women's purity, certain words
could not be spoken in their presence. Undergarments were "unmentionables." A leg or
an arm was called a "limb." Even tables had limbs, and in one especially delicate
household, the "limbs" of a piano were covered in little trousers!
Both the Declaration of Independence and the Declaration of Sentiments hold
integrity and respect to be key elements of freedom and liberty. Although they both view
integrity and respect as essential elements, they take different approaches to defining
integrity and freedom. The Declaration of Independence holds that respect and integrity
are trampled upon by taxation without fair representation and keeping in times of
peace, standing armies without the consent of our legislators. The Declaration of
Sentiments holds that respect and integrity are trampled upon by keeping women from
equal access to college and profitable jobs. Whereas the Declaration of Independence
maintains that viewing citizens as subordinate to the king is a violation of fundamental
freedom, the Declaration of Sentiments maintains that viewing women as subordinate to
men violates freedom. In the Declaration of Sentiments, He has created a false public
sentiment by giving to the world a different code of morals for men and women, by
which moral delinquencies which exclude women from society, are not only tolerated,
but deemed of little account in man. It is obvious that the Declaration of Sentiments

views gender equality as a key concept to freedom whereas the Declaration of


Independence views political equality to be a key concept.
As historical context changes, the ideas of freedom and liberty change. Freedom
and liberty will always be freedom and liberty, but nonetheless are left open to
interpretation. The Declaration of Independence was written during a time when
freedom meant political justice and insubordination to the British King. The Declaration
of Sentiments was written during a time when freedom meant equality among genders.
By comparing the Declaration of Independence and Declaration of Sentiments, it is
obvious that the ideas of freedom and liberty are dynamic and left to the interpretation of
the culture.

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