Overview
Assesses the combined influence of temperance and suffrage on woman's evolving role in American society. Traces the history of temperance and suffrage to women's involvement in missionary work, moral reform, and abolition between the Revolutionary and Civil Wars. Intensive study of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union, founded in 1874, reveals what many will find to be its surprisingly wide scope of social concerns. The temperance women, often thought of in caricature as priggish, narrow-minded souls who abhorred alcohol, were largely motivated by the desire to eliminate the ill health, poverty, violence against women and children, and broken homes that resulted from its abuse. The Social Movements Past and Present Series offers thorough analyses of the ideas and actions that have changed the way Americans think and live. Each volume is written by a specialist drawing on the insights and methodologies of history, sociology, and political science.
