"Weary of Petticoat Government": The Specter of Female Rule in Early Nineteenth-Century Shaker Politics

MOST STUDENTS OF SHAKER HISTORY are familiar with the story of how Ann Lee established her right, as a woman, to head the new church in New England.According to Jethro Turner, one of her early male American followers, she was specifically asked by the potential converts Joseph Meacham and Calvin Harlow about the apparent contradiction between her leadership role and her gender.She answered with an illuminating metaphor, comparing the governance of the church of Christ to the governance of the family.Mother answered, "The order of man, in the natural creation, is a figure of the order of God in the spiritual creation. . . .Where they both stand in their proper order, the man is the first, and the woman the second in the government of the family. . . .All the children, both male and female, must be subject to their parents; and the woman, being second, must be subject to her husband, who is the first; but when the man is gone, the right of government belongs to the woman: So is the family of Christ."Joseph Meacham acknowledged Ann Lee's spiritual authority as a result.He saw Jesus Christ to be the Father of the spiritual creation, who was now absent; and he saw Ann Lee to be the Mother, of all who were now begotten in the regeneration, and she being present in the body, the power and authority of Christ on earth, was committed to her; and to her appertained the right of leading, directing and governing all her spiritual children. 1