Elizabeth Cady Stanton & the Seneca Falls Convention
Elizabeth Cady Stanton made her first public speech at the Woman’s Rights Convention in Seneca Falls, New York, on July 19, 1848. After Cady Stanton was denied participation in an anti-slavery convention and was told that women were ‘constitutionally unfit for public and business meetings,’ she and four other women, including abolitionist Lucretia Coffin Mott, planned a convention to challenge that notion. They drafted a ‘Declaration of Sentiments and Resolutions’–11 resolutions calling for equal rights for women, including the right to vote. After lengthy debate, the document was amended and signed by 68 women and 32 men of the approximately 300 attendees, setting the American women’s rights movement in motion.
Photo: Library of Congress
