In Women's Activism and Social Change, Nancy A. Hewitt challenges the popular belief that the lives of antebellum women focused on their role in the private sphere of the family. Examining intense and well-documented reform movements in nineteenth-century Rochester, New York, Hewitt distinguishes three networks of women's activism: women from the wealthiest Rochester families who sought to ameliorate the lives of the poor; those from upwardly mobile families who, influenced by evangelical revivalism, campaigned to eradicate such social ills as slavery, vice, and intemperance; and those who combined limited economic resources with an agrarian Quaker tradition of communialism and religious democracy to advocate full racial and sexual equality.

A pillar of radical activism in nineteenth-century America, Amy Kirby Post (1802-89) participated in a wide range of movements and labored tirelessly to orchestrate ties between issues, causes, and activists. A conductor on the Underground Railroad, co-organizer of the 1848 Rochester Woman's Rights Convention, and a key figure in progressive Quaker, antislavery, feminist, and spiritualist communities, Post sustained movements locally, regionally, and nationally over many decades. But more than simply telling the story of her role as a local leader or a bridge between local and national arenas of activism, Nancy A. Hewitt argues that Post's radical vision offers a critical perspective on current conceptualizations of social activism in the nineteenth century. While some individual radicals in this period have received contemporary attention-most notably William Lloyd Garrison, Frederick Douglass, and Lucretia Mott (all of whom were friends of Post)-the existence of an extensive network of radical activists bound together across eight decades by ties of family, friendship, and faith has been largely ignored. In this in-depth biography of Post, Hewitt demonstrates a vibrant radical tradition of social justice that sought to transform the nation.

Women in the United States organized around their own sense of a distinct set of needs, skills, and concerns. And just as significant as women's acting on their own behalf was the fact that race, class, sexuality, and ethnicity shaped their strategies and methods. This authoritative anthology presents some of the powerful work and ideas about activism published in the acclaimed series Women, Gender, and Sexuality in American History. Assembled to commemorate the series' thirty-fifth anniversary, the collection looks at two hundred years of labor, activist, legal, political, and community organizing by women against racism, misogyny, white supremacy, and inequality. The authors confront how the multiple identities of an organization's members presented challenging dilemmas and share the histories of how women created change by working against inequitable social and structural systems. Insightful and provocative, Women's Activist Organizing in US History draws on both classic texts and recent bestsellers to reveal the breadth of activism by women in the United States in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Contributors: Daina Ramey Berry, Melinda Chateauvert, Tiffany M. Gill, Nancy A. Hewitt, Treva B. Lindsey, Anne Firor Scott, Charissa J. Threat, Anne M. Valk, Lara Vapnek, and Deborah Gray White

100 Years of Women's Suffrage commemorates the centennial of the Nineteenth Amendment by bringing together essential scholarship on the women's suffrage movement and women's voting previously published by the University of Illinois Press. With an original introduction by Nancy A. Hewitt, the volume illuminates the lives and work of key figures while uncovering the endeavors of all women-across lines of gender, race, class, religion, and ethnicity-to gain, and use, the vote. Beginning with works that focus on cultural and political suffrage battles, the chapters then look past 1920 at how women won, wielded, and continue to fight for access to the ballot. A curation of important scholarship on a pivotal historical moment, 100 Years of Women's Suffrage captures the complex and enduring struggle for fair and equal voting rights. Contributors: Laura L. Behling, Erin Cassese, Mary Chapman, M. Margaret Conway, Carolyn Daniels, Bonnie Thornton Dill, Ellen Carol DuBois, Julie A. Gallagher, Barbara Green, Nancy A. Hewitt, Leonie Huddy, Kimberly Jensen, Mary-Kate Lizotte, Lady Constance Lytton, and Andrea G. Radke-Moss

