Women's Rights Movement

The role of women in the 1800s was primarily a domestic one. It was expected that in a household, the husband would go out to work every day. The workplace and the environment not around the home was called the Public Sphere, where men were expected and women discouraged from being. Women, however, were expected to live lives of domesticity, staying in the Private Sphere out of sight. The Private Sphere was a name for the home, and women were expected to hide themselves in here, safe from the terrors of the Public Sphere. These spheres were applied to the middle class, where the men alone could provide for the family. While the men were expected to work, women also had a strict set of expectations. The Cult of Domesticity embodied the belief that middle class women should be confined to their home, fulfilling their "proper" role of taking care of the house, man, and children. In addition to this, there were four characteristics of an ideal woman that society expected of them. The first was Piety, or religious devotion. It was expected that all women should look up to the church. The second characteristic was Purity. This meant that every girl was expected to be a virgin, and this lead to hysteria, a condition applied to women with exaggerated emotions, even those stressed about keeping her "treasure" safe. The third ideal characteristic was Submissiveness. Every middle class woman was expected to be submissive to their man, but this also lead to strict clothing requirements. Corsets and cage dresses were very common, and they lead to many health problems. The last characteristic is Domesticity, which again is the expectation that all women should stay at home, as an object of leisure.
The Seneca Falls Convention was a convention that took place to discuss the growing issue of the lack of women's rights. It was composed primarily of women, but men attended as well. The attendees had much to talk about, as women were seen as inferior to men and were thus given less rights. Many of these rights, or lack of, stemmed from the ideal characteristics of women. Women were not allowed to vote, own property when married, and were in positions of almost total dependency to their husbands. The attendees vowed to change this, and created the Declaration of Rights and Sentiments. The Declaration of Rights and Sentiments was a document that had many similarities to the Declaration of Independence, something that the creators did on purpose to highlight the hypocrisy that the document has. The writers wanted to show that the equality that the Declaration of Independence focuses on also applies to women. One of the largest concerns was the idea of women's suffrage. A lot of women thought that women could vote alongside men, but some argued against it. They thought that this was absurd- that men would never take their cause seriously if they pushed for such a radical idea. However, it was eventually put into the Declaration of Rights and Sentiments.
While the Seneca Falls Convention was very important in the history of women's rights in America, voices were left unheard. They discussed the unfair treatment of women, but paid no regard to race. African American women and Native American women were not present at the convention, and thus unable to share their problems in an attempt to get them fixed. This meant that slavery and other mistreatment of the other races was ignored in the Convention. This is ironic, as they use the Declaration of Independence to state that all people were created equal, while at the same time neglecting masses of people. However, many positive advances were made in the Convention. Suffrage, property rights, and professional rights were covered in the Declaration of Rights and Sentiments. In class, we decided that the most important right was to be recognized as as functioning member of the United States, and all the rights that went with it, like the ability to hold office positions.
I think the most important resolution discussed is the right to vote and hold office. This means that our country is not shaped only by the views of the male population, but by the women too. This would increase the number of votes in a campaign, leading to a more accurate representation of the choice of the country for leaders and other positions. I think that this has been achieved, along with all of the goals that the attendees had in mind at the Seneca Falls Convention. Women can vote, participate with men in the market, and altogether have the same rights that men do. This being said, I do think there are expectations for each gender even in society today.