USH - Seneca Falls Convention - Church

The Seneca Falls Convention was held in Seneca Falls, New York on July 19 and 20, 1848. The first women’s rights convention held in the United States, it is often labeled the birthplace of feminism. A group of American women and men met here to discuss the legal limitations imposed on women during this period. These discussions were influenced by the contributors’ participation in the abolitionist movement, and they eventually used (as many different groups throughout history have) language and structure from the United States Declaration of Independence to formally state their belief that women should be entitled to the rights granted to American citizens in a document known as the Declaration of Sentiments.

At this time in American history, the country was in the middle of cultural and economic change. Since the American Revolution and the Constitutional Convention, the geographical boundaries and the population had both more than doubled, the population had begun to shift westward, and the economy was moving from a system of independent farmers to a world built around distant, unknown markets (known as the Market Revolution).

Prior to this convention, there had been no public meeting of such a large scale to discuss this topic, despite the questions raised by such women of the Revolutionary era as Abigail Adams. However, when the men were preoccupied with the war effort, women had to take over many of their responsibilities, thus leading the creation of many new social roles following the end of the war, and women were able to establish a place for themselves in society. Many women began organizing in reform organizations aiming to improve the lives of others and fight for the rights of those who could not speak out for themselves (ex.: schoolchildren, the mentally ill).

As part of their declaration, they listed the grievances that reflected the severe limitation on women’s legal rights (they could not vote, couldn’t participate in the creation of laws they were expected to follow, their property was taxed, rarely got custody of children in a divorce, often couldn’t get higher education, etc.). They proclaimed that “all men and women were created equal.” This helped to open the public’s eyes to ideas like women’s rights and they were, for the first time, willing to question convention.