Feminism and Marriage: Has the Movement Harmed the Institution?

Introduction

Notwithstanding viewpoints to the contrary, the feminist movement — past and present — has not ruined the institution of marriage in America. Indeed, some feminists have challenged marriage as a valid tradition, and those challenges should be viewed as healthy contributions to an ongoing dialogue. This paper delves into that topic and presents a variety of scholarly narratives in order to provide perspective and clarity.

Tocqueville and Lockean Views on the Liberation of Women

When examining the Lockean view of women, an initial question arises: are the basic foundations of liberalism "fundamentally flawed" (Wolfson, 1996, p. 203) due to the fact that the Lockean social contract fails to include women? According to Jean Bethke Elshtain, John Locke's liberalism is "parasitic upon surviving patriarchal forms" because when he created his thesis on property rights, the female population was "propertyless" — and hence, Elshtain justifiably wonders how women could emerge simply by a grant of "formal rights" (Wolfson, 203).

Other feminist writers, including Zillah Eisenstein and Susan Moller Okin, allude to Locke's failure to include women in his liberalism. Eisenstein refers to Locke's "patriarchal capitalism," and Okin argues that because women were "saddled" with domestic roles that prevented them the opportunity of enjoying "full equality of opportunity in the public realm," they have essentially been left out of Lockean doctrine (Wolfson, 203).

Of course there are always contrary arguments when an influential historical figure presents assertions that do not align perfectly with modern thinking, and there are also rebuttals to those arguments as a natural response from intellectuals and scholars. Wolfson takes issue with the assertions that Okin, Eisenstein, and others offer, suggesting that since women are holding public office, becoming leaders in the workplace, and serving in the military — Wolfson's article was published well before the Pentagon authorized women to step into combat roles — the "fruition of Lockean principles" is evident to all who examine the contemporary realities for women.

As for Tocqueville, Wolfson explains that he does not reject the domestic roles that women play but rather "encourages" them, and he "praises American women for resisting democratic equality" (204). In his writings, Tocqueville defends the more traditional gender roles, which relegate American women to "the domestic sphere, where she willingly and proudly serves her husband," along with giving up desires for personal achievement in order to assure the "well-being of her children" (Wolfson, 204). By taking these positions on the female role in the family, Tocqueville receives sharp criticism from Elshtain, who complains that he has "glossed over" the lopsided relationship between men and women when it comes to women's "political and social inferiority to men" (Wolfson, 204).

Delba Winthrop argues that Tocqueville is open to criticism because he is "silent about natural differences" between males and females: "Why does Tocqueville not mention the most obvious and relevant natural difference: namely that women bear children?" (Wolfson, 204). To that analysis, Wolfson retorts that while Tocqueville is indeed a bit "sketchy" on natural differences, he does believe that a woman's maternal instinct "motivates," in meaningful ways, women's sacrifices — which can be seen as justification for their "domestic subordination" (Wolfson, 204).

That said, Tocqueville clearly does not give a pass to the male gender in America, and in the process supports feminism to a degree. The American husband is typically "unfeeling and selfish" as he "sets coldly about" to pursue his "fortune" with not the slightest interest in romance, Wolfson writes, quoting Tocqueville (204). Using "cold" energy, the American husband would never "entrust his life or his future to the whims of chance" — and most certainly he would not entrust his being to "the fate of a woman" (Wolfson, 205). A woman marries into what Tocqueville refers to as the "husband's vast egotism," and as a result the wife ends up giving a great deal while receiving very little (Tocqueville, via Wolfson, 205). And yet, given the challenges that an egotistic, unfeeling husband presents, the wife nonetheless "displays a profound peace" reflected in her "natural, quiet determination" (Wolfson, 205).

In Jerome Huyler's book Locke in America, the author discusses the benefits that the American Revolution brought to society. Huyler acknowledges that slaves and Native Americans were "systematically denied the liberty, property and opportunity" that white settlers enjoyed (Huyler, 1995, 207). He adds that even if "women generally were chained to traditional patriarchal patterns," most of humanity enjoyed a freer form of existence (207–208). Huyler quotes from Gordon S. Wood's The Radicalism of the American Revolution, in which Wood suggests that scholars should not dwell on what the Revolution failed to do — including its failure to "abolish slavery and change fundamentally the lot of women" — but rather should emphasize that the Revolution "made possible the anti-slavery and women's rights movements of the nineteenth century" (208). Moreover, Huyler adds — "in capturing the spirit of Locke" — that Thomas Jefferson understood the serious flaws in early American government but believed (quoting Jefferson) that "if man [or government] is not yet perfect, he [it] is at least perfectible" because there are "natural laws in ethics" (208).

