1965

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illustration - Episcopalian Constance Baker Motley used her legal skills in the cause of Civil Rights
Photo - From Smith College On-line Exhibit, "Agenst of Social Change

Background:

The U.S. Congress has passed the Equal Pay Act, and the Civil Rights Acts of 1957, 1960, and 1964, and the Civil rights Movement is actively challenging segregation and discrimination.
The report of the national Commission on the Status of Women has documented widespread discrimination against women and Betty Friedan's book, The Feminine Mystique is a recent best-seller.
American troops are fully committed to the Vietnam Conflict
President Lyndon Johnson has declared a War on Poverty

The national council turns the Women's Auxiliary into the General Division of Women's Work, and local and diocesan Auxiliary units have become the Episcopal Church Women. ECW has merged its segregated structures.
Women can now earn the B.D. degree at some of the seminaries of the Church, and the separate training programs at Windham House and St. Margaret's are planning to close.
Carman St. John Hunter is serving as the Chief Executive for Education in the Church
Women continue their parish ministries and guilds, leading in parish life and Christian education, serving at diocesan conventions and provincial synods, publishing religious materials, teaching in church schools and Sunday Schools, serving as organists and choir directors or members, serving as domestic and foreign missionaries, joining and founding religious orders, running hospitals and other social service institutions, and funding the United Thank Offering and other ministries.
Women are serving on vestries and may be licensed as lay readers, but only in "isolated areas."
Deaconesses may marry without leaving their ministry and are recognized as being "in orders."

This web page is maintained by Webster Joan R. Gundersen
for the Episcopal Women's History Project.