Women, Race & Class

Nonfiction | Book | Adult | Published in 1981

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Summary

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Chapters 1-3

Chapters 4-6

Chapters 7-10

Chapters 11-13

Key Figures

Themes

Index of Terms

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Chapters 4-6Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Chapter 4 Summary: “Racism in the Woman Suffrage Movement”

Davis expands on a key shortcoming of the growing suffrage movement: racism and its powerful hold on even the movement’s most progressive leaders. Davis identifies this rising influence of racism during and immediately after the Civil War period. She cites a letter written by Elizabeth Cady Stanton from December 1865 expressing several racist ideas and arguments; in particular, it illuminates her concern that Black men will progress further than white women and her corresponding unwillingness to support Black men’s enfranchisement if women could not get the same. Stanton and others (like Susan B. Anthony) opposed Black suffrage based on the belief that emancipation had made Black men equal to white women and that suffrage for Black men would therefore put them a step above white women. As Davis writes, this assumption “ignored the utter precariousness of Black people’s newly won ‘freedom’ during the post-Civil war era” because in reality (77), Black people had to deal with violent mobs and continuing economic oppression.

Stanton and others saw the Republican Party’s failure to extend women suffrage as choosing to uphold male supremacy and extend it to Black men. Davis argues that Stanton and her supporters misunderstood the underlying intentions of the Republican Party from the outset and were consequently vulnerable to falling into the trap of racism. To Davis, the capitalists of the North did not actually care about the liberation of Black people or women from a moral standpoint, but rather only cared about their economic interests. Davis argues that these politicians only supported emancipation and suffrage for Black men because their votes would ensure the Republican Party’s political power over the South.

Racist attitudes were also present during the establishment of the Equal Rights Association (ERA) in 1866. For example, abolitionist Henry Ward Beecher claimed that educated white women had more right to suffrage than Black men or immigrants did. The issue of Black suffrage remained a contentious point at the ERA’s conventions. Stanton and Anthony were unwilling to support the 14th Amendment (which focused on only male citizens) and the 15th Amendment (which granted Black male suffrage) because white women were not being given the right to vote at the same time. Davis argues that in their opposition, these women’s rights leaders revealed the “superficial nature of their relationship to the postwar campaign for Black equality” (76). On the other hand, Frederick Douglass and his supporters, who understood that the abolition of slavery did not eliminate economic oppression and violence, argued that there was an immediate need for Black people to obtain political power given the daily threats to their lives and their emancipated status. Douglass believed the danger to Black lives required Black suffrage to temporarily take priority over women’s suffrage, but he simultaneously committed to fighting for women’s suffrage too; he even described the 15th Amendment as only fulfilling half of the movement’s demands without women’s suffrage. Davis finds Douglass’s argument persuasive given that white women could not claim a physical threat to their lives in the same way. She further criticizes women’s suffrage leaders for seeking support from white supremacist Democratic leaders in the South, who supported women’s suffrage as a means of counteracting Black male suffrage.

This open conflict between members led to Stanton and Anthony calling to dissolve the ERA; eventually they started the National Woman Suffrage Association (NWSA). Davis calls the dissolution of the ERA another failure of unity between the Black liberation and women’s liberation movements. Davis recognizes, “[i]n all fairness to” leaders like Stanton and Anthony, that the men (Black and white) in the ERA were not above the influence of male supremacy and sexism (84). However, Davis believes this sexism from Black men, which was inexcusable itself, did not justify the racism in response.

Chapter 5 Summary: “The Meaning of Emancipation According to Black Women”

Davis explores Black women’s realities post-emancipation. She details continuing oppressive conditions for Black women, most of whom worked in the fields or homes of white families. Black women who worked in agriculture experienced grueling conditions like their male counterparts. The convict lease system also allowed Black people who had been arrested to be leased out as unpaid laborers, ultimately serving the same role they did during slavery and in equally oppressive conditions. Citing W. E. B. DuBois, Davis argues that the “profit potential” of the system also resulted in “both employers and state authorities acquir[ing] a compelling economic interest in increasing the prison population” (89).