Those "natural laws in ethics" Jefferson alluded to did not make room for equality for the female gender in Puritan society, as author David Hall explains in Puritans in the New World: "wives were to defer to their husbands. Wives could inherit property from their husbands or parents but were excluded from participating in civil and church government" (Hall, 2004, 163).

It apparently seemed correct to Locke — in solidarity with Puritan values — that one member of a marital union should be dominant and the other compliant. In M. Seliger's The Liberal Politics of John Locke, Seliger recounts that Locke believed a "conjugal society is 'made by a voluntary compact' yet is at once natural and artificial" (Seliger, 1968, 221). Furthermore, Locke saw that while this voluntary association was initially "one of equals," the "necessity of placing the last determination in the hands of one of the contracting parties" meant that "subordination becomes an inescapable concomitant of the voluntary union" (Seliger, 221).

Men, Locke went on, answer the call to be dominant "in accord with God's will"; men have a choice when it comes to selecting a partner, but men do not have the freedom "to dispense with the institution or with the dominion appropriate to it" (Seliger, 222). In other words, Locke is asserting that God has chosen men to dominate women in conjugal arrangements — a rather extraordinary assertion, notwithstanding the age and era in which it was issued and the lack of scriptural evidence in its support.

Women's Changing Roles and Expectations

In Nancy McWilliams' essay "The Worst of Both Worlds: Dilemmas of Contemporary Young Women," she touches on the dynamics of decisions young women made in the past and what they must decide in the current era as they approach marrying age. Prior to the modern era, a girl could decide to become a wife and parent — "and manage the domestic sphere the way her mother did" — or she could become more independent and fill the role of a "spinster" (McWilliams, 1992, 28). When the birth control pill arrived, women who came of age in the 1960s experienced "a rebellion against prior constraints, and a shared sense of mission to raise the consciousness of the rest of the culture about women's appropriate rights, underestimated strengths," along with a more realistic understanding of women's value to the greater society (McWilliams, 28).

That said, the economic realities facing women today temper some of the ebullience experienced following the sexual revolution launched in part by "the pill." McWilliams explains that "the economic exigencies" of today's society force young women to contend with all the "identity-related stresses that young men have faced for generations"; women realize they have very little "compensatory relief from the demands of their former roles as domestic specialists" (29). Meanwhile, unlike a man, a woman faces a key decision regarding her "biological clock": if she would like to have a child, she has a limited time frame in which to do so. She must therefore either enter a career first — to achieve financial independence in case a relationship fails — or decide to have a baby and pursue a career later (McWilliams, 29).

McWilliams also notes that young women are "acutely aware of the divorce rate" and understand they would "likely" be left in a single-mother parenting situation with "lesser access to financial resources" if their marriage fails — as such a high percentage of marriages do (29). Summing up the essential dilemma for today's woman — who must navigate both workplace inequality and reproductive timing — McWilliams offers this succinct observation: "They have the worst of both worlds: the burdens of limitations and the hazards of opportunity" (30).

Conclusion

In her book The Aftermath of Feminism: Gender, Culture, and Social Change, McRobbie explains that along with the "anti-feminist discourse" coming from the "resurgent new right" — beginning with "second wave feminism" — there are responses from "recanting feminists" like Germaine Greer and Betty Friedan (McRobbie, 2009, 31). McRobbie is saying that Friedan, Greer, and even Jean Bethke Elshtain are acknowledging "we got it wrong" — that feminism at its beginning was "too anti-men, too pro-lesbian, and far too anti-family" (McRobbie, 31). Now these feminists have moderated their positions, McRobbie asserts, and are advocating "pro-family values." Feminist positions of the past "alienated ordinary women," but today the feminist position should be that women need to be self-sustaining, enjoy their families, their children, and motherhood (McRobbie, 31).

What this paper ultimately demonstrates is that: a) feminism has not ruined marriage, nor does it seek to; and b) there is more than one form of feminism, and generalized narratives about what women want and what they should do — with respect to both independence and marriage — require clarification and objectivity.