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Conclusion
- Indiana University Press
- Chapter
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Free Will Christians—Arminian Anglicans, Quakers, and Roman Catholics—shared a fundamental view of salvation that tended to unify them more often than their professed differences divided them. They believed that all sinners had an equal opportunity to work toward eternal salvation—if they chose to do “good works.” Conversely, Maryland Particular Baptists, Presbyterians, Puritans, and other followers of John Calvin’s predestinarian beliefs perceived their world as corrupt, ®awed, and feigned; these “elect,” with their passive souls, awaited certain salvation; they thus saw “good works” as a sign, not a cause, of their election. This essential theological bifurcation had a decisive impact upon women ’s freedom in the early modern English world. In Maryland, Calvinists’ belief in predestination contributed to their perception that Eve’s daughters tended to be wanton, lustful creatures who by nature led their men astray. Thus, Calvinist Predestinarian males had a moral duty to protect society and their families from these “weaker vessels”by favoring hierarchical family structures headed by strong patriarchs; it was their duty to limit a female’s freedom. In keeping with this moral imperative, patriarchs tended to treat their wives as dependents in their bequests—by bequeathing them merely personal goods or rigorously restricting their control of any land given to them. The beliefs held by Free Will Christians, on the other hand, encouraged them to construct a de¤nition of womanhood that emphasized women ’s central role in their families as companions, con¤dantes, and loving partners. Thus, Free Will Christians supported more egalitarian familial 180 Conclusion structures that resulted in a more equitable social, political, and economic world for their women. These people fully expected female kin to control land and property, manage it effectively, execute wills, wield power and authority within their families, play pivotal roles in their churches, and have their day in court.1 At a time when seventeenth-century Maryland society was dominated by Free Will Christians, many women moved freely in the public sphere. Yet as the society grew and matured a noticeable shift in inheritance patterns occurred. By the middle of the eighteenth century male testators bequeathed signi¤cantly fewer female heirs real estate. Since Calvinist Predestinarians did not outnumber Free Will Christians in the society at any time during the colonial period, what could explain the widespread adoption of what I have dubbed a “Predestinarian” inheritance pattern by the mid–eighteenth century? Lois Carr and Lorena Walsh have suggested that a disparate sex ratio, in which men outnumbered women, in the seventeenth century provided an environment in which men tended to accord women an elevated role in society.2 Under these circumstances, men who sought female companionship may have had to offer more goods, land, and perhaps power to potential marriage partners in order to attract a spouse. Thus, when the sex ratio equalized after 1704, the culture adopted the traditional English bequest pattern of allocating real estate to sons instead of wives and daughters . In sum, an increase in the number of females available for marriage meant that men could decrease the amount of land offered to their womenfolk .3 Thus, as a community grew and its economy matured, men gave their women less land, particularly when land became less productive and scarcer as planters stripped the soil of nutrients with the overproduction of tobacco . Carr posits that over time families had less land to bequeath children and therefore fathers attempted to preserve as much of the family’s land as possible by leaving their land to sons and bequeathing daughters and wives only movable goods. Surely these demographic and economic interpretations have much to tell us about the behavior of early modern folk. But further investigation might uncover a more complex phenomenon similar to what Amy Louise Erickson found in early modern England, where land was also scarce. In England , while land generally went to sons, daughters did inherit goods of much the same value as their brothers’ portions of the family wealth; moreover , many wives inherited more than their third of the estate. Perhaps Maryland females, like their English counterparts, also continued to preserve their own separate estates that were made up of silver, slaves, and livestock . Further research needs to be done to see just how closely Marylanders’ conclusion 181 [34.204.52.16] Project MUSE (2024-03-28 16:05 GMT) eighteenth-century behavior followed Erickson’s ¤ndings for early modern England. Yet it might be worthwhile to speculate about other factors, such as religion, that may...