The value of democracy and human freedoms in the USA was laid in the state’s very foundation, its constitution. Still, the country’s authorities have long turned a blind eye to the infringement of rights to participate in political life. The logical response to this imposed discrimination was the desire of the educated part of the female population to assert the need for universal equality. The main objective of this essay is to analyze the impact of the Seneca Falls conference on the women’s rights movement in the United States and to consider its contribution to history.
Women began fighting for their rights earlier than the Seneca Falls convention. During the Civil War, they effectively performed many traditionally male jobs. A very strong spark in the popularization of feminism was the Industrial Revolution, when many Americans moved from the villages to the cities, became entrepreneurs, and worked in industrial plants (Ruiz Ulloa, 2020). Female workers were paid half wages at best, and career advancement was unrealistic. This artificially created ceiling disgusted many educated women. In addition, there were restrictions on the ability to vote and elect a government.
For first-wave feminists, the main impetus for the formation of this movement was a lack of understanding of why a contribution to the United States of those years was devalued. The London Anti-Slavery Convention of 1837 hugely impacted the popularization of the struggle. Nine American women were invited there, including Elizabeth Cady Stanton (Ruiz Ulloa, 2020). They could not attend the convention because 90 percent of the attendees refused to let them follow, based on the argument that no one but men is capable of making informed political decisions (Ruiz Ulloa, 2020). This event is considered the starting point of what later, after the Seneca Falls convention, became the women’s rights movement.
Seneca Falls, in the 1840s, became densely populated industrial area embraced by reform movements. Among the locals, the idea of abolishing slavery was particularly appealing (Ruiz Ulloa, 2020). The draft convention arose at Jane Hunt’s home after a tea party at which some of the town’s most educated people. These women, brought up in the spirit of equality and higher education, became congress leaders. The model for the future policy document was the Declaration of Independence, which the organizers adapted to their purposes. Seneca Falls in 1848, the first-ever women’s rights convention was held with 300 people in attendance (Ruiz Ulloa, 2020). It began on July 19 and lasted two days, participants to discuss women’s rights publicly for the first time (Ruiz Ulloa, 2020). The convention covered religious, civil, and social rights. The greatest debate was over the right to vote, because many felt that granting voting rights to women was an extreme measure, but in the end, all the resolutions were approved.
The chief legacy of the Seneca Falls convention was the Declaration of Sentiments, written by Elizabeth Stanton. Based on the Declaration of Independence, the text included a list of rights and freedoms to be granted to women. It had the principle of the universal equality of the sexes and the requirement that women be given the right to choose their power. This declaration represented the first time people gathered to fight for their rights (Ruiz Ulloa, 2020). The convention was the first of a series of such events in the history of the feminist movement, raising awareness of the difficult situation in which women found themselves. Seventy-two years later, on August 26, 1920, the 19th amendment to the constitution gave women the right to vote.
At the end of this essay, it is important to note that U.S. civil society has come a long way to ensure that all people are equal in their rights, regardless of race or gender. Dynamically evolving in the mid-19th century, it faced important civilizational choices. The Seneca Falls convention set in motion a chain of changes, the consequences of which every modern woman can experience for herself, whether running a large technology company or casting her vote for a candidate of her choice in the voting booth.
Reference
Ruiz Ulloa, A. (2020). The origins of women’s rights movement in the United States: the Seneca Falls Convention. Univerisdad del Pais Wasko.