Most Black women who did not work in the fields were domestic servants—a line of work that white women in the South rejected and was generally done by immigrant women in the North. Black women would largely remain in this occupation for the next century and would sometimes would experience work conditions akin to slavery. For instance, Davis shares that immediately prior to World War II, 59.5% of Black women who were employed worked in domestic service and 10.4% in non-domestic service occupations. Sexual abuse against Black women also continued as part of domestic service jobs. Black women were often forced to submit to sexual abuse or face the risk of losing employment and impoverishing their families (91). This was a catch-22 situation: The degrading nature of the work fed myths regarding Black women as immoral or promiscuous, and the work was deemed degrading because it was primarily done by Black women considered immoral and promiscuous. Even in the North, Black people experienced similar racist assumptions, including that they necessarily were servants, or conversely that servants can only be Black; Davis cites a woman who said she hired Black people “because they look more like servants” (94). Davis labels this idea of Black people as servants “one of the essential props of racist ideology” (94). During World War II, Black women finally could start moving outside of domestic service due to the economy’s reliance on female labor.

Davis also discusses the connection between racism and sexism, arguing that racist ideology also affected white women workers, whose wages reflected the same standards used to set wages for Black women. Davis asserts that working-class white women, who were often immigrants, were consequently closer to Black women in their “wage-earning potential” than to white men. She concludes by noting the exploitative nature of domestic work, which has been exacerbated both by its difficulty to unionize and by the role of middle-class housewives (including feminists) in oppressing domestic workers.

Chapter 6 Summary: “Education and Liberation: Black Women’s Perspective”

Following emancipation, Black people identified three primary priorities: land, political power, and education. Education was the top priority due to a “profound craving” and “furious impatience” for knowledge common among Black people even during slavery (101). For example, in 1787, Black people petitioned Massachusetts to allow them to attend Boston schools. Since racist ideology viewed Black people as mere chattel, they were thought to be “incapable of intellectual advancement” (101). Davis points out the “topsy-turvy” logic of racism, noting that if Black people were truly incapable of intellectual advancement, no prohibition against learning would be needed: “[T]hey would have manifested neither the desire nor the capability to acquire knowledge” (101). Yet Southern states had strict prohibitions against educating enslaved people out of fear that it would encourage resistance or revolt. Nevertheless, many enslaved women risked punishment to learn in secret and share that knowledge with others, reducing illiteracy among enslaved people. To Black people, education was a crucial part of the struggle for freedom, as it also ensured their ability to fight for land and political power.

Davis praises examples of solidarity from white women regarding the issue of education for Black people. Women such as Prudence Crandall and Myrtilla Miner risked their lives trying to help educate Black people. Miner, for instance, gained the admiration of Frederick Douglass for running a Washington, DC, college for Black women teachers despite threats that included arson. Davis explains that such examples demonstrate that solidarity between white and Black women “could give birth to earthshaking accomplishments” (104). Davis also brings attention to the solidarity between Black and white women teachers and considers this alliance a peak point in women’s struggle for education in US history.

Education was a marker of progress during the Radical Reconstruction era. Black colleges and universities opened in the South, and the foundations for the first public school system, which would benefit students of all races, were laid. Although the subsequent era of Jim Crow severely reduced Black people’s opportunities for educational advancement, the desire for knowledge did not wane.

Chapters 4-6 Analysis

Chapters 4 through 6 focus on the Civil War through the Reconstruction era. In these chapters, Davis really begins to get to the crux of her analysis. She follows a general pattern in these chapters that accomplishes several goals and underscores multiple themes:

Extensively critiquing of the suffrage movement or its leaders (as in Chapter 4), reflecting the theme of shortcomings on the part of white middle-class women with respect to race and class considerations
Spotlighting the lives of Black people and/or working-class people, particularly women, and their contributions to various struggles for freedom (as in Chapter 5 and, partially, Chapter 6), explaining the need for an intersectional analysis
Providing examples of solidarity among Black and white historical figures (as in Chapter 6), demonstrating the potential power of unity across differences

Throughout this analysis, Davis incorporates reflections on the insidious power of racism and identifies capitalism as an emerging and growing source of social inequality.

