Why do we love Elizabeth? Called "the leading voice and philosopher of the women's rights and suffrage movements," Elizabeth Cady Stanton was the cofounder of the first great push for American women's equality. She was among the only of those early crusaders to insist upon equality in all realms, not only suffrage. Elizabeth worked hard to get the best education available to women when she was growing up, studying Greek, Latin, and mathematics. She was among the first women to eliminate the word "obey" from her marriage ceremony to abolitionist Harry Stanton when she was 25. They honeymooned at the London World's Anti-Slavery Convention in 1840, where Elizabeth befriended Lucretia Mott, another American delegate who was, along with all other women present, prohibited from sitting in the convention hall. Elizabeth and her husband returned to Seneca Falls, New York. In 1848, Elizabeth and Lucretia, among others, planned a convention to determine and publicize an agenda for achieving women's liberation. Attended by 300 women and men, the 1848 Seneca Falls Women's Rights Convention was a landmark in American activism, and it was entirely Elizabeth's baby (which she tended whilst raising seven children). She drafted the strongly worded Declaration of Rights and Sentiments, which was opposed by more conservative members, including Lucretia Mott and Elizabeth's husband, Harry Stanton. Soon after the convention, she met her lifelong friend and longtime partner, Susan B. Anthony. Together, they attacked the many facets of the restriction of women, from laws that prevented married women from owning anything in their own names to restrictive codes of dress. Elizabeth was seen as the radical and was often reduced to writing the speeches Susan would deliver, since her very presence was often seen as audacious. Among her bolder acts, Elizabeth wrote The Women's Bible, a huge project wherein she corrected all sexist references in biblical passages. It was an immediate bestseller. Elizabeth and Susan eventually parted ways politically—Susan's primary crusade was for the vote at any price, while Elizabeth was loath to ally herself with the conservative, religious crusaders who were making headway toward achieving suffrage. They nevertheless remained friends for the rest of their lives. Though she didn't live to see women attain voting rights (over a hundred years after her birth, and almost 150 years after the signing of the Declaration of Independence), she never ended her crusade to make the voices of women heard on all subjects. Biography: Born - November 12, 1815 Johnstown, New York Died - October 26, 1902 New York, New York In her own words -- On declaring our rights: Modeled precisely on the Declaration of Independence, Stanton's Declaration of Rights and Sentiments included a litany of injustices imposed upon the oppressed party, in this case women, by the tyrannical ruler, men: "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 law 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. 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 the 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 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 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."   March 28   •   March 30 Home