The U.S. Civil Wars Impact on Womens Work and Political Participation

Madison Arnsbarger, Andreas Ferrara and Paige Montrose
Additional contact information
Madison Arnsbarger: Weber State University
Andreas Ferrara: University of Pittsburgh
Paige Montrose: University of Pittsburgh

CAGE Online Working Paper Series from Competitive Advantage in the Global Economy (CAGE)

Abstract: This paper studies the role of economic participation via the labour market in enabling the political mobilization of an underrepresented group. Specifically, we study the wives and daughters of disabled Union Army soldiers after the U.S. Civil War. Linking Union Army enlistment records to the 1860 and 1870 U.S. censuses, we find that the wives and daughters of disabled veterans were significantly more likely to participate in the labour force than those of non-disabled veterans. Historical evidence suggests that disabled veterans were also more exposed to post-war alcohol and substance abuse, increasing the household burdens faced by women. Town-level data show that increases in womens labour force participation combined with higher shares of disabled veterans predict more Temperance Crusade activity in 1873/74. Information provision via newspapers and proximity to other protest towns amplify these effects. Using unit-level disability rates as an instrument for veterans disability status supports a causal interpretation of the labour market effects. Our results suggest that labour force participation can be an important enabling factor for the political mobilization of underrepresented groups.

Keywords: U.S. Civil War; Female Labor Force Participation; Temperance; Political Activism JEL Classification: N31; J15; J18; D72 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/economics/research/c ... tions/wp807.2026.pdf

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cge:wacage:807

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in CAGE Online Working Paper Series from Competitive Advantage in the Global Economy (CAGE) Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Jane Snape ().