First, with her analysis of racism within the suffrage movement, she offers a different perspective on historical events and figures to set the foundation for a recurring theme: that white middle-class women like Stanton and Anthony failed to consider how race and class created unique circumstances of oppression for Black and working-class women beyond the shared oppression of male supremacy. Davis’s analysis considers the positions of historical figures within their historical context. While she understands and gives credit to Anthony and Stanton for their significant contributions to women’s rights, she is consistent in her criticism of their inability to understand the struggles of both Black women and working-class women and their failure to embrace a potential solidarity. She understands the scale of sexism they were facing at the time, even within the Equal Rights Association, but does not find this reason enough to justify their use of racism in their arguments or their inability to understand the “precariousness of Black people’s newly won ‘freedom’ during the post-Civil War era” (77). In reading Davis’s overview of the factions within the ERA, Davis hopes readers may imagine what the ERA could have achieved had it been united.

Additionally, since the Stanton and Anthony and Douglass factions were divided based on their prioritization of sex and race, respectively, Davis begins to sketch out the impossible position Black women were placed in. The split demanded that they choose one over the other even though their needs required an intersectional strategy of addressing both. Davis’s analysis reveals that suffragists essentially viewed the battle for suffrage as a zero-sum game, erroneously assuming that choosing to prioritize Black male suffrage would mean dismissing women’s suffrage or giving Black men political superiority. Though Davis does not say so explicitly, the logic of capitalist competition was likely at play here as well, framing one person’s gain as (necessarily) another person’s loss.

Davis also makes a point of observing that figures like Stanton and Anthony weren’t representative of common thinking among white women of the time; rather, they were known to be radical and progressive women. The fact that even they were susceptible to racism highlights its pervasiveness. Davis underscores her argument by bringing attention to Anthony and Stanton’s willingness to align themselves with white supremacist Democratic leaders in the South. By pointing this out, she expands on the scale of these leaders’ failure to empathize with Black people. Davis’s analysis of racist attitudes in the North, which viewed Black people as servants and servants as Black people, is closely related. This analysis reveals a historical reality that is often overlooked: Northerners—even abolitionists— were not immune to white supremacist ideology. Underscoring racism’s prevalence reminds readers of the role racism played in the daily lives of Black people even post-Civil War.

Second, Davis dedicates parts of her book to doing what she argues suffrage leaders failed to—that is, give voice to the Black women and working-class women whose immense contributions have been excluded from the historical narrative. These sections expand on the theme of the special circumstances or needs of these groups of women, who would have benefitted from a multi-factor, intersectional approach to liberation. For example, Chapter 5 focuses extensively on Black women’s lives during the post-emancipation era, detailing their continued oppression as domestic servants and connecting their economic exploitation to that of white working-class women.

Lastly, Davis underlines the theme of the importance and power of solidarity with specific examples. She does this especially in Chapter 6, describing the sisterhood between white women and Black women in their efforts to obtain education for Black people. Without explicitly calling for unity, Davis repeatedly references examples of potential or actual solidarity or other unifying factors among different classes or races. For example, she points out that white women workers were closer in wage potential to their Black sisters than to white men. By doing so, she emphasizes the potential power of solidarity between different oppressed groups.

Davis’s rhetorical strategy in these chapters also involves juxtaposition, which she uses to illuminate themes. At times, she juxtaposes the subject matters of entire chapters, such as the suffrage leaders and their racism in Chapter 4 with the white women of Chapter 6, who risked their lives helping Black people access education. Davis’s repeated references and reminders of Douglass’s commitment to women’s rights also contrast with Stanton and Anthony’s lack thereof to Black liberation. Anytime Davis criticizes suffragists, she then also talks about Black women’s efforts to help themselves, further bringing attention to what could have been done had they all been united.

Davis’s word choice is also illuminating and serves to emphasize her arguments. For example, with respect to the struggle for education, she describes the desire for knowledge among Black people as one of “furious impatience” or “profound craving” (101). In Chapter 6, she uses the word “earthshaking” to describe the scale of accomplishments that solidarity could produce. Davis similarly reveals her attitude through tone. We see Davis’s exasperation as she points out the absurd logic of racist ideology that claimed Black people were unable to advance intellectually yet also prohibited them from trying. Other stylistic choices that serve to convey key points include the quotation marks Davis puts around the words “free,” “freedom,” or “emancipation.” By doing so, she implies that even after emancipation, formerly enslaved people were not truly free. She hammers this point home when she concludes Chapter 5 by describing the “signs of freedom” as “vague” and so “distant” that they were almost impossible to see.