"The voice of woman has been silenced in the state, the church, and the home, but man cannot fulfill his destiny alone, he cannot redeem his race unaided."
-Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Keynote Address, Seneca Falls Convention
Important Women
Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott were abolitionists who went to London to attend the World Anti-Slavery Convention. Once they got there, they were not allowed to attend because they were women. This made them ready to plan a women's rights convention. At first, there were only five women involved (Gurko 2). These five
women included Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Martha Coffin Wright, Lucretia
Mott, Jane Hunt, and Mary Ann McClintock. The five women all gathered around Jane Hunt's table to discuss organizing a convention (Cullen-DuPont).
"There I met several members of different families of Friends, earnest, thoughtful women. I poured out, that day, the torrent of my long-accumulating discontent, with such vehemence and indignation that I stirred myself, as well as the rest of the party, to do and dare anything. My discontent, according to Emerson, must have been healthy, for it moved us all to prompt action, and we decided, then and there, to call a 'Woman's Rights Convention.' We wrote the call that evening and published it in the Seneca County Courier the next day, the 14th of July, 1848, giving only five days' notice, as the convention was to be held on the 19th and 20th. The call was inserted without signatures,–in fact it was a mere announcement of a meeting,–but the chief movers and managers were Lucretia Mott, Mary Ann McClintock, Jane Hunt, Martha C. Wright, and myself. The convention, which was held two days in the Methodist Church, was in every way a grand success. The house was crowded at every session, the speaking good, and a religious earnestness dignified all the proceedings."
(Stanton, Eighty Years and More)
" But the female abolitionists quickly discovered (Elizabeth Cady Stanton; pt. 2)
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" 'As Mrs. Mott and I walked home arm and arm, we resolved to hold a convention as soon as we returned home to America and form a society to advocate the rights of women.' " (Elizabeth Cady Stanton; pt. 2)
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Elizabeth Cady Stanton | Lucretia Mott | Martha C. Wright | Mary Ann McClintock | Jane Hunt | July 19, 1848 | July 20, 1848