Committed abolitionist, controversial Quaker minister, tireless pacifist, fiery crusader for women's rights--Lucretia Mott was one of the great reformers in America history. Her sixty years of sermons and speeches reached untold thousands of people. Yet Mott eschewed prepared lectures in favor of an extemporaneous speaking style inspired by the inner light at the core of her Quaker faith. It was left to stenographers, journalists, Friends, and colleagues to record her words for posterity. Drawing on widely scattered archives, newspaper accounts, and other sources, Lucretia Mott Speaks unearths the essential speeches and remarks from Mott's remarkable career. The editors have chosen selections representing important themes and events in her public life. Extensive annotations provide vibrant context and show Mott's engagement with allies and opponents. The speeches illuminate her passionate belief that her many causes were all intertwined. The result is an authoritative resource, one that enriches our understanding of Mott's views, rhetorical strategies, and still-powerful influence on American society.

100 Years of Women's Suffrage commemorates the centennial of the Nineteenth Amendment by bringing together essential scholarship on the women's suffrage movement and women's voting previously published by the University of Illinois Press. With an original introduction by Nancy A. Hewitt, the volume illuminates the lives and work of key figures while uncovering the endeavors of all women-across lines of gender, race, class, religion, and ethnicity-to gain, and use, the vote. Beginning with works that focus on cultural and political suffrage battles, the chapters then look past 1920 at how women won, wielded, and continue to fight for access to the ballot. A curation of important scholarship on a pivotal historical moment, 100 Years of Women's Suffrage captures the complex and enduring struggle for fair and equal voting rights. Contributors: Laura L. Behling, Erin Cassese, Mary Chapman, M. Margaret Conway, Carolyn Daniels, Bonnie Thornton Dill, Ellen Carol DuBois, Julie A. Gallagher, Barbara Green, Nancy A. Hewitt, Leonie Huddy, Kimberly Jensen, Mary-Kate Lizotte, Lady Constance Lytton, and Andrea G. Radke-Moss

Vitally linked to the Caribbean and southern Europe as well as to the Confederacy, the Cigar City of Tampa, Florida, never fit comfortably into the biracial mold of the New South. In Southern Discomfort, highly regarded historian Nancy A. Hewitt explores the interactions among distinct groups of women--native-born white, African American, Cuban and Italian immigrant women--that shaped women's activism in this vibrant, multiethnic city. Southern Discomfort emphasizes the process by which women forged and reformulated their activist identities from Reconstruction through the U.S. declaration of war against Spain in April 1898, the industrywide cigar strike of 1901, and the emergence of progressive reform and labor militancy. This masterful volume also recasts our understanding of southern history by demonstrating how Tampa's triracial networks alternately challenged and reinscribed the South's biracial social and political order.

In this collection, fifteen leading historians of women and American history explore women's political action from 1830 to the present. Together, their contributions illustrate the tremendous scope and racial, ethnic, and class diversity of women's public activism while also clarifying various conceptual issues. Essays include an analysis of ideologies and strategies; suffrage militance in 1870s; ideas for a feminist approach to public life; labor feminism in the urban South; women's activism in Tampa, Florida; black women and economic nationalism; black women's clubs; the YMCA's place in the community; the role of Southern churchwomen in racial reform and transformation; and other topics. "Establishes important links between citizenship, race, and gender following the Reconstruction amendments and the Dawes Act of 1887."--Sharon Hartmann Strom, American Historical Review

Committed abolitionist, controversial Quaker minister, tireless pacifist, fiery crusader for women's rights--Lucretia Mott was one of the great reformers in America history. Her sixty years of sermons and speeches reached untold thousands of people. Yet Mott eschewed prepared lectures in favor of an extemporaneous speaking style inspired by the inner light at the core of her Quaker faith. It was left to stenographers, journalists, Friends, and colleagues to record her words for posterity. Drawing on widely scattered archives, newspaper accounts, and other sources, Lucretia Mott Speaks unearths the essential speeches and remarks from Mott's remarkable career. The editors have chosen selections representing important themes and events in her public life. Extensive annotations provide vibrant context and show Mott's engagement with allies and opponents. The speeches illuminate her passionate belief that her many causes were all intertwined. The result is an authoritative resource, one that enriches our understanding of Mott's views, rhetorical strategies, and still-powerful influence on American society.