New York

A diverse history, as well as a record of continuing challenges, has characterized motherhood in the state of New York. This history begins with the Iroquois Indians, with their matrilineal culture, gender parity, and matrilocal households. Clan mothers enjoyed much political influence. These rights were unknown among Europeans, although in New Netherland, settled in 1624, women could inherit property, retain it in marriage, and bequeath it as well. Under English rule, beginning in 1664, these rights deteriorated. Subsequently, activists labored to improve mothers' status in many ways.

In New York, various reform efforts involved motherhood. After the Revolutionary War, mothers gained attention as the nurturers of future citizens, leading to expansion in women's educational opportunities. New York feminists began to demand equality, and, in 1848, met at Seneca Falls for the first women's rights convention in the United States. Activists called for female property rights, educational and job opportunities, the vote, and equal rights to custody of children. New York mothers gained this last objective in 1902. The utopian Oneida community went so far as to abolish monogamous marriage, attempt to prevent unwanted pregnancies, and institute communal child rearing.

Motherhood continued to enter into reforms of the 19th and early 20th centuries. Temperance activists argued that alcohol abuse led to domestic violence and the squandering of fathers' paychecks. Catholic nuns, middle-class Protestants, and African Americans and Jews worked to assist poor mothers and children. Settlement house workers, as at Henry Street Settlement, worked to improve the lives of poor immigrant mothers with childcare, visiting nurses, and agitation for protective labor laws and better working and living conditions. In 1915, the state adopted Mother's Pensions, a social welfare program to assist widowed mothers. In New York, the concerns of mothers were prominent in social welfare, labor, and urban issues.