An APUSH SAQ — Republican Motherhood

Ten questions designed to help students review for the annual exam and that relate to an 18th-century term for an attitude toward women’s roles present in the emerging United States before, during, and after the American Revolution

1. In the late 1700s and in response to women’s participation in the American Revolution, Enlightenment ideas, and women’s appeals for expanded roles, an ideal of Republican Motherhood gained popularity. It called on women to teach republican values within the family. What are republican values?
2. What is meant by the term Enlightenment ideas?
3. The ideal of Republican Motherhood that gained popularity in the late 1700s “granted women a new importance in American political culture.” What does this mean?
4. Briefly describe one major similarity and one major difference between the term Republican Motherhood and the term Cult of Domesticity.
5. It is often said that the ideal of Republican Motherhood reinforced the idea of a domestic women’s sphere separate from the public world of men. How so?
6. At the very same time that the ideal of Republican Motherhood gained popularity, increased awareness of inequalities in society motivated some women (their men too) to call for the abolition of slavery. The members of what religious group first called for the abolition of slavery?
7. At the very same time that the ideal of Republican Motherhood gained popularity, the effort for American independence was energized by colonial leaders such as Benjamin Franklin, as well as by popular movements that included the political activism of laborers, artisans, and women. Name and briefly describe either one woman or one group of women that “energized” the effort for American independence?
8. At the very same time that the ideal of Republican Motherhood gained popularity, increased awareness of inequalities in society motivated some women to call for greater political democracy in the new state and national governments. Name and briefly describe one piece of evidence in support of this claim.
9. At the very same time that the ideal of Republican Motherhood gained popularity, men and women mobilized in large numbers to provide financial and material support to the Patriot movement. Name and briefly describe one piece of evidence in support of the claim that women mobilized in large numbers to provide financial and material support to the Patriot movement.
10. Although the notion of republican motherhood initially encouraged women in their private roles, it eventually resulted in increased educational opportunities for American women. Name and briefly describe one piece of evidence in support of this claim.