Author, lecturer, and chief philosopher of the woman’s rights and suffrage movements, Elizabeth Cady Stanton was born on November 12, 1815 in Johnstown, New York. Because she was coming from a privileged family she received a good education, which enabled her to become one of the most influential women in the fight for gender equality. Elizabeth Stanton authored “The Declaration of Sentiments” that described women's grievances and demands. The main message of declaration was following: “We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men and women are created equal.” calling on women to fight for their constitutionally guaranteed right to equality as U.S. citizens. In 1848, Staton with her fellow activists held the first Woman’s Rights convention at Seneca Falls, New York, where she read the Declaration of Sentiments, proposing women be given the right to vote, to own property, to give authority of divorce and child custody, as well as the right of college education etc. However, the Declaration of Sentiments was only the foundation, the starting point of the organized struggle for equality, as American women would have to fight for another 72 years (until 1920) in order to finally achieve the same rights as men. By the 1880s, when Stanton was already 65 years old, she mainly focused on writing. Along with numerous articles on the subject of women and religion, Stanton published the Woman's Bible, in which she voiced her belief in a secular state and urged women to recognize how religious orthodoxy obstructed their chances to achieve self-sovereignty. Stanton died on October 26, 1902 from heart failure. Before her death she wanted her brain to be donated to science upon her death to reject claims that the mass of men’s brains made them smarter than women. Her children, however, didn’t carry out her wish.
Article by Ana Tvaladze Translated by Salome Kashia Edited by Mariam Beshidze
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