An Analysis Of The Women's Rights Movement

In the late 1800’s through the early 1900’s, women were not given the rights they have today and were being mistreated, but because of a few brave women who gave up their lives to fight for what they knew was right, this all changed. Many of these women were educated and brave, but were still denied their rights. Women have suffered through this long battle to get what they knew they deserved and took time out of their lives to fight for what they believed in, which was to have a voice. Women wanted to get the same respect that men were given. The women’s suffrage movement was not only in the United States, but it was all over the world. It took the women’s suffrage movement many years to work and come through, but women were finally able to vote and have the same rights as men. Through their work in the suffrage movement, Lucretia Mott, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and Susan B. Anthony and many more changed the role of women in society.

Over a hundred years ago, one event created chaos among gender roles and here are some of the initial factors of how rights for women started as a predicament which later began to evolve into a much larger problem that involved many people around the nations. Over the course of history, many issues had change the world to what it has become today. Many problems led to social, economic, and other changes. One small event is able to cause more obstacles, which eventually leads to larger complications. Even though society had tried to resolve these issues, they still encountered many hardships that were disruptive to their own perspectives as also for other people within the community. Thus, this was an important issue because it had changed

The Women's Rights Movement was a significant crusade for women that began in the late nineteenth century and flourished throughout Europe and the United States for the rest of the twentieth century. Advocates for women's rights initiated this movement as they yearned for equality and equal participation and representation in society. Throughout all of history, the jobs of women ranged from housewives to factory workers, yet oppression by society, particularly men, accompanied them in their everyday lives. Not until the end of the nineteenth century did women begin to voice their frustrations about the inequalities among men and women, and these new proclamations would be the basis for a society with opportunities starting to open for

Generations of women fought courageously for equality for decades. The ratification of the Nineteenth amendment was vindication for so many women across the country. After having spent so many years oppressed and unable to make way for themselves, women everywhere were growing tired of being unable to own property, keep their wages and the independence that an academic education gave them. The decades that ensued brought with them various female activists, men that supported them and a division of its own within the movement. The women’s suffrage movement lasted 71 years and cam with great discourse to the lives of many women who fought for the cause.

With the advancement of suffrage to equal pay, over the last century, women’s rights have progressed immensely. Through historic marches and demonstrations across the United States, women protested for their equal place in politics and social progress. Despite the fear-mongering components used in achieving these rights, women’s rights are still thoroughly debated within society today. Over the last century, incredible and unreachable goals have been fulfilled for women, such as the right to vote and a sense of equal state in the “Free World,” and can only improve in the years to come.

Led by a fair number of women, the Second Great Awakening opened new possibilities for women. The idea that women were subordinate to men was slowly becoming a thing of the pass. Women broke the social norm and began to lead reform movements in order to gain rights. The Grimké sisters regularly spoke to coed audiences about abolitionist efforts in order to gain support and spread the idea of abolition (Pastoral Letter to the Liberator, 1837). However, women didn’t fully receive equal legal status and rights until the mid-nineteenth century. The Seneca Falls Convention ultimately paved the way for women’s rights and the Declaration of Sentiments proposed “women’s equality in everything from education and employment to legal rights and voting”(Hewitt, Lawson

Along with their right to vote came a change in the social status of women as a whole. They were no longer viewed as inferior individuals to men, but as strong citizens of the United States who could equally contribute to the political system. Nevertheless, women began changing their “natural roles” years before the Nineteenth Amendment was even ratified. They left the domestic housewife label and took on different jobs such as factory and office work. The support of women reformers urged them to move forward and aim for a change. Because of the women reformers in the Progressive Era, modern day women are benefitting from their hard work and persistence. Women are still able to vote and express their political opinions. Female votes matter just as much as those of the men. Furthermore, women are not confined to being housewives. They can take on any job that a man can and also care for those in their home. In fact, many women are the main supporters of their households now. With that being said, women reformers paved the way for all women that followed after them. If women reformers could see a glimpse of how far women have come since their time, they would be highly pleased to see the fruits of their

The women’s suffrage is a major reform movement in the 1800’s. It was a movement for women’s rights and freedoms. “They are both moral and accountable beings, and whatever is right for a man to do, is right for women to do” (pg 283). Everyone is created equal it stated. No one else was above anyone else. The Grimké sisters, Sarah and Angelina, are the one’s who spoke up and got active about this movement. They stated that women had social & legal limitations that limited their participation. The leaders of this movement along with the Grimké sisters were Catherine Beecher, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Lucretia Mott, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, & Dorothea Dix. Many accepted this factor, others did not. The women worked on many movements, but didn’t help because, they could not vote. The Seneca Falls Convention of 1848 in New York, was to discuss the women's rights. There it became the Declaration of Sentiments and Resolutions, “All men and women created equal”. The battle for women to have the right to vote was won in 1920.

