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de. No doubt his behavior gave Caddy psychological pressure and made her feel ashamed, so that her life style was affected afterwards. Ⅳ. Women’s Social Status Reflected from Caddy’s Tragedy From Caddy’s tragedy, we can see that the social status of women was very low in the early of the 20th century. A. Women Having Fewer Rights at That Time Throughout most of history women generally have had fewer legal rights and career opportunities than men. Wifehood and motherhood were regarded as women’s most significant professions. In the 20th century, however, women in most nations won the right to vote and increased their educational and job opportunities. Perhaps most important, they fought for and to a large degree accomplished a reevaluation of traditional views of their role in society. But in the South America, there is a traditional, idealized Southern code of honor and conduct. This code is a legacy of the old South, a highly paternalistic society in which men were expected to act like gentlemen and women like ladies. Just like Caddy, since she was a child, who was taught that she was expected to act as a lady. They could not do something obey the code. In the end of the 19th century, women began working outside their homes in large numbers, notably in textile mills and garment shops. In poorly ventilated, crowded rooms women (and children) worked for as long as 12 hours a day. Great Britain passed a ten-hour-day law for women and children in 1847, but in the United States it was not until the 1910s that the states began to pass legislation limiting working hours and improving working conditions of women and children. But it had not changed the condition yet. And the myth of the natural inferiority of women greatly influenced the status of women in law. Under the common law of England, an unmarried woman could own property, made a contract, or sue and be sued. But a married woman, defined as being one with her husband, gave up her name, and virtually all her property came under her husband’s control. During the early history of the United States, a man virtually owned his wife and children as he did his material possessions. If a poor man chose to send his children to the poorhouse, the mother was legally defenseless to object. Some communities, however, modified the common law to allow women to act as lawyers in the courts, to sue for property, and to own property in their own names if their husbands agreed. Besides, in the early of the 20th century, women had no right in politics. Women were outsiders to the formal structures of political life -- voting, serving on juries, and holding elective office – and they were subject to wide-ranging discrimination that marked them as secondary citizens. In 1900, women’s legal standing was fundamentally governed by their marital status. They had very few rights. A married woman had no separate legal identity from that of her husband. She had no right to control her biological reproduction, and no right to sue or be sued since she had no separate standing in court. She had no right to own property in her own name or to pursue a career of her choice. Women could not vote, serve on juries, or hold public office. According to the Supreme Court, they were not “persons” under the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, which guarantees equal protection under the law. American women have had the right to vote since 1920, but their political roles have been minimal. There were only sever