Political Activism
Harriet Taylor’s daughter Helen had enjoyed a brief period of independence from her family, pursuing a career as an actress. After her mother’s death, however, she devoted herself to her stepfather, who depended on her for both personal assistance and political advice.
In conjunction with other prominent figures like Harriet Martineau and Barbara Bodichon in England, and in close communication with feminists in both the United States and France, they campaigned for new political rights and expanded economic opportunities for women.Mill had never been fond of Harriet Martineau and had little regard for her grasp of political economy. Martineau was, however, a shrewd ally in the effort to budge public opinion. A famously self-supporting spinster herself, she emphasized that ‘‘the footing of women’’ was changing as a result of declining marriage rates. She published an article in the Edinburgh Review using data from the British census of 1851 to call attention to the impact of male outmigration on the English sex ratio.31 The article helped jolt the middle class into greater awareness of the problem of “redundant” women. Those unable to find respectable work outside the home were likely to become a burden on their fathers and brothers.32
The more radical Barbara Bodichon questioned the assumption that married women should ideally devote themselves exclusively to family life. ‘‘There are thousands of married women,” she wrote, ‘‘who are in want of a pursuit—a profession. It is a mistake to suppose marriage gives occupation enough to employ all the faculties of all women.’’33 Her arguments eerily anticipated those the U.S. feminist Betty Friedan would make a hundred years later in The Feminine Mystique (see discussion in Chapter 20).
Political progress was slow and uneven, but discernible. In 1857, Parliament approved a bill making it possible (though not easy) to sue for official separation or divorce in a secular, rather than an ecclesiastical court.
It also gave married women some control over their property in the event of desertion or divorce. In the same year, the first Married Women’s Property Bill was introduced into Parliament, and roundly defeated.34 In 1865, Mill agreed to run for election to Parliament—on the condition that he would not canvass, spend any money, or compromise his political views. He gained support from those hoping to extend the male franchise as well as from women’s groups and was, somewhat to his surprise, elected.Strategic considerations dictated a proposal to extend the suffrage only to women of property. Barbara Bodichon spearheaded an effort to gather the signatures of nearly 1,500 women (including Martineau’s) on a formal petition. On the appointed day, June 7 1866, the women came to Westminster carrying a large scroll. Hoping to keep it a surprise, they asked a woman selling apples near the entrance to conceal it under her cart. She kindly agreed, and upon learning of its intent, pulled it out and added her own name. It seemed an auspicious omen and Mill collected the scroll, exclaiming ‘‘This I can brandish to good effect.’’35 The effect, if good, was small. Still, it laid the groundwork for Mill’s most famous speech in Parliament proposing an amendment to the Reform Bill of 1867. He asked that the word ‘‘person’’ be substituted for the word ‘‘man’’ at every place in the bill.
In making his case, Mill reiterated the criticisms William Thompson and Anna Wheeler had leveled against his father James Mill over thirty years before, directing them with blistering irony at those who claimed support for the interests of the working class:
The interests of all women are safe in the hands of their fathers, husbands, and brothers, who have the same interest with them, and not only know, far better than they do, what is good for them, but care much more for them than they care for themselves. Sir, this is exactly what is said of all unrepresented classes.
The operatives, for instance; are they not virtually represented by the representation of their employers? Are not the interests of the employers and that of the employed, when properly understood, the same?... And, generally speaking, have not employers and employed a common interest against all outside the family? And what is more, are not all employers good, kind, benevolent men, who love their workpeople, and always desire to do what is most for their good? All these assertions are as true, and as much to the purpose, as the corresponding assertions respecting men and women.36In order to make his meaning absolutely clear, Mill went on to describe the horrors of domestic violence against women. He did not win the franchise battle, but his arguments built support for the married women's property acts, approved in 1870 and considerably extended in 1882. By that time, Mill had lost his seat in Parliament, not only because his views on women’s rights were controversial, but also because he had contributed to the campaign of another politician who was a public atheist and advocate of birth control.
Mill also risked his political reputation to publicly oppose a new initiative to regulate prostitution. In 1869, the English government, increasingly concerned about the spread of venereal disease, passed legislation modeled on that in effect in France. The Contagious Diseases Acts empowered local authorities to force any women suspected of prostitution to submit to periodic medical examination. The authorities underestimated the opposition that such explicit, yet one-sided regulation would elicit. Many women were outraged by their own vulnerability to accusation and medical examination without due process. That men remained utterly exempt from public scrutiny made it difficult to justify the policy as one intended only to preserve public health. Mill denounced the sexual double standard, arguing that men should also be examined for venereal disease and held legally responsible if they infected an innocent woman.
Other critics emphasized that state regulation of prostitution implied social approval of it. Harriet Martineau welled with moral fury. When one supporter of the Acts opined that prostitution was a necessity, she asked him if he was unaware that fornication was denounced in the Holy Scriptures.37 No one dared bring forward Bernard Mandeville’s ancient brief. Invoking the value of the home as the ‘‘nursery of all virtue’’, a stalwart middle-class woman named Josephine Butler provided formidable leadership for an international movement against state regulation of the health of prostitutes.38 In 1883, English advocates for such regulation backed off.