How Did The Position Of Women Change 1917-80?

Question 1

Eleanor Roosevelt

Answer 1

Chairwoman of charities/ invite BA to WH
Flown by Tuskegee airmen Red Tails
FDR needed Dixiecrat support
Civil Rights significant for women

Question 2

Women get the vote

Answer 2

1920

20s is the start of women’s liberation

Question 3

WW2

Answer 3

1939 War Outbreak
Go into war work
40s: more and more women enter the workplace

Question 4

Kennedy and women

Answer 4

Set up Commission on the Status of a Women 1961

1963 Equal Pay Act

Question 5

Women’s liberation movement

Answer 5

1961-80

60s saw more sexual freedom

Question 6

NOW and FEW

Answer 6

National Organisation for Women

Federally Employed Women

Question 7

Progress made by 1980

Answer 7

Normal for women to work
Social freedom
Sexual freedom, contraception
Involved in politics

Question 8

How did the position of women change in the 20s?

Answer 8

1) 18th August 1920: women for the vote
2) even more freedom- small minority flappers
3) some remained employed following war work (typing pool)- many housewives
4) women’s Bureau of Labour

Question 9

Impact of the depression on women

Answer 9

Effects due to class rather than gender
Unemployment, falling wages and rising prices
Women with husband kept jobs or looked for work to supplement
Widows took any work

Question 10

1932 Bureau of Labour

Answer 10

97% of women working in slaughtering and meat packing worked as the only wage earner/ boost husbands wage

Question 11

Women’s Bureau of Labour and general bureau

Answer 11

Largely ignore by General bureau of labour due to its focus- some thought it hindered progress
Women had limited hours (10)
Enormous migrant labour pool

Question 12

Impact of the New Deal

Answer 12

Advisors understood immense pressure and burden of feeding a family
New Deal Aid for Families
Men came first in New Deal
Poorest families received help

Question 13

Camps for women

Answer 13

Eg Camp Tera
Set up by Eleanor Roosevelt
1936:36 federally funded camps
Black women rejected due to racism, established Housewives League in Detroit

Question 14

Impact of WW2 on women

Answer 14

Posters of women working ‘we can do it’
3million worked in agriculture in 1943
Coloured and BA women could work where previously banned yet some employers didn’t

Question 15

Acts for women for the war

Answer 15

1940 Selective Training and Service Act: trained women for war and to take jobs
1941 Lanham Act’s childcare provision was extended and % of married women working rose

Question 16

Suburban life

Answer 16

Part of building boom that made houses more affordable
Socially segregated and built similarly
Black Americans lived similarly, low cost suburbs near white to provide services

Question 17

Achievements of the women’s lib movt 50s/ 60s

Answer 17

1958 Education Act
1963 Equal Pay Act
1964 Civil Rights Act, inc sexual equality

In reality, issues continued and girls were not encouraged into HE

Question 18

Betty Friedan

Answer 18

Trained psychologist
1963 writes of suburban life constraints
Got women thinking of their rights
One of the founding members of NOW
Get equality by raising awareness and working steadily for change
Feminine Mystique

Question 19

Young radicals

Answer 19

Predominantly under 30, white, middle class, college educated
Parallel to Black Civil Rights movt
Media focus more on them
Voice of all lib movt

Question 20

Criticisms of young radicals

Answer 20

Easier for men to ridicule
Attracted opposition
Some objected to specifics of abortion and contraception
Conservatives: ‘unamericaness’

Question 21

Phyllis Shlafy

Answer 21

Conservative who opposed ideas of women’s liberation

STOPERA: prevent equal rights act

Question 22

Gains of women’s liberation

Answer 22

LBJ extends executive order calling for affirmative action to improve conditions
1972 Einstadt v Baird case- contraception available to married and unmarried
1973 abortion federally legalised Roe v Wade

Question 23

Limitations of women’s liberation

Answer 23

LBJs ex order only served for federal employees or businesses working for fed
1970: few states allow abortion
15 states refuse 1972 Equal Rights Act by 1982: needed ratification
US didn’t sign up for 1979 UN policy of non discrimination of women in all walks of life
Found ‘acceptable’ ways to discriminate

Question 24

Disintegration of liberation movt

Answer 24

Conservatives
Working class and non white women felt excluded
National Alliance of Black Women and Congress of Labour Union Women established