The Ph.D. Program in History at the CUNY Graduate Center Presents…
The 13th Annual John Patrick Diggins Memorial Lecture
Mary Bilder on “The Perils of Sex: Catharine Macaulay’s Constitution of Liberty”

Wednesday, February 25th 2026, 6:30 PM – 8:00 PM

 

The influential constitutional historian Catharine Macaulay published the first female-authored constitutional plan in 1767. A mysterious revision offers a glimpse at Macaulay’s desire for women to have the same independence as men in a democratical political state. Her family’s rise to wealth taught her that the male constitutional state was built on the perils of sex and maternal morbidity. Her plan reflects constitutional liberty as imagined by a woman and suggests a historical foundation for an expansive conception of constitutional liberty.

 

This event will take place in the Segal Theatre and will be livestreamed via Zoom. For In-Person RSVPs, please email [email protected]. For online attendance, please register here.