Cry of Murder on Broadway

Author(s):  
Julie Miller

This book shows how a woman's desperate attempt at murder came to momentarily embody the anger and anxiety felt by many people at a time of economic and social upheaval and expanding expectations for equal rights. On the evening of November 1, 1843, a young household servant named Amelia Norman attacked Henry Ballard, a prosperous merchant, on the steps of the Astor House Hotel. Agitated and distraught, Norman had followed Ballard down Broadway before confronting him at the door to the hotel. Taking out a folding knife, she stabbed him. Ballard survived the attack, and the trial that followed created a sensation. Newspapers in New York and beyond followed the case eagerly, and crowds filled the courtroom every day. The prominent author and abolitionist Lydia Maria Child championed Norman and later included her story in her fiction and her writing on women's rights. Norman also attracted the support of politicians, journalists, and legal and moral reformers who saw her story as a vehicle to change the law as it related to “seduction” and to advocate for the rights of workers. This book describes how New Yorkers followed the trial for entertainment. Throughout all this, Norman gained sympathys, in particular the jury, which acquitted her in less than ten minutes. The book weaves together Norman's story to show how, in one violent moment, she expressed all the anger that the women of the emerging movement for women's rights would soon express in words.

2018 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 97
Author(s):  
Hanna Christine Ndun ◽  
Sarah Suttor ◽  
I Gusti Agung Ayu Dike Widhiyaastuti

There is a stereotype with regard to the rights of the Balinese women on inheriting under the Balinese tradi-tional customary law. It is generally assumed that the law discriminates Balinese women as well as against the human rights principle of equality. This article analyzes the contemporary problems of such issue and would demonstrate the actual principles, rules and practices, including the essential concept of the rights under the Balinese traditional customary law of inheritance. This issue has been explored under a normative legal approach where the resources are primarily taken from the relevant national legal instruments and court decisions, instead of textbooks and journals. An interview has also been commenced for clarifying some aspects of the issue. This article concludes that there has been a generally misleading on viewing the Balinese customary law as discriminating women on an inheritance issue, as in fact, the law also provides rules for supporting women’s rights for inheriting. The law in a certain way has properly preserved the right of women for inheriting in which women under the law have also enjoyed rights for inheriting, especially the daughter and widow. In contrast, the Balinese men that are generally perceived as the ultimate gender enjoying privileges rights to inherit, in the practice of inheritance in the traditional community are also subject to some discrimination. The law has provided a set of rule of inheritance both for men and women where they are subject to certain equal rule and condition. The law also clarifies that both genders are enjoying equal rights on inheritance in a certain portion and situation binding under the principle of balancing between rights and obligation for each side.


2016 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 716
Author(s):  
Dede Kania

Up to now, the law is still considered discriminatory and gender inequality. Though the law should be equal or sensitive to gender inequality to guarantee women’s rights. By following the principle of equality in all areas of the good men  and women have equal rights or opportunities to participate in every aspect of social life and state. so if there is discrimination against women, it is a violation of women’s rights. women’s rights violations occur due to many things, including the result of the legal system, where women are victims of the system. Reform Order is the most progressive period in the protection of human rights. Various laws and regulations come outin this period, including laws and regulations concerning women’s rights. Seen from the government’s efforts to eliminate discrimination based on sex are included in many  legislations.


2021 ◽  
Vol 7 (4) ◽  
pp. 445-458
Author(s):  
Novia Puspa Ayu Larasati

the present time, the law is still considered discriminatory and not gender-just. Whereas the law should not regard gender to guarantee the fulfillment of women's rights. Women's rights are still not protected. Equality and elimination of discrimination against women are often the center of attention and a shared commitment to implement them. However, in social life, the achievement of equality of women's dignity still has not shown significant progress. So, if there is discrimination against women, it is a violation of women's rights. Women's rights violations occur because of many things, including the result of the legal system, where women become victims of the system. Many women's rights to work still have a lot of conflict about the role of women in the public sector. Today, discrimination against women is still very visible in the world of work. There are so many women who do not get the right to work. This research found that the structure of the company, rarely do we see women who get a place as a leader, in addition to the acceptance of female workers companies put many terms, such as looking attractive, not married, must stay in dormitory and so forth. Their salaries are sometimes different from male workers. Like male workers, women workers also have equal opportunities in the world of work. While there are many legislations governing the rights of women workers, it seems that many companies deliberately do not socialize it and even ignore the legislation just like that.


Author(s):  
Tracy A. Thomas

This chapter explores Elizabeth Cady Stanton’s views on women’s reproductive rights. It traces the voluntary motherhood movement among women’s rights activists and social reformers, which endorsed women’s singular right to choose sexual relations and procreation. Stanton took this concept a step further, advocating eugenic ideas of enlightened motherhood as a method of birth control. The chapter juxtaposes Stanton’s work for reproductive control against the abortion movement of the latter nineteenth century, which eventually criminalized abortion in all states. Following Stanton’s interest in the trial of Hester Vaughan for infanticide, the chapter reveals how Stanton used the trial to expose gendered inequalities of the law, including women’s exclusion as judges, lawyers, legislators, and jurors.


Graphic News ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 160-194
Author(s):  
Amanda Frisken

This chapter shows how, in 1895-96, women’s rights activists attempted to use sensationalism to critique the double standard in domestic violence prosecution. Lacking illustrated newspapers of their own, veteran activists including Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, Lucy Stone, and Henry Blackwell, used the pages of the New York Recorder, World, and Journal to apply the “crime of passion” defense to the case of Maria Barbella (or Barberi), a woman tried twice for killing a man who had seduced and dishonored her. Their efforts to introduce into the daily papers a complex debate about women’s rights and the double standard in legal protection helped win the campaign for Barbella’s acquittal. It had the unintended cost of undermining women’s standing to critique honor killings by men.


Author(s):  
Julie Miller

This chapter recounts how Lydia Maria Child had taken Amelia Norman to her home to live with her as an intimate of her family after she won the trial. It notes how Lydia kept track of Amelia during the months that she lived with her in the spring of 1844, getting to know her better than she had been able to when Amelia was a prisoner at the Tombs. It also mentions Lydia's belief that Amelia's strong deep feelings were what drove her to the verge of madness. The chapter refers to Maria Lowell, wife of poet and diplomat James Russell Lowell, to whom Lydia recommended Norman for a job as a personal maid. It highlights Lydia's publication of “Letter from New York No. V” while Amelia was living with her, which was a jeremiad against the failure of the law to protect women and the men who made the law.


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