Catharine Macaulay: Difference between revisions

Macaulay is a central figure in the history of women's political thought.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Green |first=Karen |title=A History of Women’s Political Thought in Europe, 1700–1800 |date=2014 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |year=2014 |location=Cambridge}}</ref> Like English philosopher and feminist [[Mary Astell]] (1666-1731), Macaulay's work anticipated ideas that would later be associated with [[Feminist theory|feminist]] political theory such as concerns about women, consent, and the [[social contract]].<ref>{{Cite book |last=Green |first=Karen |title=Catharine Macaulay’s Republican Enlightenment |publisher=Routledge |year=2020 |location=New York |publication-date=2020}}</ref> In her ''Loose Remarks on Certain Positions to be found in Mr. Hobbes's 'Philosophical Rudiments of Government and Society''' (1767), Macaulay criticized [[Thomas Hobbes]]'s construction of [[patriarchy]] and paternal right.<ref name="Gunther-Canada 190–216">{{Citation |last=Gunther-Canada |first=Wendy |title=9 Catharine Macaulay’s ‘‘Loose Remarks’’ on Hobbesian Politics |date=2015-06-29 |work=Feminist Interpretations of Thomas Hobbes |pages=190–216 |editor-last=Hirschmann |editor-first=Nancy J. |url=https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.1515/9780271061351-012/html |access-date=2024-09-25 |publisher=Penn State University Press |doi=10.1515/9780271061351-012 |isbn=978-0-271-06135-1 |editor2-last=Wright |editor2-first=Joanne H.}}</ref> <ref>{{Cite book |last=Green |first=Karen |title=“When is a Contract Theorist not a Contract Theorist? Mary Astell and Catharine Macaulay as Critics of Thomas Hobbes,” in Feminist Interpretations of Thomas Hobbes, N.J. Hirschmann and J.H. Wright (eds.) |date=2012 |publisher=The Pennsylvania University Press |year=2012 |pages=169-189}}</ref>Although predominantly a historian, Macaulay developed her own theory of politics.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Green |first=Karen |date=2012 |title=Catharine Macaulay: Philosopher of the Enlightenment |journal=Intellectual History Review |volume=22 |issue=3 |pages=411-426}}</ref> She criticized absolute monarchs and despotic regimes—and the patriarchy that she believed made both possible. She outlined her elements of her own form of popular or republican government.<ref name="Gunther-Canada 190–216"/> Scholarly interest in her feminism has led to more attention to her critique of patriarchy and her political theory (beyond her works of history).<ref>{{Cite book |last=Titone |first=Connie |title=Gender Equality in the Philosophy of Education: Catherine Macaulay’s Forgotten Contribution |date=2004 |publisher=Peter Lang |location=New York}}</ref> <ref>{{Cite journal |last=Hicks |first=Philip |date=2002 |title=“Catharine Macaulay’s Civil War: Gender, history, and Republicanism in Georgian Britain” |journal=Journal of British Studies |volume=41 |issue=2 |pages=170–99}}</ref> <ref>{{Citation |last=Green |first=Karen |title=Catharine Macaulay |date=2024 |work=The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy |editor-last=Zalta |editor-first=Edward N. |url=https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/catharine-macaulay/#Femi |access-date=2024-09-26 |edition=Summer 2024 |publisher=Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University |editor2-last=Nodelman |editor2-first=Uri}}</ref> Scholars have also noted the relationship between her feminism and religious ideas.<ref>{{Citation |last=Hutton |first=Sarah |title=Liberty, Equality and God: The Religious Roots of Catherine Macaulay’s Feminism |date=2005 |work=Women, Gender and Enlightenment |pages=538–550 |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.1057/9780230554801_34 |access-date=2024-09-25 |place=London |publisher=Palgrave Macmillan UK |isbn=978-0-230-51781-3}}</ref>

In addition, scholars have noted Macaulay's impact on early feminist [[Mary Wollstonecraft]], author of ''[[A Vindication of the Rights of Woman]]'' (1792).<ref>{{Cite book |last=Green |first=Karen |title=“Catharine Macaulay’s Philosophy and Her Influence on Mary Wollstonecraft” in The Routledge Handbook of Women and Early Modern European Philosophy, Karen Detlefsen and Lisa Shapiro (eds.) |date=2023 |publisher=Routgedge |location=London |pages=546–57}}</ref> <ref>{{Cite journal |last=Hill |first=Bridget |date=1995 |title=“The Links between Mary Wollstonecraft and Catharine Macaulay: new evidence,” |journal=Women’s History Review |volume=4 |issue=2 |pages=177–92}}</ref> <ref>{{Cite book |last=Gunther-Canada |first=Wendy |title=“The Politics of Sense and Sensibility: Mary Wollstonecraft and Catherine Macaulay Graham on Edmund Burke’s Reflections on the Revolution in France,” in Women Writers and the Early Modern Political Tradition, H. Smith (ed.) |date=1998 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |year=1998 |pages=126-147}}</ref>Macaulay and Wollstonecraft both wrote on themes such as education, freedom as independence, equality, virtue, reputation, injustice, history, and false ideas.<ref name=":0">{{Cite book |last=Coffee |first=Alan |title="Catharine Macaulay's Influence on Mary Wollstonecraft" in The Wollstonecraftian Mind Edited By Sandrine Bergès, Eileen Hunt Botting, Alan Coffee |date=2019 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=9781138709973}}</ref> Wollstonecraft recognized the impact when she wrote to Macaulay: "You are the only female writer who I coincide in opinion with respecting the rank our sex ought to endeavour to attain in the world. I respect Mrs Macaulay Graham because she contends for laurels while most of her sex only seek for flowers." <ref name=":0" />

Macaulay's work challenged the political and legal world of her time. MostBritish centrally,law British societyrelied acceptedon [[coverture]]: a husband “covered” the legal identity of a married woman so that, by a “fiction of the law,” marriage joined husband and wife into one legal person represented solely by the husband. As the head of household, the husband controlled a married woman's wages and body as well as their children. Coverture began in England in the 12th century and continued to control legal thinking in common law countries (such as Great Britain and the United States) into the 20th century.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Liebell |first=Susan P. |date=2021-04-01 |title=Sensitive Places?: How Gender Unmasks the Myth of Originalism in District of Columbia v. Heller |url=https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/712393 |journal=Polity |volume=53 |issue=2 |pages=207–238 |doi=10.1086/712393 |issn=0032-3497}}</ref> Macaulay's political works interrogated the subordination of women in British society and law.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Gunther-Canada |first=Wendy |date=1998 |title=Catharine Macaulay on the Paradox of Paternal Authority in Hobbesian Politics |journal=Hypatia |volume=21 |issue=2 |pages=150-173}}</ref> [[File:Bluestockings3.jpg|thumb|right|Macaulay (seated, far left), in the company of other "[[Bluestocking|Blue Stockings]]" (1778)]]