In the social contract proposed by De Gouges, human relationships between males and females become 'in kind' or communal. "Liberty consists in the freedom to do everything which injures no one else; hence the exercise of the natural rights of each man has no limits except those which assure to the other members of the society the enjoyment of the same rights" -- a quasi-socialist idea of the perfectibility of human society because of the perfectibility of the individual is suggested in these words from the "Declaration of the Rights of Man" and its assertion of a communal good, but De Gouges takes this even farther. She writes: "We intend and wish to make our wealth communal, meanwhile reserving to ourselves the right to divide it in favor of our children and of those toward whom we might have a particular inclination, mutually recognizing that our property belongs directly to our children, from whatever bed they come, and that all of them without distinction have the right to bear the name of the fathers and mothers who have acknowledged them, and we are charged to subscribe to the law which punishes the renunciation of one's own blood." In contrast, the "Declaration of the Rights of Man" affirmed the right to individually owned property.
Finally, the renunciation of one's own blood, namely the inferiority of non-legitimate children is condemned by De Gouges. This seems to be keeping with the ideas of the first declaration -- after all, if distinctions of birth and rank in regard to social position and occupation are inherently unfair, why should a child be limited because of the mistakes of his or her parents, if transgressing the bounds of religious doctrine are considered mistakes at all? "Law can only prohibit such actions as are hurtful to society," say the declaration of 1789. But as in all matters, the "Declaration of the Rights of Women" emerges as the more radical text, even though it takes the ideal of the perfectibility of humankind to a more extreme utopian...
She does not deny the need for law, although her system of law has aims of societal engineering, rather than merely protecting rights, as articulated in the first declaration. Despite her cynicism about the current relationship between the genders, even in her tract one can see the enlightenment optimism that rejected the ideas that human nature is flawed by original sin, a faith-based doctrine. If only humanity throws away its erroneous attitudes about bastardy and the inequality of women, then humanity is perfectible, just as the "Declaration of the Rights of Man" suggested that humanity's supposed tendency towards evil and error was rooted in constraint, rather than a lack of constraint. By eliminating bad laws, humanity's innate democratic goodness would emerge.
While thinkers of the French Revolution dreamed of a society based upon the infinite perfectibility of individuals, eventually this dream fell into disrepute after corruption marred the French Revolution, and the revolution, begun in idealism, grew more and more savage. History and common experience may seem to tend to support the lack of perfection in humanity -- yet, given the history of France before the revolution, one might add that behaving as if human beings were perfect, and allowing free choice through democracy, although in some sense a philosophical and political fiction, is superior to a society which assumes the worst, and limits all but the freedom of a few.
Works Cited
De Gouges. "The Declaration of the Rights of Women." 1791. The Internet Modern
History Sourcebook. [24 Nov 2006] http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1791degouge1.html
The Declaration of the Rights of Man." 1789. The Avalon Project. [24 Nov 2006] http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/rightsof.htm
