Women and family

Revolutionary War experiences affected the quality of life for women and the bonds of family relationships. While substantive reforms in the legal status of women would be slow in coming, continuing well into the twentieth century, the Revolutionary War years bred a questioning disposition and assertiveness among women that would serve them well in the future. The process for wider participation in community life, definitely in evidence by the mid-eighteenth century, accelerated. Ideas of equality and the desire for inculcation of republican virtue into the American character aided in loosening the restraints on women's roles and diminishing patriarchal authoritarianism in family life. But the war also had a negative impact. The recognition of women as the prime nurturers of virtue within the family contributed to the definition of women's sphere as more firmly lodged in the household. As Sylvia R. Frey and Marian J. Morton have noted, there was not much challenge in seeking to liberate women from the household, only what they did there, in “contributing to republican stability by rearing virtuous citizens.” ¹