The 19th Amendment guarantees a vote for women in the United States of America, but how did this constitutional change happen? Many females prior to this accomplishment faced struggles from external forces that denied their rights and capabilities. Feminism and equal rights were and still are prominent in American society. In order to provide women of the future what is rightfully theirs, women during the 1700s have taken control of their opinions and used their strong-will to make the necessary changes in American society. During the Seneca Falls Convention, Elizabeth Cady Stanton exclaimed in her address, “The right is ours. The question now is: how shall we get possession of what rightfully belongs to us,” (Stanton). The leaders, Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott of the Seneca Falls Convention, along with other female leaders, displayed civil disobedience, provided powerful lectures, and organized conventions that gave a new perspective on gender equality.

For more than a century, women from all over have deliberately confronted and engaged in numerous protests to destroy all restrictions, control and violations in regards to many prejudices made against their gender. Yet, it was not until the mid 1800’s that powerful women such as Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and Lucretia Mott passionately fought and publically spoke for the rights that women deserved as American citizens. Essentially, the movement for women’s full entitlement reached out to an enormous audience with the Seneca Falls convention in New York and inspired the creation of a written stand on political requests by Stanton and other activists, named and remembered as The Declaration of Sentiments. At

    Women’s rights in the United States have come a long way in the last two centuries. Women have gone from being seen as minorities to being viewed as powerful and independent by many. Basic rights such as initiating divorce, working and earning a salary, going to college, owning property, and voting were denied to them. The list of these denied rights goes on, but women such as Sojourner Truth, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and Elizabeth Blackwell worked to change this. They helped women gain the rights they know today.

In the older times women had the right to do nothing, but throughout the years women have been courageous enough to stand up and fight for what they want. The authors writes, “In 1869 the National Woman SuFFrage association, with Miss Anthony and Mrs. Stanton at its head, was formed in New York and in the same year the American Woman SuFFrage association was organized in Cleveland with Lucy Stone and Julia Ward Howe as its leaders” (4). A lot of amendments were made in the 1800’s in America, and that is one of the main things that have changed in America. At the start we had no laws, no rules, no commandments, and no amendments; we had no rights what so ever. As time passed though, people fought for what they wanted, and people made laws that are still here today.

Today, the feminist movement is a worldwide force, calling for rights and equality for women. It’s come a long way from its shaky beginnings, especially for American women. Many know to thank the strong pioneers of feminism for bringing women so far- leaders like Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage. However, not many are aware of where they began, and how their ideas about the way women must be treated in a proper society were shaped. Though they are not often acknowledged, the women of the Iroquois confederacy had a major impact on the birth of American feminism (Oneida Indian Nation 2009).

The main subject of the book is women, This book also covers women's activism, from 1840-1890, focusing on the incredible figures --Lucretia Mott, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Lucy Stone, and Susan B. Anthony that started it all and it also discusses their accomplishments. McMillen addresses the stories of the four figures lives, and how those women took up the leadership on the cause of women's rights, and the astonishing progress they accomplished during their lifetimes, and the lasting legacy they left behind and transformative effects of the work they did. In Seneca Falls, New York, over the course of a couple of days in July, 1848, a small group of women and men, led by Elizabeth Cady Stanton who was a: suffragist, social activist, abolitionist, and Lucretia Mott an abolitionist and a women's rights activist and a social reformist, they held a convention that set in motion the woman's rights movement and changed history. The significance of that important convention would not only be important in America but is very important all around the world. In Seneca Falls and the Origins of the Woman's Rights Movement, at the convention they talked about how women and men are equal and they also argued that women deserve legal rights and education opportunities just as men receive those rights.

Throughout history, Canada’s identity has changed in many ways and there have been many historical events that have greatly shaped and impacted Canada’s history and identity. The Women’s Movement and women’s contribution in the past and throughout history has had the greatest impact on shaping Canada into what it is today. Among many identifying qualities like being multicultural, bilingual, and world leaders, Canada is also country that has changed immensely in the way of becoming a country that has learned to accept women, move towards providing them with equal opportunities and treating them equally. Through economic, social and political movements and actions, the contribution from women and the women’s movement have increased, changed and improved women’s rights and equality greatly. Women worked to create independence and equality economically through their contributions to war on the homefront in WWI resulting in greater workplace equality, socially through the actions of the Flappers in the 1920’s giving women currently, the confidence and strength that they need to speak up, and politically, through the work of the Suffragists including the Famous 5 to allow women to have the same political rights as men.