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Declaration of Sentiments
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Themes
The Tyranny of Men
For many women in mid-19th-century America, the differences between the rights of men and women rankled. Men in the United States and elsewhere had long since established “a different code of morals for men and women” (Paragraph 17). Men insisted they were smarter and wiser than women, and preachers argued that the Bible put women beneath men. Therefore, women were told to obey their male counterparts, remain silent while men discuss important matters, and permit their lives to unfold as men saw fit. The Declaration of Sentiments refutes this stance and insists that the regime of men over women amounts to a tyranny similar to that suffered by colonists at the time of the American Revolution.
The Declaration claims that 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” (Paragraph 3). The document lists 16 grievances concerning men’s disrespectful and oppressive treatment of women. These include the refusal to permit women to vote, the plundering of her property, the suppression of her right to education and professional achievement, and a double standard of conduct that punishes women but not men.
The Declaration contends that these policies violate women’s natural rights and that this tyranny is invalid and ought to be dismantled. The document adds that men will ridicule it and its purpose, but that its authors will persist in working for what is right and just, and to remove this tyranny from the backs of women.
The Right to Equal Treatment
A nation founded on the principle of the natural human right to liberty becomes a hotbed of hypocrisy if it forbids this right to all its citizens. At the time of the Seneca Falls Convention, American women had few or no property rights, were forbidden entry into higher education and professions, were required to obey their husbands in all matters, had little to no ability in a divorce to protect their right to see and raise their own children, and lived in a society that regarded them as second-class citizens. To women who otherwise admired the words of the Declaration of Independence, this situation seemed blatantly unfair; they believed that the principal assertion that “all men are created equal” ought to be modified to read “all men and women are created equal” (Paragraph 2).
The ongoing conversation in society about the inferiority of women appeared to be a mere excuse that men used to dominate their wives, daughters, and other female relations and acquaintances. The result was that women suffered under a regime of continuous disrespect. A woman came to expect that a man would try “to destroy her confidence in her own powers” (Paragraph 19). That had to cease.
For these reasons, the Declaration of Sentiments insists that women be treated as equals and receive “immediate admission to all the rights and privileges which belong to them as citizens of these United States” (Paragraph 20). The document concludes by inviting American women to gather together in future conventions where they can discuss these issues and organize campaigns to end the unfair treatment of women.
The Right to Equal Voice
Women can’t protect their rights if they have no voice in public affairs. The Declaration argues that this had happened already: “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” (Paragraph 7).
The most important way that women can affect governance and alter oppressive laws is through the power of voting. Without the “elective franchise,” women have no organized political power. For this reason, the right to vote is mentioned first among the sentiments listed in the Declaration and twice more within that set of grievances.
The document points out that women suffered from the same form of oppression that sparked the American Revolution—taxation without representation. A woman was forced to pay for public services over which she had no voice, the men having “taxed her to support a government which recognizes her only when her property can be made profitable to it” (Paragraph 12). The right to vote would resolve this ethical dilemma and bring women, at last, into the discussion about matters concerning her own property.
The Declaration is all of a piece, in that the grievances are examples of men’s overarching attitude of entitled superiority; likewise, the rights demanded go together. Leading this list is the right to vote: Without it, women must stand aside while men discuss the disposition of women’s affairs without consulting them. With the right to vote, women—powered by the force of law—can join the debate, their voices finally heard.
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