"We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men and women are created equal."

Seneca Falls, New York. July 19, 1848.  Hundreds of men and women gathered in the name of women's rights.  Those in attendance were graced with the presence of Boston-based Lucretia Mott, a Quaker famous for her speaking ability, as well as Elizabeth Cady Stanton, a skeptical non-Quaker who followed logic more than religion. 

The convention spanned two days and consisted of six sessions; including a lecture on law and multiple discussions about the role of women in society.  Stanton and Quaker presented two documents, the Declaration of Sentiments and an accompanying list of resolutions.  The Declaration of Sentiments, mainly prepared by Stanton, was based upon the Declaration of Independence.  Frederick Douglass quoted in his publication the North Star the document was the "grand basis for attaining the civil, social, political, and religious rights of women."  His attendance at the convention and support of the Declaration helped pass the resolutions put forward.  Exactly 100 of the approximately 300 in attendance at the convention signed the document.

Despite they're arduous resources, impressive commitment, reasonable logic, and stately purpose of this stalwart band of individuals, more than seven decades would pass before the crusandes were finally able to secure the right of American women to vote.  American's journalism's discouraging treatment of women didn't begin in Seneca Falls.  From the beginning of the republic, the media had worked quite hard to place women in their "right" role in society-- the home.  This belief intenfied with the coverage of the Seneca Falls Convention.  The women's rights leaders at one point decided that the best route in order to attain their goal of suffrage was to follow the example of the abolitionists and create an entirely alternative publishing network.  Although women began this "suffrage press" movement  in hopes of counteracting the male journalistic conspiracy of female stereotypes that had blocked their progress the feminists found that the male dictatorship was to extensive that even this seperate communication system was impervious to it.

This mahogany tea table was used on July 16, 1848 to compose much of the Declaration of Sentiments.




Picture taken from
Declaration of Sentiments Table, 1848, Social History Division, National Museum of American History, Smithsonian Institute.
Quote taken from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Declaration_of_Sentiments