Did England's successful Queens have any effect on women's rights, inheritance of title or public sentiment towards women's perception as leaders?

by MarianaTrenchBlue

England has had some very impactful, successful, and admired female monarchs. Elizabeth Tudor, Victoria and Elizabeth now. But it seems like their success and esteem didn't really have an impact on women's ability to inherit property or titles.

Were there any feminists earlier in England's history who were influenced by these women's leadership? Why did the public accept the rule of women monarchs, but not give women leadership roles or voting rights based on the queens' competency?

Somecrazynerd

This is an interesting question.

During the 16th century when Mary I and Elizabeth ruled, there were some foreign travellers who said the women in England were bolder than other countries. This evidence is somewhat anecdotal and it doesn't suggest any particular effect, nor any specific connection with queens regnant. But perhaps at the cultural level in the upper classes it did have some impact? We can also see that ladies attendant on such queens had a more direct access to the top level of power than when attending on a consort. This was noted by observers during Elizabeth's reign as a potential worry, because of course they were concerned with women "forgetting their place" and becoming too significantly and overtly involved ("Petticoats and Politics: Elisabeth Parr and Female Agency at the Early Elizabethan Court", Helen Graham-Matheson in “The Politics of Female Households: Ladies-in-waiting across Early Modern Europe”, edited by Nadine Akkerman, Birgit Houben 2013). For most court women, subtly was required whenever attempting to exert significant political influence. They had to either work in certain areas, like Anna (Anne) of Denmark's influence on her children's household staff, or through certain methods, such as when Robert Cecil's wife Elizabeth acted as intermediary with Christopher Hatton and he described in letters as if was a poor last resort option. There doesn't seem to have been much difference before and after the accession of queen regnants on this functioning; subtlety was still very much required. Elizabeth I was often described as an exception, the quality of monarchy was such that it allowed her to exercise the kind of overt power other women did not have, even to be chief of government. But not because they were considering allowing other women into offices. As the tensions in Matheson's work show, that women in the court circle might desire offices of their own was a significant bugbear. And women's opportunities for agency only continued to decline further. Ironically, as well as some cultural developments around gender standards, modernisation actually hurt them. Without the court attendant role being as relevant through personal monarchal power, and with court culture on the decline, it increased the number of wives confined to housewifery.

In Victoria's case we can see this principle apply actually even more. While it was part of the general era (and the previous centuries) that monarch's personal power was declining, it is still noteworthy that Victoria was often praised as an ideal feminine role model; a modest family woman, but rarely as the kind of central figure of state Elizabeth I was described as. Victoria was occasionally influential over political matters, but the primary work and decision making of governance was not in her hands. And that image of a sort of housewife queen arguably actually contributed to reinforcing gender standards; by presenting her as a role model for the vogue values rather than a exception or contradiction to them. While there were some reforms, in some respects the 19th century was the worst century for historical Western women. The current Elizabeth has also largely followed in Victoria's footsteps in being relatively palatable for conservative views on gender while politically not being the centre of focus.

So in conclusion, which he might speculate about a small number of women being embolden slightly, particularly in the 16th century with court attendants, I'm not aware of any real evidence than queens regnants made any difference. And in Victoria's time in particular, the economic growth of the middle class allowing for it while ideology was promoting it made it a strong period for housewives. Housewives aren't necessarily irrelevant, but given power was increasingly focused on that area of official parliamentary and bureaucratic power they were barred from, being married to a high-status person was not as useful without court culture and the role of court attendants. The emphasis on female fragility was also stronger, compared to the medieval acceptance that most working-class women (of which there were many) were also working women. Not a good environment to allow women agency, hence the suffragettes.