Thesis

Sister Suffragette: The Origins and Practices of the Independent Women’s Rights
Movement in The United States 1840-1920
Emily Morin
Eastern Nazarene College
Fall 2015

2
Introduction: The History of a Movement and the Origin of a Term
Women’s history in the United States is a key part of understanding the wider
perspective of America’s past. During the foundational years of America’s development
and at the 1787 Constitutional Convention, women’s rights failed to be addressed. Even
still, women have been key players in the background of American politics.1
Perhaps one
of the most famous examples of this is when in a letter to John Adams (1735-1826) in
1776 his wife Abigail Adams (1744-1818) said:
I long to hear that you have declared an independency —and by the way in the
new Code of Laws which I suppose it will be necessary for you to make I desire
you would Remember the Ladies, and be more generous and favourable to them
than your ancestors. Do not put such unlimited power into the hands of the
Husbands. Remember all Men would be tyrants if they could. If perticuliar [Sic]
care and attention is not paid to the Laidies [Sic] we are determined to foment a
Rebelion [sic], and will not hold ourselves bound by any Laws in which we have
no voice, or Representation.2
Adams’ letter shows that women forged their own place in the complex world of
American politics and law and from the founding of the nation were not afraid to speak
up. Women throughout American history were willing to push back against patriarchal
norms and gain representation. Organized women’s movements to do this, however, only
emerged in the 1840s. A group of women, led by Lucretia Mott (1793-1880) and
Elizabeth Cady Stanton (1815-1902), met in Seneca Falls New York and drafted the
“Declaration of Sentiments” claiming, “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.”3
Women as an organized group were
1
Rita J. Simon and Gloria Danziger, Women's Movements in America: Their Successes,
Disappointments, and Aspirations, (New York: Praeger Publishers, 1991), 1.
2
Abigail Adams, “Remember the Ladies,” Letter to John Adams, March 31, 1776.
3
Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan Brownell Anthony, The Selected Papers of Elizabeth

3
beginning to vocalize injustice and call for reform. This meeting was the beginning of the
women’s rights movement, or as it is called in the framework of other women’s
movements throughout history, the first wave of feminism.
The history and evolution of the women’s rights movements of the 19th
and early
20th
century in the United States is an important component of both American history and
gender studies. The period in question starts in 1830 with the feminist abolitionist
movement and ends in 1920 with the passing of the 19th
amendment, which established
women’s suffrage. Some of the questions that arise in this field of study include what
factors fueled the creation of the women’s right movement of the 19th
and early 20th
century, and why it took place. This study can be done by looking at the effect of
abolitionism on the women’s rights movement and by analyzing the legal issues of the
period and the relationship the leaders of the first wave of feminism had with the laws of
the time and how they interpreted them to allow for agency4
in society. In the case of the
legal issues, some of the major benchmark legislations include the passing of the 13th
,
14th
, and 15th
Amendments, the Susan B. Anthony (1820-1906) trial, and the 19th
Amendment.
For many, the word feminist or feminism feels like a dirty word. It is connotative
of ideas of female superiority over men and to some the overall deterioration of society
and social norms as we know them today. This fatalistic view of the matter is simply
incorrect, and the history of the term itself tells a different story. The term feminism, to
define women’s rights issues, was developed in France in the 1880’s as féminisme, the
Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony, Ed. Ann D. Gordon, Vol 1. In the School of Anti
Slavery, 1849-1866, (New Brunswick, Rutgers University Press, 2006), 70-71.
4
Agency as a historical and sociological term refers to a persons ability to act freely and
independently to make choices in their society or community.

4
combination of the French word for woman, femme, and the suffix isme, which denotes
social movement or political ideology.5
The term has always been politically linked, and
that is where some of the controversies over its usage lie. It was not until the 1980’s that
the term gained universal usage with a definition entailing anyone who challenged the
social or political norms of their time as related to women’s issues. For this reason, in the
modern context, the term feminism describes the women’s movements of the 19th
century
even if it is a term that would not have been used by the women at the time.
Historical gender study is more easily conceptualized if it can be divided into
chapters, because of the evolution of the term feminism in the modern framework. This
division is into waves of feminism, even if the behavior itself predates the term. The first,
second, and third waves of feminism are a demarcation of the major focuses and issues of
women’s rights. The first wave in its most basic conceptualization was focused on
suffrage and other political representation and is generally dated between 1848 and
1920.6
The second wave focused on women’s reproductive rights, sexual health, and
labor and wage inequalities and is approximately dated from the 1960s to the 1970s.7
The
third wave of feminism focused on women of color, racial inequality, and social and
political treatment of lesbians.8
The dating of the third wave of feminism is trickier than
the other two waves. Starting in the 1980s and 1990s, we see the peak of these
movements, but the question is whether the 2000s to the present still fall within the third
5
Estelle B Freeman, No Turning Back: The History of Feminism and the Future of
Women, (New York: Ballantine Books, 2002), 3.
6
Charlotte Kroløkke and Anne Scott Sørensen, "Three Waves of Feminism: From
Suffragettes to Grrls." In Gender Communication Theories & Analyses: From Silence to
Performance, (Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications Inc, 2006), 2.
7
Ibid., 7.
8
Ibid., 15.

