Of the various reform causes that Addison County women supported in the first half of the nineteenth century, there was one that became almost solely a women’s cause. Though moral reform is little known today, compared to temperance and antislavery, it was the first uniquely women’s movement for social change in America. It arose in alarm over a perceived rise in “licentiousness,” be it prostitution, fornication or adultery. In women’s hands, moral reform became a protest against male sexual aggression gene … (read more)
