Near panic gripped the five feminists as they gathered around the McClintocks’ parlor table the following Sunday morning. They had only three days to set an agenda and prepare a document ‘for the inauguration of a rebellion.’ Supervised by Cady Stanton, they drafted a ‘Declaration of Sentiments and Resolutions,’ paraphrasing the Declaration of Independence. The document declared that, ‘all men and women are created equal’ and ‘are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights…’ These natural rights belong equally to women and men, but man ‘has usurped the prerogative of Jehovah himself, claiming it as his right to assign for her a sphere of action, when that belongs to her conscience and to her God.’ The result has been ‘the establishment of an absolute tyranny over her.’

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There followed a specific catalog of injustices. Women were denied access to higher education, the professions, and the pulpit, as well as equal pay for equal work. If married, they had no property rights; even the wages they earned legally belonged to their husbands. Women were subject to a different moral code, yet legally bound to tolerate moral delinquencies in their husbands. Wives could be punished, and in a case of divorce, a mother had no child custody rights. In every way, man ‘has endeavored to destroy [woman's] confidence in her own powers, to lessen her self-esteem, and to make her willing to lead a dependent and abject life.’ Above all, every woman had been deprived of ‘her inalienable right to the elective franchise.’

Eleven resolutions demanding redress of these and other grievances accompanied the nearly 1,000 word Declaration. When Cady Stanton insisted upon including a resolution favoring voting rights for women, her otherwise supportive husband threatened to boycott the event. Even Lucretia Mott warned her, ‘Why Lizzie, thee will make us ridiculous!’ ‘Lizzie,’ however, refused to yield.

Although the gathering was a convention for and of women, it was regarded as ‘unseemly’ for a lady to conduct a public meeting, so Lucretia’s husband, James Mott, agreed to chair the two-day event. Mary Ann McClintock’s husband, Thomas, also participated. Henry Stanton left town.

When the organizers arrived at the Wesleyan Chapel on the morning of Wednesday, July 19th, they found the door locked. No one had a key, so Cady Stanton’s young nephew scrambled in through an open window and unbarred the front door. As the church filled with spectators, another dilemma presented itself. The first day’s sessions had been planned for women exclusively, but almost 40 men showed up. After a hasty council at the altar, the leadership decided to let the men stay, since they were already seated and seemed genuinely interested.

Tall and dignified in his Quaker garb, James Mott called the first session to order at 11:00 A.M., and appointed the McClintocks’ older daughter (also named Mary Ann) as secretary. Cady Stanton, in what was her first public speech, rose to state the purpose of the convention. ‘We have met here today to discuss our rights and wrongs, civil and political.’ She then read the Declaration, paragraph by paragraph, and urged all present to participate freely in the discussions. The Declaration was re-read several times, amended, and adopted unanimously. Both Lucretia Mott and Cady Stanton addressed the afternoon session, as did the McClintocks’ younger daughter, Elizabeth. To lighten up the proceedings, Mott read a satirical article on ‘woman’s sphere’ that her sister Martha had published in local newspapers. Later that evening, Mott spoke to a broader audience on ‘The Progress of Reforms.’

The second day’s sessions were given over to the 11 resolutions. As Mott feared, the most contentious proved to be the ninth–the suffrage resolution. The other 10 passed unanimously. According to Cady Stanton’s account, most who opposed this resolution did so because they believed it would compromise the others. She, however, remained adamant. ‘To have drunkards, idiots, horse racing rum-selling rowdies, ignorant foreigners, and silly boys fully recognized, while we ourselves are thrust out from all the rights that belong to citizens, is too grossly insulting to be longer quietly submitted to. The right is ours. We must have it.’ Even Cady Stanton’s eloquence would not have carried the day but for the vocal support she received from Frederick Douglass, the ex-slave and abolitionist editor of the North Star. ‘Right is of no sex,’ he argued; woman is ‘justly entitled to all we claim for man.’ After much heated debate, the ninth resolution passed–barely.

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