ABSTRACT
Moral reformers in New York and Boston prosecuted campaigns for laws against male sexual crimes with differing levels of enthusiasm, and they achieved different results. Whereas the New Yorkers committed themselves to a long-term struggle, those in Boston withdrew from the fray after a fairly brief effort. Both approaches underscore for us the challenges female reformers confronted in what was a novel field—agitating for social legislation for the protection of women. Present-day readers are apt to dismiss the campaigns as a naive attempt to legislate morality, or a misguided one from the standpoint of the woman’s rights movement, and those historians who have investigated the campaigns emphasize the ineffectiveness of the laws that were passed. While acknowledging these problems, this chapter seeks to give credibility to the drive for moral reform legislation by placing it in the context of certain cultural, legal, and political trends of the 1840s. Our interest throughout remains in the petition campaigns as a logical, if problematic, development of the moral reform crusade and its swan song, and as a gauge of moral reformers’ success at tapping wider support for their cause. To better comprehend the significance of their achievement, we also explore the legal background and trace the political process that yielded the legislation these women sought.
