Declaration of Sentiments
The Declaration of Sentiments, also known as the Declaration of Rights and Sentiments, is a document signed in 1848 by 68 women and 32 men—100 out of some 300 attendees at the first women's rights convention to be organized by women. Held in Seneca Falls, New York, the convention is now known as the Seneca Falls Convention. The principal author of the Declaration was Elizabeth Cady Stanton, who modeled it upon the United States Declaration of Independence. She was a key organizer of the convention along with Lucretia Coffin Mott, and Martha Coffin Wright.
According to the North Star, published by Frederick Douglass, whose attendance at the convention and support of the Declaration helped pass the resolutions put forward, the document was the "grand movement for attaining the civil, social, political, and religious rights of women."
Opening paragraphs
Sentiments
- He has not ever 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 her from rights which are given to the most ignorant and degraded men—both natives and foreigners.
- Having deprived her of this first right as a citizen, the elective franchise, thereby leaving her without representation in the halls of legislation, he has oppressed 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 of divorce, 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 a 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 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 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.
Closing remarks
Signers
Signers of the Declaration at Seneca Falls in order:- Lucretia Mott
- Harriet Cady Eaton - sister of Elizabeth Cady Stanton
- Margaret Pryor - Quaker reformer
- Elizabeth Cady Stanton
- Eunice Newton Foote
- Mary Ann M'Clintock - Quaker reformer, half-sister of Margaret Pryor
- Margaret Schooley
- Martha C. Wright - Quaker reformer, sister of Lucretia Mott
- Jane C. Hunt
- Amy Post
- Catherine F. Stebbins
- Mary Ann Frink
- Lydia Hunt Mount - well-off Quaker widow
- Delia Matthews
- Catharine V. Paine - 18 years old at the time, she is likely one of two signers of the Declaration of Sentiments to have cast a ballot. Catherine Paine Blaine registered to vote in Seattle in 1885 after Washington Territory extended voting rights to women in 1883, making her the first female signer of the Declaration of Sentiments to legally register as a voter.
- Elizabeth W. M'Clintock - daughter of Mary Ann M'Clintock. She invited Frederick Douglass to attend.
- Malvina Beebe Seymour
- Phebe Mosher
- Catherine Shaw
- Deborah Scott
- Sarah Hallowell
- Mary M'Clintock - daughter of Mary Ann M'Clintock
- Mary Gilbert
- Sophrone Taylor
- Cynthia Davis
- Hannah Plant
- Lucy Jones
- Sarah Whitney
- Mary H. Hallowell
- Elizabeth Conklin
- Sally Pitcher
- Mary Conklin
- Susan Quinn
- Mary S. Mirror
- Phebe King
- Julia Ann Drake
- Charlotte Woodward - the only signer who lived to see the 19th amendment though illness apparently prevented her from ever voting.
- Martha Underhill - her nephew also signed
- Eunice Barker
- Sarah R. Woods
- Lydia Gild
- Sarah Hoffman
- Elizabeth Leslie
- Martha Ridley
- Rachel D. Bonnel
- Betsey Tewksbury
- Rhoda Palmer - the only woman signer who ever legally voted, in 1918 when New York passed female suffrage.
- Margaret Jenkins
- Cynthia Fuller
- Mary Martin
- P.A. Culvert
- Susan R. Doty
- Rebecca Race
- Sarah A. Mosher
- Mary E. Vail - daughter of Lydia Mount
- Lucy Spalding
- Lavinia Latham
- Sarah Smith
- Eliza Martin
- Maria E. Wilbur
- Elizabeth D. Smith
- Caroline Barker
- Ann Porter
- Experience Gibbs
- Antoinette E. Segur
- Hannah J. Latham - daughter of Lavinia Latham
- Sarah Sisson
- :The following men signed, under the heading "…the gentlemen present in favor of this new movement":
- Richard P. Hunt - husband of Jane C. Hunt, brother of Lydia Mount and Hannah Plant, all also signers
- Samuel D. Tillman
- Justin Williams
- Elisha Foote - spouse of Eunice Newton Foote
- Frederick Douglass
- Henry W. Seymour - spouse of Malvina Beebe Seymour, a signer
- Henry Seymour
- David Spalding - spouse of Lucy Spalding
- William G. Barker
- Elias J. Doty
- John Jones
- William S. Dell - uncle of Rachel Dell Bonnel, a signer
- James Mott - husband of Lucretia Mott
- William Burroughs
- Robert Smalldridge
- Jacob Matthews
- Charles L. Hoskins
- Thomas M'Clintock - husband of Mary Ann M'Clintock
- Saron Phillips
- Jacob Chamberlain - Methodist Episcopal and later a member of the US House of Representatives.
- Jonathan Metcalf
- Nathan J. Milliken
- S.E. Woodworth
- Edward F. Underhill - his aunt was Martha Barker Underhill, a signer
- George W. Pryor - son of Margaret Pryor who also signed
- Joel Bunker
- Isaac Van Tassel
- Thomas Dell - son of William S. Dell and cousin of Rachel Dell Bonnel, both signers.
- E.W. Capron
- Stephen Shear
- Henry Hatley
- Azaliah Schooley Spouse of Margaret Schooley. Born in Lincoln County, Upper Canada, and naturalized as an American citizen in 1837. A resident of Waterloo, New York, and member of the Junius Monthly Meeting. Also had ties to Spiritualist and Abolition Movements.