5
wave or whether we are amid the emerging fourth wave of feminism.
The first wave of feminism as a distinct historical entity is key to the discussion of
women’s rights because it marks the beginnings of a movement. The later feminist
movements in American history would not have had the momentum or precedent without
the first wave of suffragettes. The question is how did this movement start and why did it
start when in did?
Abolitionism and Women
The abolitionist movement played a major part in the history of the first wave of
feminism. While the term ‘women’s rights movement’ generally encompasses suffrage
and political representation for women, the first wave of feminism also includes female
involvement in the abolition of slavery in the United States. Some historians like Kathryn
Kish Sklar, have conceptualized women’s antebellum political culture as three-fold,
“first, group activity beyond the limits of the family; next, gender-conscious group
activity (that is women acting consciously as women); and finally, group activity
intended to advance women’s rights and women’s interest.”9
Under this outline, the women of the abolitionist movement who did not continue their
activism to the suffrage movement would usually be under the second tier of this political
culture, gender-conscious. The reason being that they felt that they could make changes
within the traditional ideological spheres of the time, but were acting because they were
women and that being female was an advantage to making a change. This opinion was
due to the prevailing notion of the time that women had moral superiority over men, and
9
Jean Fagan Yellin Ed, and John C. Van Horne Ed. The Abolitionist Sisterhood:
Women’s Political Culture in Antebellum America, (Ithaca, New York: Cornell
University Press, 1994), 2.

6
thus, on the issue of slavery women would be more likely to do the right thing. The third
manifestation of women’s antebellum political culture is in the case of women who
transferred their passions after the passing of the 13th
Amendment to women’s issues
specifically. This point would also include women who felt that being parts of the
abolitionist movement was a stepping-stone to campaigns of female equality. It is
important to note these three different types of activism because they represent the
diversity of women’s views on the issues of women’s equality at the time.
Women who embraced traditional gender norms, and women who rejected them
both came together in the movement of abolitionism.10
Some women did want to improve
their own social positions. They felt that the woman’s role could be improved in society.
Others would not become members of the suffrage movement after their involvement in
the abolitionist movement. To them, the situation of slavery was a moral wrong, but the
situation of women in society was not a moral wrongdoing and should not be compared
to slavery. Other women were on the fence. Society and religion were telling them one
thing about their place, and so when they wanted to push against norms, they felt it was
sinful. Nonetheless, despite of feeling guilty about wanting to change their role in society
this did not make them any happier with their lot in life.
Regardless of their opinion on women’s rights, the role of women in antislavery
activities made achieving abolition possible.11
In the early 19th
century, abolitionism was
the major focus of social change in the United States, and suffrage was overshadowed. In
spite of this fact, many women were not resentful that women’s issues were secondary to
the abolitionist movements; many joined the movement whole-heartedly. Women
10
Ibid., 3.
11
Simon and Danziger, Women's Movements in America: Their Successes,
Disappointments, and Aspirations, 9.

7
provided much financial support for the cause; they wrote literature that was published
for abolitionist news organizations, and they conducted petition campaigns.12
Between 1832 and 1855, over 200 female antislavery societies emerged in the
United States; called “Sister Societies.” They were key examples of the organization of
the female abolitionist movement.13
They gave women a structure in which to meet and
this allowed them to make more progress than any individual woman in the movement
would be able to. They organized independently from men into their own groups and as
such were allowed to serve as officials, draft and vote on resolutions, and run meetings.
They could do all the things that the men were doing in other organizations, and this gave
them to confidence and skill to grow as independent reformers.
During this period, the question of the female’s role in society was not the major
issue of the time. Men did not mind women being involved in the abolitionist movement
because it was a moral issue.14
The women were being involved in the politics of the
time, but were, in some ways in the eyes of the men, still operating in their proper sphere.
Morality as a defining trait, within the 18th
and 19th
century’s idea of the separate spheres
of men and women, had been attributed to women. As mentioned previously, the idea
behind this was that women were considered more moral than men so it would be natural
for them to get involved in moral campaigns.
It was not just morality but the fact that women felt akin to the plight of the slaves
in the United States. They felt that women and slaves were both in bondage to the white
men of society. This feeling was pushed farther by well-known and more radical
12
Ibid., 9.
13
Beth A. Salerno, Sister Societies: Women’s Antislavery Organizations in Antebellum
America, (DeKalb, Illinois: Northern Illinois University Press, 2005), 4.
14
Ibid., 48.

