Barbara--

I don't think anyone here is suggesting that the legal doctrine of coverture was in any way favorable to women, or that it functioned to enhance or promote the freedom of women.  I think pretty much everyone in the conversation can agree that it was debilitating and debasing, and that it enforced a profound dependency for married women.  This certainly represents the consensus view of modern historians.  I do not know any contemporary historians who would want to suggest that the legal and social status of married women--or of early American women more generally--was desirable, or favorable, or empowering.  

The issue I have been disputing is narrower.  I have been arguing that American people in the 17th and 18th century did not understand women, either legally or socially, as the property of men.  Patriarchy was, and is, an illiberal institution (or more properly, set of institutions) that we all rightfully can condemn.  But if we understand it as slavery, we are mischaracterizing and misunderstanding it.  It seems to me that getting the function of illiberal institutions right is important, if we wish to oppose their operation in the present.  (I am using "liberal" here in its classical sense, as concerning the promotion of a society in which the capacity of the individual to define the ends of his or her life is maximally empowered.)

I would hope that we can conduct our conversation here within the context of this larger agreement.  I don't see the need to argue that coverture was illiberal, because I take that to be a given--something on which we all can agree. 

All best,
Kevin
___________________________
Kevin R. Hardwick
Associate Professor
Department of History, MSC 8001
James Madison University
Harrisonburg, Virginia 22807
______________________________________
To subscribe, change options, or unsubscribe please see the instructions at
http://listlva.lib.va.us/archives/va-hist.html