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50 Years Transform Women’s Lives

By Gail Collins, WeNews correspondent
Tuesday, December 1, 2009

(WOMENSENEWS)--In 1960, when our story begins, although computers were still pretty much the stuff of science fiction, almost all the other things that make modern life feel modern—jet travel, television, nuclear terror—had arrived. But when it came to women, the age-old convictions were still intact.

Everything from America’s legal system to its television programs reinforced the perception that women were, in almost every way, the weaker sex. They were not meant to compete with men, to act independently of men, to earn their own bread or to have adventures on their own.
While circumstances varied by state, many American women lived under laws that gave their husbands control of not only their property, but also their earnings. They could not go into business without their husbands’ permission or get credit without male cosigners.

Women were barred from serving on juries in some states. The rest made it either very difficult for women to serve or very easy for them to avoid serving. (No one questioned why a movie about a troubled jury was called “Twelve Angry Men.”) Supreme Court Chief Justice Earl Warren was advised, in a memo from his clerk, that permitting women to serve “may encourage lax performance of their domestic duties.”

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