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abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison (1805-1879). Garrison’s view was that slavery was a
sin because it deprived freedom. He believed humans should have choices in their life
and that no person should deprive them of that because God created them all.15
It was his
belief that slavery must be completely abolished and that there was no middle ground for
compromise. He explicitly tied the struggle of slavery to women and their plights, to get
them involved with the cause. Women then thought that then when the fight for the
abolition of slavery was won the same leaders would pick up the banner of women’s
suffrage, and that would be the next major social campaign. For this reason, many
women abolitionists were specifically Garrisonian abolitionists.
Garrisonian abolitionists held certain anticlerical views, being against the idea of
organized religion, and also held to the concept of the absolute moral equality of all
people. Women took to these ideas because they stated that women were equal to men
and religion could not restrict them.16
Garrisonians saw scripture being unjustly used to
justify slavery, and women saw that the church was subjugate women’s rights by
implementing these same principles. Garrisonians also stressed the commonality of all
peoples regardless of color, and abolitionist women also took this point in regards to
women and men. The ideological point was “the philosophical tenet that women were
essentially human and only incidentally female liberated them from the necessity of
justifying their own actions in terms of what was appropriate for the women’s sphere.”17
Garrisonian language provided a philosophical base of ideas to justify the aims of
15
Kathryn Kish Sklar, Women’s Rights Emerges within the Antislavery Movement 1830-
1870: A Brief History with Documents, (Boston: Bedford/ St. Martin’s, 2000), 13.
16
Ellen Carol Dubois, Feminism and Suffrage: The Emergence of An Independent
Women's Movement in America, 1848-1869, (Ithaca New York: Cornell University Press,
1978), 35.
17
Ibid., 36.

9
the women’s rights movement. They now had theory and practice in the world of social
change. Women developed strategies and reorganized themselves at this time to be more
effective in their campaigns for female emancipation. A point of Garrisonian reform that
was very relevant to how the independent emerging women’s rights movement operated
was the notion that “a revolution in people’s ideas must precede and underlie institutional
and legal reform, in order to effect true social change.”18
Therefore, we see the development of the structure that women needed to create
and fuel the independent women’s rights movement and also some of the language they
used stemming from the abolitionist movement. Women before this period were
advocating for more rights in the eyes of the law, but their methods were less unified.
Individual educated women wrote papers during the enlightenment declaring that the
notions of human rights and citizenship were all applicable to women too, but organized
groups did not exist in the same way that they did during the fight for abolitionism or in
the period afterward.
For a period, the women’s movement was dependent on the abolitionist
movement to be a channel of change and provide women with an audience that would be
sympathetic to their plight. However, the partnership was lopsided. Women needed the
abolitionists for resources and support, but the abolitionist movement, once it gained
steam and entered the more mainstream of northern life, did not need the women in the
same capacity they once had.19
The Independent Women’s Movement
18
Ibid., 38.
19
Ibid., 52.

10
The independent women’s movement began to emerge in the 1840s because of
increasing divisions in the anti-slavery movement. As stated previously, many female
abolitionists were Garrisonians and the Garrisonian movement was at odds with other
less radical abolitionists. At first, the aims of the different groups of abolitionists were not
too far removed, but in the late 1830s, internal changes were taking place, which
radicalized the movement further.20
One of these changes was the addition of other types
of reform beyond abolitionism.
The Garrisonian movement, while being predominately concerned with
abolitionism, included ideas of women’s rights and “perfectionist views of pacificism and
opposition to government.”21
Pacificism is a middle viewpoint between passivism and
defensism, arguing that the use of violence and force as a form of protest should normally
not be used, but it is appropriate in situations of moral wrong and injustice. Perfectionism
is the idea that humanity can become perfect and in doing so they can destroy the evils of
the world such as slavery, and that the government was anti-Christ and against God’s
will. The view of perfectionism specifically was a view not popularly held at the time,
being both religiously and politically radical. Garrison’s view made making social change
through preexisting political means near impossible.
For this reason, internal conflicts arose. People that had closely aligned
themselves with the movement felt that Garrison’s perfectionist views brought disrepute
upon the abolitionist movement. The other major reason for the split was because of the
advancement of women in the organization.22
That is why in 1839-40 the movement split
20
Sklar, Women’s Rights Emerges within the Antislavery Movement 1830-1870: A Brief
History with Documents, 40.
21
Ibid., 40.
22
Ibid., 43.

11
into factions. Garrison still had control of the American Anti Slavery Society, which he
had helped found, and he still continued to allow women to hold roles of leadership in the
society, but women wanted to move beyond this. Women knew that they had a safe place
in the Garrisonian community, but they also knew that the future trajectory of the
movement was too radical to get the attention of the moderate public. They wanted their
issue to be played out on the stage of mainstream America, so they could gain traction
and bring about change. 23
Garrisonian abolitionism then, was no longer the best stage for the women’s
rights movement to unfold. Women did not want to continue to be at odds with middle-
class social and the political culture of the day and wanted ways to normalize their goals
and get mainstream America on their side. Two major figures that fueled the beginning of
the independent women’s movement; Lucretia Mott and Elizabeth Cady Stanton. Mott
was a senior member of the Garrisonian movement operating on radical religious
motivation while Stanton was indicative of the younger women’s view of women’s rights
as a secular issue. 24
Together, they organized the Women’s Rights Convention in Seneca Falls New
York, which took place in 1848, this convention being seen as the first major example of
a unified women’s organization petitioning for women’s rights.25
The most well-known
document to come out of this meeting was the “Declaration of Sentiments” which
discussed specifically how women had been subjugated and how men had perpetuated
“an absolute tyranny over her.”26
The facts behind this claim that the declaration cited
23
Ibid., 47.
24
Ibid., 47-48.
25
26
Stanton and Anthony, The Selected Papers of Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B.

