“Neither guns nor bombs – neither the state nor God – will stop us from fighting for our children”: motherhood and protest in 1960s and 1970s America

Abstract

This article looks at ideologies of motherhood within the welfare rights movement of the late 1960s and the anti-busing struggle of the early 1970s, primarily focusing on Boston. It argues that, within these seemingly very different movements, women’s identities as mothers played an integral role in motivating their activism. It also explores similarities in how both movements drew upon maternal ideologies, rhetoric and symbolism to justify their protests and advance their cause. However, gender was intricately entwined with race and class, and this article analyzes key differences in the way welfare rights and anti-busing activists understood and used motherhood within their respective struggles. Furthermore, it examines how participation in social protest impacted on women’s ideas about gender. Engaging with current debates over the complex relationship between maternalism and feminism, it examines how women within the welfare rights and anti-busing movements reacted to the burgeoning feminist movement of the era. Although these movements were born out of similar maternal outlooks, they differed significantly in the extent to which participants came to re-examine traditional gender ideologies or develop a feminist consciousness. While many welfare recipients developed a feminist consciousness as a result of their activism, anti-busing women generally eschewed feminism and remained wedded to conventional gender roles. Ultimately then, this study enriches our understanding of the way in which gender intersects with race and class to shape political activism and social change.