User:Tomdo08/workshop/Susan B. Anthony: Abortion dispute

Legacy section
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Purchase of birth house (a)
Anthony's birthplace in Adams was purchased in August 2006 by Carol Crossed, founder of the New York chapter of Democrats for Life of America, affiliated with Feminists for Life (FFL).

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Dispute exists
Anthony's position on abortion (or lack thereof) has been subject to a long running dispute over her views on the issue, the degree of importance with which she regarded the problem, and the relevance of today's issues to those she faced in the 19th century.

Anthony is used
Pro-life organizations such as the Susan B. Anthony List (SBA List) and Feminists for Life (FFL) use Anthony's image and words to promote their causes,

Anthony never said anything
but academic history experts who have reviewed her private letters and published texts say that she mostly worked to win women the vote, that she was reticent to discuss sexual topics, and that her thoughts on abortion laws were never expressed.

Proposed arguments out of context
Some of these academic scholars believe that the words used by pro-life organizations have been taken out of context or incorrectly attributed.

Effect nontheless
However, the pro-life groups have had an effect: because of the recasting of her as vital to the topic, American students today "routinely assume Anthony opposed abortion".

Usage example FFL
left|thumb|Anthony image and quoted text, used by [[Feminists for Life to portray her as "anti-choice"]]

Usage example SBA List
The SBA List, which "seeks to advance pro-life women in politics", writes that Anthony was "an outspoken critic of abortion", and another pro-life feminist group, FFL, makes extensive use of her words and images in their work.

Letter to Frances Willard
A letter that Anthony wrote to Frances Willard in 1889 has been presented by both the SBA List and FFL to indicate her stance on abortion:

Citation
"Sweeter even than to have had the joy of caring for children of my own has it been to me to help bring about a better state of things for mothers generally, so that their unborn little ones could not be willed away from them."

Argument
SBA List President Marjorie Dannenfelser adds that these words "speak for themselves".

Refute
However, in 1998, Mary Krane Derr, FFL's foremost historian, determined the context of Anthony's words to be unrelated to abortion; instead, she was referring to her victory in overturning a law which extended past death a father's absolute control of his children, through the means of his last will, resulting in a baby's fate determined by the father's legal estate if it was born after his death; the "unborn little one" could be "willed away" from its mother.

Pro-suffrage speech
Derr says that Anthony's "comments relating to abortion are few", but describes "Social Purity", an anti-alcohol, anti-prostitution and pro-suffrage speech given repeatedly by Anthony in the 1870s, as one that is "more explicit".

Content of speech
After naming alcohol abuse as a major social evil and estimating that there are 600,000 American men who are drunkards, Anthony describes in her speech how liquor traffic extends "deep and wide into the financial structure of the government" and that it must be fought with "one earnest, energetic, persistent force."

She continues: "The prosecutions on our courts for breach of promise, divorce, adultery, bigamy, seduction, rape; the newspaper reports every day of every year of scandals and outrages, of wife murders and paramour shooting, of abortions and infanticides, are perpetual reminders of men's incapacity to cope successfully with this monster evil of society."

Anthony and Abolishment of prostitution
Historian and journalist Marvin Olasky writes that the social purity movement began in the late 1860s with British feminist Josephine Butler working to improve the welfare of prostitutes; the American feminist version of the movement intended to abolish prostitution, and Anthony sided with this cause in 1872.

Anthony and Linkage of drunkenness with sexual abuse
Estelle B. Freedman, Professor of History and a founder of the Program in Feminist Studies at Stanford University, writes that Anthony's "Social Purity" speech "linked drunkenness to the sexual abuse of women" and that women's occupational and wage discrimination, leading desperately poor women to prostitution, was described by her as depending "on the denial of equal suffrage".

Essay in The Revolution
Pro-lifers cite an 1869 essay published in The Revolution called "Marriage and Maternity" which says,

Citation
"Guilty? Yes, no matter what the motive, love of ease, or a desire to save from suffering the unborn innocent, the woman is awfully guilty who commits the deed. It will burden her conscience in life, it will burden her soul in death; but oh! thrice guilty is he who, for selfish gratification, heedless of her prayers, indifferent to her fate, drove her to the desperation which impelled her to the crime."

Signatur
The piece was signed simply "A."

Refute 1
Anthony researchers and authors Ann D. Gordon and Lynn Sherr dispute that Anthony wrote the piece, saying, "Although no data exist that Anthony wrote it, or ever used that shorthand for herself, she is imagined to be its author."

Argument 1a
But FFL notes that she was known to sign "S.B.A."

Argument 1b
and was affectionately referred to as "Miss A." by others.

Refute 2
Gordon, referring to the article's many scriptural quotes and appeals to God, says its style does not fit with Anthony's "known beliefs".

Anti-argument
Columnist Stacy Schiff notes that the essay "argues against an anti-abortion law ... [the] author did not believe legislation would resolve the issue of unwanted pregnancy."

Outrage
Allison Stevens of "Women's eNews" wrote that pro-choice activists are outraged that the memory of Anthony "is being appropriated by a community led by the very people Anthony battled during her lifetime: social conservatives."

Wish to reclaim
Nora Bredes, the director of the Susan B. Anthony Center for Women's Leadership at the University of Rochester in New York and a Democratic politician who supports abortion rights, said in 2006 that she wished to "reclaim Anthony's legacy".

Purchase of birth house (b)
In 2006, Carol Crossed, a pro-life feminist and advisory board member of the SBA List, purchased the property where Anthony was born.

Transformation into Museum
Crossed transformed the house into the Susan B. Anthony Birthplace Museum,

Exhibition on anti-Restellism
which includes an exhibit on anti-Restellism, a popular 19th-century term used to describe abortion in reference to Madame Restell.

Newspaper pro-life views present, but not overwhelming
When asked by a local newspaper if the museum would become a platform for a pro-life agenda, Crossed said, "The pro-life views expressed in Anthony's newspaper, The Revolution, will not be excluded from the exhibition. This vision represented a very small part of Anthony's life, and while it will be presented, it will not be an overwhelming theme of the birthplace. ...

Anthony's stance mentioned in 1 of 10 exhibits
... Anthony's own anti-abortion stance is mentioned in just one of the museum's 10 exhibits."

Newspaper: 122 references against abortion
Crossed notes that there are 122 references in opposition to abortion in ''The Revolution.