Feeling betrayed by the explicit limitation of suffrage to male citizens in the text of what would become the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, participants in the Eleventh National Woman’s Rights Convention drafted a protest to Congress. Although that protest did not change the wording of the amendment, it contributed to eventual winning of universal suffrage in the United States.
On May 10, 1866, the Eleventh National Woman’s Rights Convention was held at the Church of the Puritans in New York City’s Union Square. The convention was called by such prominent activists for women’s rights as Elizabeth Cady Stanton. Active for many years in abolitionist and reformist circles, Stanton had worked to abolish slavery, bring about labor reform, and secure equal property, labor, and voting rights for women. Many participants in the women’s convention also had participated in the 1848 Women’s Rights Convention at Seneca Falls, New York, and most of them were prominent in the movement to secure the rights of African Americans in the aftermath of the Civil War (1861-1865). Almost from the beginning, the battles to abolish slavery and to enfranchise women both legally and socially had gone hand in hand. In 1865, however, those goals began to diverge, and this divergence directly prompted the convention of 1866.
Amendment[Fourteenth Amendment]
In the spring of 1865, the U.S. Congress
Julia Ward Howe.
Other prominent abolitionist leaders disagreed with Stanton’s position. For example, Horace Greeley
When the women’s convention met in May of 1866, the participants were concerned with woman suffrage and women’s rights in general, and specifically with the explicit limitation of suffrage to male citizens in the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, which was then under consideration in Congress. The convention listed as its main aim the securing of “equal rights to all American citizens . . . irrespective of race, color, or sex.”
As the meeting convened, Stanton was elected president, but she declined, stating that she would prefer the first president to be Lucretia Mott
Mott’s
The most significant outcome of the 1866 convention was the adoption of an address to Congress regarding the issues of African American male suffrage and woman suffrage. This document stated the majority opinion of the convention participants, including their belief that
The only tenable ground of representation is universal suffrage, as it is only through universal suffrage that the principle of “Equal Rights to All” can be realized. All prohibitions based on race, color, sex, property, or education, are violations of the republican idea; and the various qualifications now proposed are but so many plausible pretexts to debar new classes from the ballot-box.
Although the 1866 convention’s address was received by Congress, it did not alter the tenor of the congressional debate on the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments, which were passed and eventually ratified by the states. The convention’s seeds had been sown, however, and continued to bear fruit. In 1868, Stanton and Anthony founded the Woman Suffrage Association of America,
In August, 1920, the efforts of these and other women’s rights organizations resulted in the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment, granting all U.S. women the right to vote in all elections. The 1866 convention was instrumental in effecting the ratification of universal suffrage laws in the United States, by calling attention to the unfairness of the Fourteenth Amendment and similar laws that explicitly excluded women. The convention also helped organize and inspire former abolitionists to begin a new fight for women’s freedom and rights, just as they previously had worked for the rights of former slaves. The ideals expressed in the address to Congress would later be rediscovered by twentieth century feminists and formed the foundation of the modern movement for full legal, social, and economic equity for women throughout the world.
-
Baker, Jean H, ed. Votes for Women: The Struggle for Suffrage Revisited. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press, 2002. Well-researched study of the history of the woman suffrage movement. -
Banner, Lois W. Elizabeth Cady Stanton: A Radical for Woman’s Rights. Boston: Little, Brown, 1980. Describes the atmosphere in which the 1866 women’s rights convention took place and important events growing from it. -
Blackwell, Alice Stone. Lucy Stone: Pioneer of Woman’s Rights. 2d ed. 1930. Reprint. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 2001. Alice Stone Blackwell, Lucy Stone’s daughter, presents an insightful and personal view of her mother’s personal and public life. -
Buhle, Mari Jo, and Paul Buhle, eds. The Concise History of Woman Suffrage: Selections from the Classic Work of Stanton, Anthony, Gage, and Harper. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1978. Abridged edition of a six-volume work that includes the texts of the call for the convention and the address to Congress adopted by the 1866 women’s rights convention. -
Cromwell, Otelia. Lucretia Mott. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1958. Describes Mott’s lifelong work for abolition and women’s rights, and explains why she was chosen as the convention’s spokesperson. -
Du Bois, Ellen Carol, ed. Women Suffrage and Women’s Rights. New York: New York University Press, 1998. Diverse collection of essays that provide an excellent overview of the woman suffrage movement in the United States. -
McFadden, Margaret, ed. Women’s Issues. 3 vols. Pasadena, Calif.: Salem Press, 1997. Comprehensive reference work with numerous articles on woman suffrage, women’s rights organizations, and related issues. -
Schneir, Miriam, ed. Feminism in Our Time: The Essential Writings, World War II to the Present. New York: Vintage Books, 1994. Contains major writings by most of the participants in the convention; helps establish the historical context in which the convention took place. -
Sherr, Lynn. Failure Is Impossible: Susan B. Anthony in Her Own Words. New York: Times Books, 1995. Excerpts from the speeches and letters of the leading figure of the nineteenth century women’s rights movement, with a commentary on Anthony’s life and career.
Seneca Falls Convention
Akron Woman’s Rights Convention
Thirteenth Amendment Is Ratified
Fourteenth Amendment Is Ratified
Woman Suffrage Associations Begin Forming
Wyoming Gives Women the Vote
Anthony Is Tried for Voting
Minor v. Happersett
Declaration of the Rights of Women
Women’s Rights Associations Unite
Susan B. Anthony; Matilda Joslyn Gage; Lucretia Mott; Elizabeth Cady Stanton; Lucy Stone.