12
included:
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 oppressed her on all sides…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.27
In the end, 68 women and 32 men signed the declaration, with these points becoming the
rallying point for women in the movement. Their desire was to be granted all the same
rights as men and to be equal with men.
After Seneca Falls, groups of women kept meeting to discuss their aims and
goals. In December of 1849, Lucretia Mott gave a famous speech entitled “Discourse On
Woman,” which reaffirmed some of the sentiments that had been laid out in Seneca Falls.
Her fear was that young people who are “open to the reception of more exalted views
upon the subject”28
of women’s rights did not hear the arguments in favor on the elevated
position of women in society because the women’s rights organizations were not reaching
the entire public.
Women’s rights advocacy evolved in the years that followed. 1865 saw the
passing of the 13th
amendment and the outlawing of slavery and indentured servitude in
Anthony, Ed. Gordon, Vol 1. In the School of Anti Slavery, 1849-1866, 70-71.
27
Ibid., 70-71.
28
Lucretia Mott, Discourse On Women. Dec 17th, 1849.

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the Unites States.29
In 1866, a group of abolitionist women created the American Equal
Rights Association. Lucretia Mott was their president and Susan B. Anthony was
secretary.30
Their major focus as an organization was to work together for the rights of
both freedmen and women. This partnership was one of the last major examples of the
connected campaigns of the women’s movement with the post-abolitionist campaigns for
the rights of freedmen; this convergence was rife with dissension from the beginning. The
major issue was language pertaining to the 14th Amendment and women’s suffrage.
From this point on the solidification of the women’s rights movement as separate entity
emerges.
The Suffrage Movement
The petition for suffrage was something that divided the newly established
women’s rights organizations. In 1848 at the Seneca Falls convention, the only resolution
that was not adopted unanimously was the call for suffrage.31
Elizabeth Cady Stanton had
submitted the resolution for suffrage on, “the duty of the women of this country to secure
to themselves the sacred right of the elective franchise.”32
Lucretia Mott felt that this
resolution was a mistake and tried to dissuade her from presenting it.33
She was most
likely opposed to it since her opinion of government and politics was in line with
Garrisonian ideals. Other women did not feel the need to have suffrage; some thought it
29
The Constitution of the United States. Amendment 13.
30
31
Ibid., 7.
32
Stanton and Anthony, The Selected Papers of Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B.
Anthony, Ed. Gordon, Vol 1. In the School of Anti Slavery, 1849-1866, 70-71.
33
Dubois, Feminism and Suffrage: The Emergence of An Independent Women's
Movement in America, 1848-1869, 40.

14
too radical and preferred to focus on economic and social equality.34
The suffrage resolution barely passed, but women’s suffrage still became the
forefront issue of the women’s rights movement. “After the Seneca Falls Convention,
there is no further evidence of reluctance within the movement to demand the vote.”35
The resolution at the women’s 1856 national convention stated:
Resolved, that the main power of the women’s rights movement lies in this: that
while always demanding for woman’s better education, better employment, and
better laws, it has kept steadily in view the one cardinal demand for the right of
suffrage: in a democracy, the symbol and guarantee of all other rights. 36
For the women of the time who were in favor of suffrage and to the detractors it was a
major issue, the reason behind this being that the right to vote was considered the
pinnacle of female equality. The vote was the ultimate culmination of social and
economic rights for women because they could then be part of the decisions that set the
norms for social and economic situations. The male leaders of the time were far less
supportive of suffrage than they were of individually focused social reforms for women
because they saw giving the vote to women as granting all of their demands.
Women had to force themselves into political theory. To many, the idea of
women’s suffrage had not even occurred. Democratic political theory was only applied to
women when feminist leaders actively attempted to include themselves into it and tried to
challenge the notion of women being incapable in political life.37
Some in antebellum
America had seen the hypocrisy of slavery and not allowing people of color to vote in a
34
35
36
Elizabeth Cady Stanton Ed, Susan B. Anthony Ed, and Mathilda Joslyn Gage Ed,
History of Woman Suffrage In Three Volumes. Vol. 1.1848-1861, (1881), 634.
37
Ibid., 44.

15
society that prided itself on freedom and representative government; but even these
people did not consider the women’s lack of freedom and suffrage. The societal norm
was that these rights laid out in the founding of the United States were only in relation to
men.
For women to make arguments for suffrage, it would have to go beyond just
changing the language of the Constitution to a realm of questioning the norms of 19th
-
century society. To argue for their right to vote, women would have to argue for their
value in society, their role outside of the home, and combat the notion that women are
under the authority of men and meant to be ruled. The implications of women’s suffrage
went far beyond the vote itself but questioned a layer of society that had for too long been
undisturbed. Before this point, women’s social reforms still fell within the traditional
sphere of the woman. Women were seen as moral creatures, and this made their
campaigns against slavery within their nature, but politics was the men’s world. The male
sphere included work outside the home and politics, something they felt women were too
swiftly encroaching upon.
Once the discussion of fighting against societal norms was on the table, they still
needed to make political change. An example of the conflicts that arose when trying to
make political changes without the necessary societal openness is in the dialogue about
the ratification of the 14th
and 15th
Amendments. The major dividing issue between the
women’s rights campaigns and the freed blacks campaigns in 1865 to 1866 has been the
passing of the 14th Amendment. It represented a compromise on the part of the
Republican Party by introducing “the issue of the political rights of the freedmen into the
Constitution, but it does so indirectly and… it required the former Confederate states

