Abigail Adams remembers America’s daughters.
If you complain of neglect of education in sons, what shall I say with regard to daughters, who every day experience the want of it? With regard to the education of my own children, I find myself soon out of my depth, and destitute and deficient in every part of education.
I most sincerely wish that some more liberal plan might be laid and executed for the benefit of the rising generation, and that our new constitution may be distinguished for learning and virtue. If we mean to have heroes, statesmen, and philosophers, we should have learned women. The world perhaps would laugh at me, and accuse me of vanity, but you I know have a mind too enlarged and liberal to disregard the sentiment. If much depends as is allowed upon the early education of youth, and the first principles which are instilled take the deepest root, great benefit must arise from literary accomplishments in women.
From a letter to her husband. Writing on the eve of American independence, the wife of John Adams remained a strong advocate for women’s education in the new republic. She also championed the abolition of slavery.
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