• DOI:10.1080/0023656042000217264
• Corpus ID: 155029172

From the courts to the state legislatures: social justice feminism, labor legislation, and the 1920s

@article{McGuire2004FromTC,
  title={From the courts to the state legislatures: social justice feminism, labor legislation, and the 1920s},
  author={John McGuire},
  journal={Labor History},
  year={2004},
  volume={45},
  pages={225 - 246}
}

• John McGuire
• Published 1 May 2004
• History
• Labor History

The Progressive Era, a period of important social and political activism which stretched from 1890 through the end of World War I, now offers a rich, diverse historiography. In contrast, the 1920s suffer from a surfeit of analysis. Most historians consider the decade a dull, conformist period. The comment of William H. Chafe seems typical. ‘The Adkins [v. Children’s Hospital] decision,’ he stated in 1972, ‘thoroughly demoralized reform groups because it removed the principal grounds on which they sought legislative help.’ But with recent analyses we can see the 1920s in a truer perspective. The social and political discontents of the pre-1914 era did not disappear, nor did reform efforts collapse. One of the catalysts of reform during the 1920s became a New York coalition of middle and working class organizations, the Women’s Joint Legislative Conference (WJLC). Created in September 1918, the WJLC initially propounded an aggressive agenda of labor legislation, only to face internal tensions and the strong opposition of a counter-network of Republican state legislators, businessmen, and members of the National Woman’s Party (NWP). The WJLC and other, similar organizations such as the Women’s Joint Congressional Committee (WJCC), also continued the efforts of a movement begun in the late nineteenth century: social justice feminism. ‘Social justice’ arose as a concept in the late 1800s as women’s organizations confronted the quandary of reconciling industrial and technological advancements with the need to preserve the dignity of working people. The term, with its social and religious implications, appealed to an American middle class wary of Marxist theory. Definitions of justice in the United States previously arose in a legalistic context, as Americans used the term only in the context of property rights. But Progressive Era reformers, influenced by the Social Gospel and the harsh effects of a newly industrialized economy in the United States, used the term ‘social justice’ to question social and economic inequalities. Social justice feminism as a movement eventually encompassed four stages in its history. The initial stage, as described later in this article, started with the appointment of Florence Kelley to the general secretaryship of the National Consumers’