16
either to enfranchise their ex-slaves or to have their congressional delegations cut
proportionally.”38
Section 2 of the amendment specifically states:
Representatives shall be apportioned among the several States according to their
respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each State,
excluding Indians not taxed. But when the right to vote at any election for the
choice of electors for President and Vice-President of the United States,
Representatives in Congress, the Executive and Judicial officers of a State, or the
members of the Legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male inhabitants of
such State, being twenty-one years of age, and citizens of the United States, or in
any way abridged, except for participation in rebellion, or other crime, the basis of
representation therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of
such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one
years of age in such State.39
The amendment was political in nature and only indirectly addresses the civil rights’
component of the social experiences of people of color in the United States. Female
abolitionists were unhappy with the language of the amendment because they had hoped
it would include women, but the abolitionist movement wanted to maintain ties with the
Republican Party and to do so they were not going to push for the inclusion of women.
Divisions arose among members of the American Equal Rights Association again
when many female members were enraged by the addition of the term “male citizen” to
the language of the Constitution in the pending 14th
Amendment in 1869 to 1870. The
original language of the amendment had not included reference to gender, and this was
then an explicit barring of female suffrage.40
The majority of men at the first convention
of the Equal Rights Association and, some women as well, were not willing to campaign
about changing this because they thought it was too radical. They felt that the inclusion of
female suffrage in the amendment would jeopardize the chances of an amendment for
38
39
40

17
freed black men’s suffrage.41
For this reason in 1869, women created their own separate organization to
advocate for the vote. Female members form the Equal Rights Association formed the
National Woman Suffrage Association, generally referred to as the NWSA. Led by
Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony, their goal was to secure a 16th
amendment
that would ensure the vote for women.42
Their demographic focus was middle and
working class women and their plan for initiating change was through lobbying efforts in
Congress instead of organized state campaigns.
Here then is another split between the women’s movement, the question of
whether to promote suffrage on a federal or state level. Stanton and company were
focusing on federal change, but some members of the women’s rights movement, like
Lucy Stone (1818-1893), felt the best option was to concentrate on a state by state
approach because the feeling was that in the end, abolitionists and Republicans would
back their cause.43
These women founded the America Women Suffrage Association
abbreviated at the AWSA. The federally minded movement of the National Woman
Suffrage Association felt that leaving the discussion to the States would draw out the
processes. Stanton argued that:
This fundamental principle of our government—the equality of all the citizens of
the republic—should be incorporated in the Federal Constitution, there to remain
forever. To leave this question to the States and partial acts of Congress, is to
defer indefinitely its settlement, for what is done by this Congress may be
repealed by the next; and politics in the several States differ so widely, that no
harmonious action on any question can ever be secured, except as a strict party
measure. Hence, we appeal to the party now in power, everywhere, to end this
protracted debate on suffrage, and declare it the inalienable right of every citizen
41
Ibid., 11.
42
Ibid., 11.
43
Ibid., 11.

18
who is amenable to the laws of the land, who pays taxes and the penalty of
crime.44
For the NWSA, the passing of the 15th
Amendment was a major setback.
Elizabeth Cady Stanton said in a speech that, “the Republican Party to-day congratulates
itself on having carried the 15th Amendment of the Constitution, thus securing ‘manhood
suffrage’ and establishing an aristocracy of sex on this continent.”45
After the ratification
of the 15th
Amendment, Stanton and Anthony changed their strategies. Wanting to get
more women involved with the movement, they began a public speaking tour in the
Midwest.46
They wanted to get new women participating and those that did show interest
had not been involved with the abolitionist campaigns in the years previous. The
divisions and conflicts that had faced the women that had run the women’s right’s
movement during the period of abolitionism had not demoralized these fresh faces.
The organizational efforts of this period of 1869 marked a central shift in the
movement. Previous suffragists had not operated campaigns of recruitment. They had
used propaganda and other techniques from their years in the abolitionist movement to
create literature to stir intellectual debate but had not focused on recruiting more women
to allow the movement to grow.47
This focal point had been fine for a time and helpful
during the period of abolitionism, but now the people they were trying to convince of
their cause were the same people they were attempting to liberate. There is no movement
for change if the people who will be affected by the movement do not want the change.
The shift of women involved was from women who were already involved and believed
44
Elizabeth Cady Stanton Ed, Susan B. Anthony Ed, and Mathilda Joslyn Gage Ed,
History of Woman Suffrage In Three Volumes, Vol. 2.1861-1876, (1881), 350.
45
Ibid., 350.
46
47
Ibid., 182-183.

