The Lily and its impact on feminist thought in nineteenth century America

Abstract

Editor Amelia Bloomer created controversy through her nineteenth century periodical—The Lily—which started out as a temperance journal but quickly came to include women’s rights issues. Her influence on the first women’s rights movement of the nineteenth century can be partially attributed to her success at creating controversy as a way to bring attention to women’s issues in three key areas: through her advocacy of temperance which emphasized, among other things, the vulnerability of a woman married to a drunkard; through her endorsement of the bloomer costume which would help inspire the nineteenth century dress reform movement, and through her use of the comparison between married women and slaves as a way to bring attention to the disadvantages facing married women in nineteenth century America.