Nina Elgo, Earnings Statutes of Illinois and Maryland (1989)

In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, many states passed earnings statutes giving married women control over their earnings. They were part of several waves of married women's property laws, which protected wives' property from their husbands' creditors and established separate estates for married women. These statutes may have been enacted in part due to the growing feminist movement. Under common law, a married couple was considered to be one person. The husband assumed responsibility for his wife's interests, in exchange for which he had an absolute right to her labor and property. Under this condition, called coverture, the wife had no legal identity. In reality, husband and wife were still separate entities, and over time common law began to accommodate this fact. The passage of earnings statutes was one such accommodation, and it planted the seed for more reform in the legal status of women.

In Illinois, industrialization and population growth in the mid-1800s led to an increase in the labor force. The Civil War created a demand for goods such as food, clothing and arms as well as a decline in the male work force. The use of labor-saving devices also made manufacturing work possible for women. A stream of immigrants, runaway slaves, and freedmen also arrived in Illinois during this time period. In combination, these developments laid the groundwork for efforts to change the coverture based property rules.

The feminist movement started to garner attention in Illinois as far back as the 1850's. Led by Myra Bradwell, these early feminists drafted and lobbied for the passage of the married women's property law of 1861 and the earnings statute of 1869. Bradwell and her colleagues used two arguments to persuade state legislators to adopt the earnings statute: that the common law denied women legal personhood, and that reforms would induce poor women to save their incomes or use them for the benefit of their families. By depriving husbands of title to their wives' earnings, the reforms allowed women to craft their own family economic priorities during a time of economic stress. Other factors may also have influenced the legislature. Various law makers may have voted for change to promote equality of the sexes, to protect the incomes of businesswomen from their husbands' creditors, or to protect the creditors of businesswomen. But regardless of the exact motivations for the legislative action, adoption of states reforming the property law of coverture showed that married women were gradually escaping the confines of the domestic sphere.

Maryland's original earnings statute, passed in 1843, was part of its early married women's property law and set a cap of $1000 on the amount of earnings a married woman could hold. A desire to protect debtors during a period of great economic turmoil probably motivated the reforms.. A statewide depression in 1834, as well as the Panic of 1837, forced many women to enter the work force. The $1000 earnings provision meant that some wives would be able to augment their family incomes without fear of losing the money to husbands of their creditors.

In 1882, the state legislature amended the earnings statute, eliminating the cap. After the Civil War, Maryland's agricultural economy declined, and people flocked to the cities. By the 1880s, the conditions in which women worked had not improved--they still had to work long hours in cramped quarters for little pay. A depression in 1884 and 1885 resulted in high unemployment, low wages and worsening circumstances for the working class. These conditions suggest that the legislature modified the earnings statute to make it easier for poor, working women to keep their money. The feminist movement also does not appear to have provided the impetus for the amendment of the earnings statute. Feminist activity within the state did not appear until the late 1880s. Case law suggests that the law may have been modified due to the growing numbers of married businesswomen, but the legislature's motives in amending the statute are unclear.

 

Revised July 23, 2003 (MD)