19
that women should have equal rights to men, to women who had probably not come to
this opinion yet.
The years 1870 through 1872 saw another shift in the strategies of the women’s
rights movement. The plan was to force the conversation of women’s suffrage into the
courts by having women endeavor to register to vote and attempt to vote in the 1871 state
and 1872 presidential elections. Lawyers and judges that supported the women
formulated legal defenses that used the language of the 14th
and 15th
amendment to
defend the women’s right to vote. The first female who attempted to vote was Marilla M.
Ricker (1840-1920) of Dover, New Hampshire. In March 1870, she registered to vote,
and a selectman said he would put her name on the checklist. The next day when she
came to vote, she found out that he had not done so, and her vote was declined. She was
prepared to sue the selectman, but her Republican friends dissuaded her.48
There were
many other cases in many different states with women, both being denied and permitted
to vote depending on the location.
Legal Analysis of the Susan B. Anthony Trial
Perhaps one of the most well-known legal cases coming out of the women’s
suffrage movement of the late 19th
century is The United States v. Susan B. Anthony. The
case was against prominent women’s suffrage advocate Susan B. Anthony when in
November 1872 she registered to vote and then voted in the presidential and
congressional election on November 5th
, 1872.49
She was charged with the crime of
voting without the legal right to vote in the district. Her case is indicative of the major
48
Ibid., 587.
49
Federal Judicial Center, The Trial of Susan B. Anthony, Ann. D. Gordon, (2005), 1.

20
trend of the other women voters and the legal cases their lawyers presented in court.
Days before, Anthony and fourteen other women were successfully able to
register to vote in the first district of the Eighth Ward of Rochester New York. When
questioned by a poll watcher about her qualifications to vote the inspectors of the election
became involved, as was required by law. They asked her under oath if she was a citizen,
if she lived in the district, and if she had accepted bribes for her vote.50
After being
satisfied by her response, she was able to vote. On November 18, 1872, she and the other
women voters were arrested after U.S Commissioner William C. Storrs (? -1873) put out
a warrant for their arrests. The charge was based on the complaint of Sylvester Lewis
(1820-1887), the poll watcher who had made the original challenge.51
As stated earlier,
the charge was voting without lawful permission and was claimed to be in violation of
Section 19 of the Enforcement Act of 1870 that stated:
That if at any election for representative or delegate in the Congress of the United
States any person shall knowingly personate and vote, or attempt to vote, in the
name of any other person, whether living, dead, or fictitious; or vote more than
once at the same election for any candidate for the same office; or vote at a place
where he may not be lawfully entitled to vote; or vote without having a lawful
right to vote; or do any unlawful act to secure a right or an opportunity to vote for
himself or any other person; … so, every such person shall be deemed guilty of a
crime, and shall for such crime be liable to prosecution in any court of the United
States of competent jurisdiction, and, on conviction thereof, shall be punished by
a fine not exceeding five hundred dollars, or by imprisonment for a term not
exceeding three years, or both, in the discretion of the court, and shall pay the
costs of prosecution. 52
The language of the Enforcement Act lays out a few key factors that must be present in
order to convict someone of violating this act; the major one used by the defense in court
was that there was a lack of evidence that Anthony knowingly violated the law. The act
50
Ibid., 2.
51
Ibid., 2.
52
Statutes at Large of the United States of America, 1789–1873, (1871).

21
of knowing was explicitly outlined in the law. During the examination on November 29th
,
1872, these issues became known and the charges were not dropped but from that point
onward, Anthony’s intent would be taken into consideration for the rest of the hearings.53
The hearing resumed on December 23, 1872, and Anthony’s lawyer Henry Selden
(1805-1885) began the proceedings. The primary argument of the defense was that
Anthony had the right to vote because voting was an inalienable right of citizenship. He
further stated that even if it was deemed by the court that she did not have that right, she
believed she did thus leaving no criminal intent, as was necessary to convict someone in
violation of Section 19 of the Enforcement Act.54
In his statement in court he said the
United States, in reference to the creeds of The Declaration of Independence was “slow
in allowing its application to the African race and… still slower in allowing its
application to women, but it has been done by the Fourteenth Amendment.”55
The major evidence behind these claims was based on the language of the 14th
and 15th Amendments. Predominantly created to protect the rights of freed black men,
these two amendments created implications for the place of women in late 19th
century
America. The 14th Amendment states in Section one that:
All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction
thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside. No
state shall make or enforce any law, which shall abridge the privileges or
immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person
of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person
within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.56
53
Federal Judicial Center, The Trial of Susan B. Anthony, Gordon, 3.
54
Ibid., 21.
55
An Account of the Proceedings on the Trial of Susan B. Anthony, on the Charges of
Illegal Voting, at the Presidential Election in Nov., 1872, and on the Trial of Beverly W.
Jones, Edwin T. Marsh and William B. Hall, the Inspectors of Election by whom her Vote
was Received, (Rochester, NY: Daily Democrat and Chronicle Book Print, 1874), 35-38.
56

