Gender and Inequality: Old Answers, New Questions
1840th Stated Meeting - Cambridge
Linda Kerber (University of Iowa) and Robert Post (Law School, University of
California, Berkeley)
December 6, 2000
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Linda Kerber
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"Do not put such unlimited power into the hands of Husbands,"
Abigail Adams pleaded in 1776. The wife of founding father—and Academy
cofounder—John Adams warned that "all Men would be tyrants if they could."
However, according to award-winning historian Linda Kerber, the founding
fathers chose instead to retain the old laws governing domestic relations,
thereby codifying gender inequality and helping to shape male-female relations
for the next two hundred years. Only in the past generation have
feminist-influenced modifications to the legal system helped spur radical
changes in gender relations.
In her talk at the Academy's 1840th Stated Meeting Professor Kerber
argued that American law will continue to play a central role in male-female
relations in the future, on such issues as domestic violence, childcare and the
structure of work, the feminization of poverty, and international human rights.
The University of Iowa historian drew on her pathbreaking research
in constitutional and legal history to show that choices we make in American
law strongly influence gender relations. In her talk she took a fresh look at
some old questions about gender inequality: What's fair? What counts as equal
treatment of men and women? Answers to these questions have changed radically
within a single generation. A half-century ago, none of the following were
considered unfair: excusing all or virtually all women from jury service;
excluding women from many forms of work, education, and training; assigning
only to men the authority to exercise violence in the name of the state.
Professor Kerber is a past president of the Organization of American Historians
and of the American Studies Association. Her address was part of a series of
Stated Meetings looking at inequality in America today.
Read the transcript in the Bulletin.
For more information please contact Suzanne
Morse at (617) 576-5047.
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