Last class, we discussed the characteristic of piety associated with womanhood during the nineteenth and this relationship factors prominently in the book. Often, the women in the book are presented as morally superior to their male counterparts and while they never directly control a situation, they can influence the decisions of the men around them. Mrs. Shelby throughout the novel opposes many of her husband’s decisions on a moral ground. She raises objections to the selling of Tom and even helps Eliza escape before being taken away by Haley.
Mary Bird, through moral suasion, convinces her husband to help the escaped slave Eliza, even though he recently helped pass a fugitive slave law in the Senate. Mary struggled to understand how any “Christian legislation” could pass a law like the Fugitive Slave Act (97). Even though Mary never maintained the authority to make the decision on the fate of Eliza, her persuasion forced her husband to morally reflect and offer assistance to the fugitive slave Eliza.
There is also a certain level of connection between the women that crosses racial barriers. Eliza, when she first meets Mary Bird, pleads by asking if she had ever lost a child. Because of her past experiences, Mary relates to the suffering of Eliza and offers her aid. Finding these cross-racial connections must have been important to Stowe because a majority of her audience would have been upper-middle class white women.
During the mid 19th century many of the important reform leaders were women. This was not just in the abolition movement but in other such movements such as sanitation, temperance, and dress reform. During this time period, women began taking a role in public life while still generally remaining in traditionally feminine roles.
I found Senator Bird and his wife to be very interesting characters. In the Ohio State Senate, Senator Bird supports a bill that forbids the assistance of runaway slaves although he is unable to turn Eliza and Harry away when the time comes. Although he publicly supported the bill he went against the rule with the assistance of his wife.
Reading your blog and various others, I feel that there is a huge difference between the values those give to Christianity in this book compared to modern times. Christianity plays such a large role in the ideals of both the slave masters and the slaves, but I feel that in modern times it doesn’t play such a huge role in every day lives like it does with characters in the book.