By Sarah Becker (c)2026

A conservative Massachusetts-er, founding father John Adams and his wife Abigail reflect not only the give and take of early American politics, but also the prejudices associated with the founding era. Said Revolutionary War historian Mercy Otis Warren in 1790: “A soul, inspir’d by freedom’s genial warmth Expands\grows firm, and by resistance strong.”

The battle for Woman’s Equal Rights crosses history’s Golden Eras. Abigail Adams parallels today’s society through her pioneering advocacy for gender equality; her balancing of household management, and her insistence on civic engagement and education.

“I long to hear that you have declared an independency—and by the way in the new Code of Laws which I suppose it will be necessary for you to make, I desire you would Remember the Laidies, and be more generous and favourable to them than your ancestors.” Abigail wrote John in March 1776, 250 years ago.

“Do not put such unlimited power into the hands of the Husbands,” Abigail continued. Into British Jurist Sir William Blackstone’s 1765 Law of coverture. In 1765 Blackstone wrote that “by marriage, the husband and wife are one person in law,” meaning the wife’s legal identity was suspended and ‘covered’ by her husband.”

“Remember all Men would be tyrants if they could,” Abigail said. “If particular care and attention is not paid to the Laidies we are determined to foment a Rebellion, and will not hold ourselves bound by any Laws in which we have no voice, or Representation.”

“That your Sex are Naturally Tyrannical is a Truth,” Abigail continued. “Why then, not put it out of the power of the vicious and the Lawless to use us with cruelty and indignity with impunity,”

“Men of Sense in all Ages abhor those customs which treat us only as the vassals of your Sex.,” Abigail concluded. “Regard us then as Beings placed by providence under your protection and in imitation of the Supreme Being make use of that power only for our happiness.”

Author and Revolutionary War historian Mary Wallstonecraft published her treatise, Vindication of the Rights of Women, in1790. Her cause: Woman’s Educational Equality. Decades later Alexandria Quaker Mary Stabler, wife of apothecary Edward Stabler, convinced fellow Quaker Benjamin Hallowell–a teacher, mathematician and scientist–to open his school to girls.

In New York, in 1832, bridegroom, newspaper editor and author of Moral Physiology Robert Dale Owen, of Scotland and Indiana “wrote a bold” marriage contract: “Of the unjust rights which in virtue of this ceremony an iniquitous law tacitly gives me over the person and property of another, I cannot legally, but I can morally divest myself.  And I hereby…declare that I consider myself…utterly divested, now and during the rest of my life….”

Many date the onset of the current Woman’s Rights Era as 1838, with the release of Quaker convert, abolitionist, and Woman’s Rights advocate Sarah Moore Grimke’s Letters on the Equality of the Sexes and the Condition of Women. Grimke’s interests included not only Woman’s Rights, but also woman’s religious equality, and the connection between racial and gender oppression.

Elizabeth Cady Stanton presented her foundational Declaration of Sentiments 10 years later, in 1848. “The history of mankind is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations on the part of man toward woman, having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over her. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has never permitted her to exercise her inalienable right to the elective franchise.

He has compelled her to submit to laws, in the formation of which she had no voice.

He has withheld from her rights which are given to the most ignorant and degraded men – both natives and foreigners.

Having deprived her of this first right of a citizen, the elective franchise, thereby leaving her without representation in the halls of legislation, he has oppressed her on all sides.

He has made her, if married, in the eye of the law, civilly dead.

He has taken from her all right in property, even to the wages she earns.

He has made her, morally, an irresponsible being, as she can commit many crimes, with impunity, provided they be done in the presence of her husband. In the covenant of marriage, she is compelled to promise obedience to her husband, he becoming, to all intents and purposes, her master – the law giving him power to deprive her of her liberty, and to administer chastisement.

He has so framed the laws of divorce, as to what shall be the proper causes of divorce; in case of separation, to whom the guardianship of the children shall be given, as to be wholly regardless of the happiness of women – the law, in all cases, going upon the false supposition of the supremacy of man, and giving all power into his hands.

After depriving her of all rights as a married woman, if single and the owner of property, he has taxed her to support a government which recognizes her only when her property can be made profitable to it.

