That Woman Is Man's Equal:
The Seneca Falls Declaration 1 Women did not share the opportunities that the free-labor system made available to white men.
In 1848, more than 150 women and 30 men met at Seneca Falls, New York, to protest the male
supremacy that prevailed throughout America. This first women's-rights convention adopted the
"Declaration of Sentiments," reprinted here, drafted by Elizabeth Cady Stanton. Born in 1815 in
a small town in New York, Stanton received a good education and, with her husband, Henry B.
Stanton, was an active abolitionist. Stanton's Seneca Falls Declaration appealed to widely shared
American ideals in order to demonstrate that drastic changes were necessary if those ideals were
to have much meaning for women. Declaration of Sentiments, 1848
When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one portion of the family of man
to assume among the people of the earth a position different from that which they have hitherto
occupied, but one to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle them, a decent respect
to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes that impel them to such a
course.
We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men and women are created equal; that they are
endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and
the pursuit of happiness; that to secure these rights governments are instituted, deriving their just
powers from the consent of the governed. Whenever any form of government becomes
destructive of these ends, it is the right of those who suffer from it to refuse allegiance to it, and
to insist upon the institution of a new government, laying its foundations on such principles, and
organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and
happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be
changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience bath shown that mankind
are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the
forms to which they were accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing
invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their
duty to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security. Such has
been the patient sufferance of the women under this government, and such is now the necessity
which constrains them to demand the equal station to which they are entitled.
The history of mankind is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations on the part of man
toward woman, having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over her. To
prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has never permitted her to exercise her inalienable right to the elective franchise. He has
compelled her to submit to laws, in the formation of which she had no voice. He has withheld
from her rights which are given to the most ignorant and degraded men — both natives and
foreigners. Having deprived her of this first right of a citizen, the elective franchise, thereby leaving her
without representation in the halls of legislation, he has opposed her on all sides.
He has made her, if married, in the eye of the law, civilly dead.
He has taken from her all right in property, even to the wages she earns.
He has made her, morally, an irresponsible being, as she can commit many crimes with impunity,
provided they be done in the presence of her husband. In the covenant of marriage, she is
compelled to promise obedience to her husband, he becoming, to all intents and purposes, her
master — the law giving him power to deprive her of her liberty, and to administer chastisement.
He has so framed the laws of divorce, as to what shall be the proper causes, and in case of
separation, to whom the guardianship of the children shall be given, as to be wholly regardless of
the happiness of women — the law, in all cases, going upon a false supposition of the supremacy
of man, and giving all power into his hands.
After depriving her of all rights as a married woman, if single, and the owner of property, he has
taxed her to support a government which recognizes her only when her property can be made
profitable to it.
He has monopolized nearly all the profitable employments, and from those she is permitted to
follow, she receives but a scanty remuneration. He closes against her all the avenues to wealth
and distinction which he considers most honorable to himself. As a teacher of theology,
medicine, or law, she is not known.
He has denied her the facilities for obtaining a thorough education, all colleges being closed
against her.
He allows her in Church, as well as State, but in a subordinate position, claiming Apostolic
authority for her exclusion from the ministry, and, with some exceptions, from any public
participation in the affairs of the Church.
He has created a false public sentiment by giving to the world a different code of morals for men
and women, by which moral delinquencies which exclude women from society, are not only
tolerated, but deemed of little account in man.
He 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.
He has endeavored, in every way that he could, to destroy her confidence in her own powers, to
lessen her self-respect, and to make her willing to lead a dependent and abject life.
Now, in view of this entire disfranchisement of one-half the people of this country their social
and religious degradation — in view of the unjust laws above mentioned, and because women do feel themselves aggrieved, oppressed, and fraudulently deprived of their most sacred rights, we
insist that they have immediate admission to all the rights and privileges which belong to them as
citizens of the United States.
In entering upon the great work before us, we anticipate no small amount of misconception,
misrepresentation, and ridicule; but we shall use every instrumentality within our power to effect
our object. We shall employ agents, circulate tracts, petition the State and National legislatures,
and endeavor to enlist the pulpit and the press in our behalf. We hope this Convention will be
followed by a series of Conventions embracing every part of the country. Resolutions
WHEREAS, The great precept of nature is conceded to be, that "man shall pursue his own true
and substantial happiness." [William] Blackstone in his Commentaries remarks, that this law of
Nature being coequal with mankind, and dictated by God himself, is of course superior in
obligation to any other. It is binding over all the globe, in all countries and at all times; no human
laws are of any validity if contrary to this, and such of them as are valid, derive all their force,
and all their validity, and all their authority, mediately and immediately, from this original;
therefore,
Resolved, That such laws as conflict, in any way, with the true and substantial happiness of
woman, are contrary to the great precept of nature and of no validity, for this is "superior in
obligation to any other."
Resolved, That all laws which prevent woman from occupying such a station in society as her
conscience shall dictate, or which place her in a position inferior to that of man, are contrary to
the great precept of nature, and therefore of no force or authority.
Resolved, That woman is man's equal — was intended to be so by the Creator, and the highest
good of the race demands that she should be recognized as such.
Resolved, That the women of this country ought to be enlightened in regard to the laws under
which they live, that they may no longer publish their degradation by declaring themselves
satisfied with their present position, nor their ignorance, by asserting that they have all the rights
they want.
Resolved, That inasmuch as man, while claiming for himself intellectual superiority, does accord
to woman moral superiority, it is pre-eminently his duty to encourage her to speak and teach, as
she has an opportunity, in all religious assemblies.
Resolved, That the same amount of virtue, delicacy, and refinement of behavior that is required
of woman in the social state, should also be required of man, and the same transgressions should
be visited with equal severity on both man and woman.
Resolved, That the objection of indelicacy and impropriety, which is so often brought against
woman when she addresses a public audience, comes with a very ill-grace from those who encourage, by their attendance, her appearance on the stage, in the concert, or in feats of the
circus.
Resolved, That woman has too long rested satisfied in the circumscribed limits which corrupt
customs and a perverted application of the Scriptures have marked out for her, and that it is time
she should move in the enlarged sphere which her great Creator has assigned her.
Resolved, That it is the duty of the women of this country to secure to themselves their sacred
right to the elective franchise.
Resolved, That the equality of human rights results necessarily from the fact of the identity of the
race in capabilities and responsibilities.
Resolved, therefore, That, being invested by the Creator with the same capabilities, and the same
consciousness of responsibility for their exercise, it is demonstrably the right and duty of woman,
equally with man, to promote every righteous cause by every righteous means; and especially in
regard to the great subjects of morals and religion, it is self-evidently her right to participate with
her brother in teaching them, both in private and in public, by writing and by speaking, by any
instrumentalities proper to be used, and in any assemblies proper to be held; and this being a selfevident truth growing out of the divinely implanted principles of human nature, any custom or
authority adverse to it, whether modern or wearing the hoary sanction of antiquity, is to be
regarded as a self-evident falsehood, and at war with mankind.
QUESTIONS FOR READING AND DISCUSSION
1. Why do you think that the writers of the Seneca Falls Declaration used the Declaration of
Independence as their model?
2. In what ways did men exercise "an absolute tyranny" over women? Why?
3. In what sense were married women "civilly dead" in the eyes of the law? Why was suffrage
important for women?
4. What changes did the Seneca Falls Declaration propose? What methods might bring about
those changes?
5. How might opponents of the declaration have responded to these arguments? How would the
assumptions of opponents be likely to differ from those of the declaration?

 

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