22
This text was the evidence that Susan B. Anthony was, in fact, a citizen of the United
States and from the language of the 15th Amendment and from this the defense drew the
claim that voting was a right of citizenship. The 15th
Amendment specifically says in
Section 1 that, “the right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or
abridged by the United States or by any state on account of race, color, or previous
condition of servitude.”57
These federal rulings he claimed overturned any state specific
legislation about voting and that thus New York could not bar U.S citizens from voting.
The prosecution, headed by Federal Attorney Richard Crowley (1836-1908),
argued that Anthony did not have the right to vote based on the 14th Amendment.
Looking at examples of federal court and state Supreme Court decisions, Crowley
claimed that the declaration of rights and immunities in the 14th Amendment has never
included a right to vote.58
His claim was that “under the Constitution and laws of the State
of New York, the right to vote is conventional, not natural.”59
His case precedents
included Virginia Minor vs. Reese Happersett. This case in 1875 went to the Supreme
Court, and Virginia Minor (1824-1894) was unsuccessful in arguing that the 14th
Amendment of the Constitution gave women the right to vote.60
However, when the
defense was using this case in the trial of Susan B. Anthony, it is important to know that
the Supreme Court had not made this decision yet. Crowley was basing his precedent on
the decision of the lower court of the Supreme Court of Missouri in 1873, not the Federal
Supreme Court.
57
58
59
Richard Crowley, Woman Suffrage Question. United States Circuit Court, Second
Circuit, Northern District of New York. The United States v. Susan B. Anthony. Argument
of Richard Crowley, U.S. District Attorney, (Lockport, New York: M.C Richardson &
Co, n.d), 19.
60
Minor v. Happersett, 88 U.S. 162 (1875).

23
Crowley was using a very recent case; Minor had only attempted to register to
vote in October of 1872 while Susan B. Anthony and the other women registered and
voted in November of the same year. The fact that both cases used the same legal
argument was no coincidence. The leaders of the suffrage movement had decided as a
group that this was the soundest legal argument in their favor, and they wanted to get it
heard in as many courtrooms as possible, with the hope that it would bring at least one of
the cases to the Supreme Court. This did happen in the case of Minor two years later. The
Supreme Court did uphold the decision on the lower court in Missouri stating that the
14th Amendment did not protect a women’s right to vote, but that had not been decided
yet when Crowley was prosecuting Anthony.
Crowley’s further citation included the second section of the amendment in
regards to specific restrictions that states may be allowed to place based on sex and age.
But when the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President
and Vice President of the United States, Representatives in Congress, the
executive and judicial officers of a state, or the members of the legislature thereof,
is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such state, being twenty-one years of
age, and citizens of the United States, or in any way abridged, except for
participation in rebellion, or other crime, the basis of representation therein shall
be reduced in the proportion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to
the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in such state.61
Furthermore, he claimed a literal interpretation must be taken of the 15th Amendment,
saying women are specifically and intentionally not included in the language. Crowley
claimed that the quantifiers of race, color, or previous condition of servitude were not
three of many types of protection, but the only protections given by the amendment.62
Crowley also claimed that the word “knowingly” in the Enforcement Act only meant that
the accused knew they were voting, not whether they knew that the act was illegal in the
61
62

24
eyes of the law.63
The presiding judge was Ward Hunt (1810-1886), Associate justice of the
Supreme Court of the United States and as such, he had to preside over a U.S circuit
court. His opinion of the case was that the right to vote was not among the “privileges
and immunities” outlined in the 14th Amendment and that states still had the right to bar
citizens from voting unless they specifically interfered based on “race, color or previous
condition of servitude.” Lastly, Hunt concluded that Anthony knew New York only
allowed men to vote and thus she knowingly violated the Enforcement Act.64
He stated
that there was no question for the jury to contemplate so it should be directed to return a
guilty verdict.
Anthony’s lawyer insisted that the jury had a right to decide guilt or innocence so
the judge could not direct the jury. Therefore, on June 19, 1873, Selden returned to court
to motion for a new trial. Unfortunately, in circuit courts, the same judge who had caused
the motion in the first place heard the motion for a new trial. Justice Hunt would have to
decide that he himself had violated the Constitution. He claimed no precedent existed for
directing a guilty verdict in a criminal trial, and he denied the motion because, in his
opinion, the right to trial by jury only existed in respect to disputed facts.65
The Supreme
Court later overturned this type of decision, and a precedent for a trial by jury in criminal
cases was created.
It was at this point when the judge was about to pronounce sentence that Anthony
gave one of the most famous speeches in the history of the women’s suffrage movement.
This speech is one of the prime examples of why this case is important to the study of the
63
Ibid., 22.
64
Ibid., 6.
65
Ibid., 7.

