| Book Review | The American Historical Review, 109.3

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| Book Review | The American Historical Review, 109.3 | The History Cooperative

Book Review

Canada and the United States

Hendrik Hartog. Man and Wife in America: A History. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. 2000. Pp. vii, 408. $29.95.

Hendrik Hartog's book is particularly relevant in an era when debate over gay marriage is front-page news. The issues raised by this debate—the rights, responsibilities, and expectations of what marriage is and can do for individuals as well as constraints imposed by the marriage contract—are at the heart of the book, even though it is focused on traditional male/female marriages from the late eighteenth century to the 1950s—what the author calls the "long nineteenth century." Hartog's main argument is that marriage law has been shaped since the late eighteenth century by ordinary men and women as they sought to enjoy the benefits and protections of marriage as well as to escape its constraints; this argument is posed in opposition to the view that the law of marriage has been determined by internal legal logic or the wishes of those in power, namely upper and middle-class men who control the legal system. Hartog claims that he is challenging the methodological assumption that the "work of history is ... to reveal the masked ideological assumptions and goals of the judges" (p. 4). In stressing the power of ordinary folks to shape the legal system, Hartog's thesis suggests that gay marriage will be ultimately decided, not by the religious right or by constitutional amendment, but by people's attempts to engage in or escape from the institution of marriage.

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