Advertisement for the Woman’s Rights Convention of 1848 (courtesy of the National Parks Service)
BY: CECELIA KAUFMANN, WINTER 2021 COLLABORATOR AT POWER IN PLACE
“We are assembled to protest against a form of government, existing without the consent of the governed – to declare our right to be free as man is free, to be represented in the government which we are taxed to support, to have such disgraceful laws as give man the power to chastise and imprison his wife, to take the wages which she earns, the property which she inherits, and, in case of separation, the children of her love; laws test against such unjust laws as these that we are assembled today, and to have them, if possible, forever erased from our statute-books, deeming them as a shame and a disgrace to a Christian republic in the nineteenth century...”
- Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Seneca Falls, 1848
On a balmy day in July, July 19th to be exact, the First Woman's Rights Convention kicked off in Seneca Falls, New York in 1848. This event, led by Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and Lucretia Mott, attracted 300 people, mostly women to a convention that would go down in history as the catalyst for the woman’s suffrage movement. Stanton’s call to action was titled the Declaration of Sentiments derived heavily from the Declaration of Independence. She said, “We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men and women are created equal.”
Lesser-known is the details of the conception of this conference. In 1840, both Stanton and Mott were barred from the convention floor at the World Anti-Slavery Convention in London. Though they were both well-known abolitionist of their time, the men of the convention did not see it fitting for women to be on the floor and involved in discussions. Angered by this, they both decided that they would create a convention, for women, by women on their own. This led to the conception of the First Woman’s Right Convention and the subsequent framework for the woman’s rights movement for decades.
The first day of the convention, only women were allowed to attend and the few men who were allowed in were asked to be quiet while the events unfolded. Stanton began reading the Declaration of Sentiments and one by one, each paragraph was edited and the women in attendance decided they would vote the following day with men in attendance. Most of the resolutions passed unanimously, including men not withholding women’s rights, or taking her property, but a numbered few dissented on the idea of women being allowed to vote, including Lucretia Mott. In the end, the Declaration of Sentiments was adopted unanimously on July 20th.
Although a momentous event in the history of women’s suffrage, there are some notable groups and issues not discussed. For one, there is no mention of enslaved women (or men) as well as indigenous women (or men). Furthermore, many of the sentiments come from an extremely elitist perspective, which wasn’t uncommon for many woman’s suffrage texts at this time. Many press and religious groups spoke out against the convention because many of the sentiments criticize the church and even the notion of giving women the right to vote in the 1840s seemed unreasonable and unlikely. This notion challenged the perceptions of women and the framework of American society at this time.
On the other hand, Frederick Douglass, world-renowned abolitionists and supporter of woman’s suffrage was in attendance and spoke at the convention. In his newspaper, The North Star, "[T]here can be no reason in the world for denying to woman the exercise of the elective franchise...." The notion of woman’s equality and suffrage was almost unheard of at this point in history but the Seneca Falls Convention in 1848 sparked the fire for decades of a never-ending fight for women’s equality and laid the groundwork for feminist movements to come.
Courtesy of the Library of Congress
References:
1 Kelly, Martin. “Seneca Falls Convention.” Thought Co., 2020. https://www.thoughtco.com/seneca-falls-convention-105508
2 History, Art & Archives, U.S. House of Representatives, Office of the Historian, Women in Congress, 1917–2006. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 2007. “The Women’s Rights Movement, 1848–1917,” https://history.house.gov/Exhibitions-and-Publications/WIC/Historical-Essays/No-Lady/Continued-Challenges/