美國歷史中的婦女(九)

編輯: 逍遙路 關鍵詞: 初中歷史 來源: 高中學習網(wǎng)

女權運動的第二次浪潮: 民權運動時期對“平等”的追求

In controversies over women’s rights, which 中考 gained prominence in the atmosphere of rights consciousness created by the civil rights movement, the Burger Court generally adhered to a traditional conception of equality before the law. Responding to changes in public attitudes and to legislative initiatives against sex discrimination, the Court seriously weakened, if it did not decisively undermine, the principle of classification by gender that formed the legal basis for long-standing federal ? and state-sanctioned denial of equal rights to women. To grasp the dimensions of this development a brief considerationof the constitutional status of women before this time will be helpful.

婦女權利在民權運動創(chuàng)造的權利意識的氛圍下突顯出來。在有關婦女權利的爭議中,博格法院(最高法院的首席大法官叫博格,故稱)一般堅持法律面前人人平等的傳統(tǒng)概念。 為回應反對性別歧視的公眾態(tài)度和立法動議的變化,最高法院,如果沒有決定性地損壞、至少是嚴重削弱了性別分類的原則,這一原則長期以來是聯(lián)邦和州支持剝奪婦女平等權利的法律基礎。為把握這一發(fā)展過程的各個方面,簡短地回顧該時期以前婦女的憲政地位有助于我們的理解。

Despite significant steps toward the emancipation of women resulting from such measures as the married women’s property acts, nineteenth-century state law, reflecting the male-dominated social consensus, consigned women to an inferior status in public life and in the world of private household and domestic relations. Women were generally excluded from voting, office holding, and jury services, denied educational and professional opportunities available to men, and in numerous ways defined as the subordinate partner in the marriage relationship.Nor did the Fourteenth Amendment, which temporarily raised feminist hopesofa major advance toward legal and political equality, alter this pattern of discrimination. Two notable constitutional cases of the Reconstruction era made this fact clear.

盡管諸如已婚婦女財產法案等,使婦女解放有所進展, 但反映男人主宰社會共識的19世紀州法律,把婦女在公眾生活、在私人家庭世界和家庭關系中置于低人一等的地位?傮w上講, 婦女被排除在選舉、擔任官職和司法行業(yè)之外;被剝奪了男人享有的受教育權和從事專業(yè)的權利;在婚姻關系中,以數(shù)不勝數(shù)的方式把婦女定義為處于從屬地位的伙伴。曾一時激起女權主義者在法律和政治平等方面取得進展希望的第十四條修正案,它也未能改變這種模式的歧視。重建時期兩個著名的憲法案子,更清楚地反映了這一現(xiàn)實。

In Bradwell v. Illinois (1873) Supreme Court rejected the claim of a Chicago woman that the right to practice law was an attribute of U.S citizenship protected by the privileges-and immunities-clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The states, declared the Court, could regulate admission to the bar as they saw fit. In an equally important holding the Supreme Court declared, in Minor v. Happersett (1875), that states could restrict suffrage to men, the right to vote not having been conferred on women by the Fourteenth Amendment. Although the Nineteenth Amendment at length guaranteed women the right not to be discriminated against in voting on account of sex and although states gradually adopted reforms recognizing a greater degree of legal autonomy and equality for women, before the 1960s numerous forms of discrimination continued to restrict women in American society.

在布拉德維爾對伊利諾伊州一案(1873年)中,最高法院拒絕了一位芝加哥婦女的要求:從事法律工作的權利是美國公民權的一個標志,它受第十四條修正案中優(yōu)惠和豁免條款的保護。最高法院宣布,各州可根據(jù)合適與否而自行規(guī)定是否允許[婦女]擔任律師。 在同樣重要的一個司法解釋中,即邁納對哈珀塞特一案(1875年)中,最高法院宣布:各州可以把選舉權僅限于男子,因為第十四條修正案沒有賦予婦女選舉權。雖然第19條修正案最終做出婦女在選舉權上不得受性別歧視的保證,而且各州逐漸實行的改革對婦女在法律、在自主和平等上有更大程度的承認, 但在20世紀60年代以前, 五花八門的各種形式的歧視繼續(xù)限制著美國社會中的女性。

In the context of the civil rights movement, women activists’ long-frustrated demands for full equality before the law began to receive mainstream political recognition. In 1963 Congress amended the Fair Labor Standards Act to require equal pay for equal work as between men and women. In Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 Congress declared unlawful employment practices that discriminated on the basis of sex, and in 1967 President Johnson, under Executive Order No. 11375, prohibits sex discrimination by employers under federal contracts. The women’s rights movement made further gains in the 1970s as Congress submitted the Equal Rights Amendment to the states for ratification and enacted a series of laws baring discrimination on account of sex in federally supported educational programs. Congress also strengthened the authority of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission to enforce the ban on sex discrimination in employment contained in Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act.

在民權運動的大背景下,長期令婦女積極分子沮喪的“法律面前完全平等”的訴求,開始獲得主流政治的承認。1963年,國會修正了要求男女同工同酬的公平勞動標準法。在1964年民權法案第七款中,國會宣布建立在性別基礎上的歧視性招工措施為非法。1967年,約翰遜總統(tǒng)在11375號行政命令中,禁止與聯(lián)邦政府有合同的雇主實行性別歧視。20世紀70年代,國會把平等權利修正案送到各州進行批準,聯(lián)邦支持的教育項目中開始實行一系列禁止性別歧視的法律時,爭取婦女權利運動取得了更大成果。國會也增強了公平就業(yè)機會委員會的權威性,并實行包含在1964民權法案第七款中的禁止就業(yè)性別歧視。

The Burger court consistently upheld these administration statutes. In Philips v. Marietta Corporation (1971), for example, it found that a company’s refusal to hire women with preschool-age children—a policy not applied to men—violated the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The Court affirmed the Equal Pay Act of 1963 against the practice of paying women day workers less as a base wage than men night-shift workers where performance of the same task was involved.In still another typical case the Burger Court invalidated an Alabama law that effectively excluded women from employment in state prisons by stipulating minimum height and weight requirements for prison guards. This law also violated the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

博格法院不斷支持這些政府法令。例如,在菲利普對瑪麗埃塔公司(1971年)一案中,最高法院發(fā)現(xiàn)該公司拒絕錄用有學齡前子女的婦女的做法(這一政策不約束男子)違反了1964年民權法案。反對婦女計日工的基本工資比干同樣工作的夜班男工工資低的做法,最高法院批準了1963年同酬法案。在另一起更典型的案例中,博格法院宣布阿拉巴馬的一條州法律非法。該法對在州監(jiān)獄擔任監(jiān)獄保安職務的婦女體重和身高的要求,實際上有效地排除了婦女在州監(jiān)獄的就業(yè)。最高法院認為該法律也違反了1964年民權法案。

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歷史理解要點:

1.美國女權運動第一階段的主要成就是:爭取選舉權,婦女獲得法理上的政治平等;但是,婦女并沒有獲得社會平等,在社會生活的諸多方面仍受到歧視。

2.第二階段:20世紀60年代,民權運動為婦女爭取社會平等提供了強大的助力。 美國的立法、司法、行政機構都開始了有利于婦女獲得平等的做法。根據(jù)美國聯(lián)邦憲法第14條修正案中的“平等”概念,最高法院一般傾向于作出有利于婦女的司法解釋。


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