1954 was when the Supreme Court decided Brown v. Board of Education, the case kicked off the modern civil rights movement, which jump started the women's movement.
Here we go.
The story of American democracy in under 10 tweets.
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Women were chattel.
Native Americans were not citizens.
You get the idea.
The governing philosophy of 19th century America was a hierarchy with white men at the top and black women at the bottom.
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There was almost no federal government and almost no regulations.
On the frontier, white men could grab land.
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You see, until fairly recently, rape was a property crime.
An unmarried girl was her father’s property. If a virgin was raped, the property damage was to her father.
If she was married, the damage was to her husband.
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Women read the 14th Amendment and thought wow! This is great!
Except 19th century courts held that it didn't give women the right to vote.
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After 1954, women and minority communities began demanding equal rights.
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We are still riding the backlash from Brown v. Board of Education.
MAGA means take America backward to a bygone era.
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MAGA means go back to the patriarchy when white men could grab whatever they wanted.
I did it. In 10 tweets.
10/
I meant the modern civil rights movement.
I think our first national "civil rights movement" would have been the angry uproar over Andrew Jackson's Trail of Tears.
Actually, abolition was probably, technically, a civil rights movement.
But not until after 1954 did women and minority communities come close to achieving true civil rights (there was that brief period in the Restoration)
Reconstruction not restoration.