He has monopolized nearly all the profitable employments, and from those she is permitted to follow, she receives but a scanty remuneration.

He closes against her all the avenues to wealth and distinction, which he considers most honorable to himself. As a teacher of theology, medicine, or law, she is not known.

He has denied her the facilities for obtaining a thorough education – all colleges being closed against her.

He allows her in Church as well as State, but a subordinate position, claiming Apostolic authority for her exclusion from the ministry, and with some exceptions, from any public participation in the affairs of the Church.

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.

He has usurped the prerogative of Jehovah himself, claiming it as his right to assign for her a sphere of action, when that belongs to her conscience and her God.

He has endeavored, in every way that he could to destroy her confidence in her own powers, to lessen her self-respect, and to make her willing to lead a dependent and abject life.

Now, in view of this entire disfranchisement of one-half the people…we insist that they have immediate admission and privileges which belong to them as citizens of these United States.”

Susan B. Anthony’s pursuit of Woman’s Equal Rights included a failed attempt to include voting rights in the 15th Amendment (1870). Anthony opposed its ratification because it enfranchised Black men only while continuing to exclude women. “Gender,” Anthony said, “should be included alongside race.”

Stanton, a consistent persistent, woman’s advocate released her two-volume The Woman’s Bible in 1895 & 1898. “From the inauguration of the movement for woman’s emancipation the Bible has been used to hold her in the ‘divinely ordained sphere,’ prescribed in the Old and New Testaments,” Stanton age 80 wrote.  “The canon and civil law; church and state; priests and legislators; all political parties and religious denominations have alike taught that woman was made after man, of man, and for man, an inferior being, subject to man.”

“The fashions, forms, ceremonies and customs of society, church ordinances and discipline all grow out of this idea,” Stanton continued.

Religion still plays a critical role in today’s conservative politics. If you doubt it, ask Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s Pastor Doug Wilson, a Christian Nationalist. “Pastor Wilson’s beliefs are extreme,” National Public Radio’s July 2026 interview began.

“Wilson is a self-described Christian nationalist who wants to repeal a woman’s right to vote,” NPR continued. “He has defended slavery, and believes homosexuality should be a crime.”

“The entire nation is rapidly unifying behind our agenda,” Pastor Wilson concluded. He “opened a D.C. ‘church service’ because of the number of Christians who adhere to his church’s teachings within the Trump administration.”

The fight for women’s rights continues: Equal voting rights and ratification of the 19th Amendment [1920], equal pay and equal job opportunities; religious freedom and the separation of church and state, abortion and reproductive rights.” Advocates like Alice Paul, Betty Friedan, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Oprah Winfrey and Gloria Steinem have fought hard to create a better tomorrow. It was Quaker President Richard Nixon, a California Republican, who signed the Title IX legislation.

Woman’s Rights, resurrection of the defeated Equal Rights Amendment [ERA] is not on Trump’s agenda. The Equal Rights Amendment was officially defeated when its extended ratification deadline expired on June 30, 1982. If only Elizabeth Cady Stanton’s “analysis of how discriminatory religious ideologies play into both radical and conservative politics” was better understood.

“We will stand bravely, we will live proudly, we will dream boldly, and nothing will stand in our way,” Trump touted.  “Our golden age has just begun.”

President Trump’s Golden age has collapsed, for many reasons! If I said Smithsonian benefactor; Indiana U.S. Representative and Smithsonian founder Robert Dale Owen is disappointed would you agree?

Exercise your hard-earned right to vote. November ‘s mid-term elections are upon us.

About the Author: Sarah Becker started writing for The Economist while a graduate student in England. Similar publications followed. She joined the Crier in 1996 while serving on the Alexandria Convention and Visitors Association Board. Her interest in antiquities began as a World Bank hire, with Indonesia’s need to generate hard currency. Balinese history, i.e. tourism provided the means. The New York Times describes Becker’s book, Off Your Duffs & Up the Assets, as “a blueprint for thousands of nonprofit managers.” A former museum director, SLAM’s saving grace Sarah received Alexandria’s Salute to Women Award in 2007. Email