The Sex Question

In the writings of the 19th and early 20th century, the questions we associate with feminism were addressed under a variety of labels, one of the most economical of which was “the sex question,” which referred, in practice, to a wide range of question concerning sex, gender, sexuality, etc. The texts collected here cover a wide range of “women’s issues.” The current collection includes material previously contained in the following archives: La Frondeuse (Black and Red Feminist History), Anarchy and the Sex Question and A Beautiful Nihilist.

The Sex Question

Lizzie M. Swank, “What Are American Institutions?” (1887)

July 26, 2017 Shawn P. Wilbur
WHAT ARE “AMERICAN INSTITUTIONS”? I AM sending this across the ocean, to seek information I cannot gain in my own native land. I have enquired of leading journals and been quietly ignored; I have asked eminent literary people and received only looks that questioned my sanity and civilised citizenship; I have interrogated workingmen, and they simply become terrified. I have decided to enquire of a “blasted furriner.” I only want to know—“what are “American institutions”? Or rather, what are the characteristics of American institutions which distinguish them from English, Russian, German, or French institutions? So much seems to depend on […]
The Sex Question

Voltairine de Cleyre, “The Economic Relations of Sex” (1891)

July 25, 2017 Shawn P. Wilbur
CORRESPONDENCE. THE ECONOMIC RELATIONS OF SEX. To the Editor of The Open Court: POSSESSED of rather more than ordinary interest in the sex question, and agreeing with Professor Cope that any proposition for the amelioration of the condition of women should be discussed and decided by women, I am moved to certain remarks suggested by his article on “The Material Relations of Sex” in the first number of The Monist.[note]Article reproduced below.—Editor.[/note] All through its perusal I was impressed by his unconscious recognition of an underlying question, which, apart from woman’s inferiority, determines the relations of the sexes. This is […]
fiction

Voltairine de Cleyre, “The Gilded Edge of Hell” (1890)

July 25, 2017 Shawn P. Wilbur
THE GILDED EDGE OF HELL Mr. Editor:–The broad roll of the Delaware flashed back a white water-glisten at the full moon. Fifteen or twenty vessels spread their white wings to the slow breeze, or sent the black vomit from their whistling throats upward to the night sky. Splash, splash! fell the water from the sides of the “John A. Warner” as she cut the flowing current, that ran like long, waving hair, away from the white line in her wake. Upon her decks two thoughtful women gazed at the dark banks, lifted their eyes to the soft sky and occasionally […]
fiction

Voltairine de Cleyre, “The Gilded Edge of Hell” (1890)

July 25, 2017 Shawn P. Wilbur
Voltairine de Cleyre [main page] THE GILDED EDGE OF HELL Mr. Editor:–The broad roll of the Delaware flashed back a white water-glisten at the full moon. Fifteen or twenty vessels spread their white wings to the slow breeze, or sent the black vomit from their whistling throats upward to the night sky. Splash, splash! fell the water from the sides of the “John A. Warner” as she cut the flowing current, that ran like long, waving hair, away from the white line in her wake. Upon her decks two thoughtful women gazed at the dark banks, lifted their eyes to […]
The Sex Question

Voltairine de Cleyre and Benjamin R. Tucker, “Some Questions and Criticisms” (1890)

July 25, 2017 Shawn P. Wilbur
Some Questions and Criticisms. To the Editor of Liberty: What is a nuisance? A nuisance. What is an encyclopædia? An encyclopædia. Will the Encyclopædia please inform the Nuisance by what peculiar system of contradictions he viciously prods believers in “duty,” yet labels the very column whence said prods proceed, “On Picket Duty”? (1) I like your definition of socialism. I have but one objection,-too scholarly. Can’t you simplify it as to language? When I quote Spencer, Andrews, Tucker, Lum, or Walker, and lastly, not leastly, Yarros, I am frequently called upon to translate it. Intensely “average,” of the common common, […]
The Sex Question

Voltairine de Cleyre and Benjamin R. Tucker, “Some Questions and Criticisms” (1890)

July 25, 2017 Shawn P. Wilbur
Some Questions and Criticisms. To the Editor of Liberty: What is a nuisance? A nuisance. What is an encyclopædia? An encyclopædia. Will the Encyclopædia please inform the Nuisance by what peculiar system of contradictions he viciously prods believers in “duty,” yet labels the very column whence said prods proceed, “On Picket Duty”? (1) I like your definition of socialism. I have but one objection,-too scholarly. Can’t you simplify it as to language? When I quote Spencer, Andrews, Tucker, Lum, or Walker, and lastly, not leastly, Yarros, I am frequently called upon to translate it. Intensely “average,” of the common common, […]
The Sex Question

Voltairine de Cleyre, “The Economic Tendency of Freethought” (1890)

July 25, 2017 Shawn P. Wilbur
THE ECONOMIC TENDENCY OF FREETHOUGHT BY VOLTAIRINE DE CLEYRE FRIENDS,–On page 286, Belford-Clarke edition, of the “Rights of Man,” the words which I propose as a text for this discourse may be found. Alluding to the change in the condition of France brought about by the Revolution of ‘93, Thomas Paine says: “The mind of the nation had changed beforehand, and a new order of things had naturally followed a new order of thoughts.” Two hundred and eighty-nine years ago, a man, a student, a scholar, a thinker, a philosopher, was roasted alive for the love of God and the […]
The Sex Question

Voltairine de Cleyre, “The Economic Tendency of Freethought” (1890)

July 25, 2017 Shawn P. Wilbur
THE ECONOMIC TENDENCY OF FREETHOUGHT BY VOLTAIRINE DE CLEYRE FRIENDS,–On page 286, Belford-Clarke edition, of the “Rights of Man,” the words which I propose as a text for this discourse may be found. Alluding to the change in the condition of France brought about by the Revolution of ‘93, Thomas Paine says: “The mind of the nation had changed beforehand, and a new order of things had naturally followed a new order of thoughts.” Two hundred and eighty-nine years ago, a man, a student, a scholar, a thinker, a philosopher, was roasted alive for the love of God and the […]
The Sex Question

Voltairine de Cleyre & Emma Goldman, “Tour Impressions” and “A Rejoinder” (1910-11)

July 25, 2017 Shawn P. Wilbur
TOUR IMPRESSIONS LEAVING Philadelphia on Friday, the 7th of October, I began my meeting with comrades and their work on that evening in New York, and from that day till the present writing (I date at Buffalo, the 18th of October) I have addressed nine meetings,—two in New York, one in Albany, one in Schenectady, one in Rochester, and four in Buffalo. In all these places I have to thank all comrades for kindly courtesy and fraternal service. But these, while most grateful to me personally, are of course not of public interest. What the readers of Mother Earth will […]
fiction

Lizzie M. Holmes, “The Evolution of an Agitator” (1904)

July 24, 2017 Shawn P. Wilbur
The Evolution of an Agitator. Some years ago, a young minister of the gospel was given charge of a good sized church in the southwestern part of Chicago. He had shown such marked ability, such earnestness and enthusiasm in the care of a small village pastorate that his superiors thought he must have a larger field on which to expend his power, and resolved to promote him. So they placed him over this church situated in one of the most populous districts in the city, where the people were nearly all poor. If plenty of work was promotion, young DeWitt […]