25
women’s rights movement she says:
I have many things to say, for in your ordered verdict of guilty, you have trampled
underfoot every vital principle of our government. My natural rights, my civil
rights, my political rights, my judicial rights, are all alike ignored. Robbed of the
fundamental privilege of citizenship, I am degraded from the status of a citizen to
that of a subject; and not only myself individually, but all of my sex, are, by your
honor’s verdict, doomed to political subjection under this so-called, form of
government.66
This statement by Anthony was the antithesis movement, and according to historian Ann
Gordon, the most famous speech in the history of the women’s movement. Women
wanted equality with men and the facts of the matter were laid out plainly. Women were
not seen as equal to men in the eyes of the United States government, and that made it a
hypocritical organization. The government claimed that citizens had rights and freedoms
in American democracy, but then yet again, as in the case of African Americans, in
practice, the United States denied groups those rights.
Anthony was sentenced to a fine of $100 dollars and the price of the
prosecution.67
She did not pay the fine as four days later a Federal Marshal reported to the
court that he could find any goods of Anthony’s to seize to pay the fine. In regards to the
other female voters, on June 21st
1873 Attorney Crowley entered motions of nolle
prosequi68
thus notifying the courts that they were not being prosecuted.
This court case and the legal language being implemented by the suffrage
movement, is a core example of the evolution of the organized women’s movement. The
language of the 14th and 15th Amendments of the Constitution being used in the legal
66
Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan Brownell Anthony. The Selected Papers of
Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony, Ed. Ann D. Gordon, Vol 2. Against an
Aristocracy of Sex, 1866 to1873, (New Brunswick, Rutgers University Press, 2006), 613-
616.
67
68
A Legal term indicating when a prosecutor voluntarily drops charges in a criminal case.

26
cases of both Minor and Anthony show a congruency in the aims of females around the
country. This is an example that the women’s movement was a fully organized
autonomous group, with communicating branches that together worked to figure out the
best strategies to achieve voting rights.
The year 1872 saw the end of the majority of the divisions between the various
factions of the women’s rights movement. It also saw a Republican victory in the
presidential election. While the Republicans had been more supportive of women’s
suffrage than other groups, their platform had not included any discussion of moving
towards giving women the vote. For many women it seemed like “the end of all strategic
opportunities for winning women the vote at least for the time being.”69
The America
Woman Suffrage Association and the National Woman Suffrage Association had both
reached a point where their aims were the same again, but due to the rivalries that had
existed, they did not officially reunite until 1890.70
They became known as the National
American Woman Suffrage Association the NAWSA with Susan B. Anthony as their
president, after Elizabeth Cady Stanton retired in 1892.71
Conclusion: The End of An Era
Margret Fuller (1810-1850) in her 1845 book Women in the Nineteenth Century
said, “we only ask of men to remove arbitrary barriers. Some would like to do more. But
I believe it needs that Woman show herself in her native dignity, to teach them how to aid
69
70
Ibid., 200.
71

27
her; their minds are so encumbered by tradition.”72
This is what the unified first wave of
feminism did. They started by creating dialogues between men and women about the
morality of the traditional role of women in society. They spoke to both the men and
women who upheld years of tradition and believed in the separate spheres of men and
women. They spoke to the societal traditions that would advocate for the right of citizens
like freed slave to the rights of voting but did not think twice about whether that should
be applicable to the female citizen.
Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony did not secure a 16th
Amendment
for women’s suffrage. Neither would live to see the passing on the 19th
Amendment in
1920 that finally removed the restriction of voting on United States citizens based on
gender.73
However, the work they did during their lives made the passing of the
amendment possible. Carrie Chapman Catt (1859-1947) rose to prominence as a leader of
the movement in the late 1890’s. She was the president of the NAWSA in 1920 and
worked through WW1 to continue a strategy to get a 19th
Amendment on the docket.74
In
spring of 1919, the Senate and the House of Representatives met and passed the suffrage
Amendment and the first election that women could vote in occurred in November of
1920.75
The Suffrage amendment was a huge victory for the women’s rights movement.
After its passing the NAWSA divided over the continuation of the campaign for equal
rights for women. The leaders of the organization wanted to continue to campaign for
72
Margaret Fuller, Women in the Nineteenth Century, (New York: W.W. Norton &
Company Inc, 1971), 172.
73
74
75
Ibid., 17.

28
legislation, to ban all forms of discrimination based on sex, but the conservative majority
of the group did not feel like any other social changes were needed for women.76
The
campaigns of women for social change quickly died down in the years that followed 1920
and the unified women’s rights movements for a time all but disappeared. It came back
energetically in the emerging culture of WW2 and beyond. The first wave of feminism
ended in the 1920s but because of the original formation of women as an organized group
that could advocate for social and political changes women in the years that followed
could more quickly mobilize and organize in a manner in which to bring about real
change.
76
Ibid.,17.

29
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Beverly W. Jones, Edwin T. Marsh and William B. Hall, the Inspectors of Election
by Whom Her Vote Was Received. Rochester, NY: Daily Democrat and Chronicle
Book Print, 1874.
Crowley, Richard. Woman Suffrage Question. United States Circuit Court, Second
Circuit, Northern District of New York. The United States v. Susan B. Anthony.
Argument of Richard Crowley, U.S. District Attorney. Lockport, New York: M.C
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Dubois, Ellen Carol. Feminism and Suffrage: The Emergence of An Independent
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Federal Judicial Center, The Trial of Susan B. Anthony. Ann. D. Gordon, 2005.
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30
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