[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 98 (Tuesday, July 21, 1998)]
[Senate]
[Page S8684]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         ADDITIONAL STATEMENTS

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            150TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE SENECA FALLS CONVENTION

 Mrs. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, I rise to recognize and 
remember the importance of the previous two days in American history. 
July nineteenth and twentieth, 1998, mark the one hundred and fiftieth 
anniversary of the Seneca Falls Convention in Seneca Falls, New York. 
This gathering of American women and men began a movement in our nation 
that changed the role of women in this country and, ultimately, around 
the world. Because of the convention's tremendous impact on the 
American way of life, I joined Senator Torricelli and several other 
Senate colleagues in recently introducing a Senate resolution honoring 
the women's rights movement and saluting those who made it all happen. 
Today I speak in honor of this occasion.
  Women's struggle for equality had very humble beginnings. Elizabeth 
Cady Stanton, a housewife and mother of three sons, and Lucretia Mott, 
a Quaker teacher and staunch abolitionist, were ejected from the 1840 
World Anti-Slavery Convention in London simply because they were women. 
Outraged at such an injustice, they were compelled to call attention to 
the many freedoms denied to women, including the right to vote or hold 
elective office, the right to own property if married, the right to 
obtain a professional education and the basic right to protect oneself 
from an abusive spouse.
  Mrs. Stanton and Miss Mott, along with Jane Hunt, Martha Coffin 
Wright and Mary Ann McClintock, called for a public convention to 
discuss the social, civil and religious rights of women. The first 
meeting of the women's rights movement convened at the Wesleyan 
Methodist Chapel in Seneca Falls, New York. Over 300 men and women 
attended the two day conference, including Susan B. Anthony and 
Frederick Douglass.
  The highlight of the convention was the reading of the Declaration of 
Sentiments, a document composed on Mrs. McClintock's kitchen table. The 
statement was based on the words of our Declaration of Independence, 
applying its self-evident truths to both males and females and 
declaring all men and women equal. The document even called for a 
woman's right to vote, a revolutionary idea at the time. In fact, while 
68 women and 32 men signed the Declaration of Sentiments, more than 200 
attendees refused to endorse such an outrageous notion. Today, it is 
difficult to imagine a democratic society that would not permit women 
to hold elective office, sign legal documents or attend the church of 
their choice, much less exercise the basic right to vote.
  Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Lucretia Mott, and the other founders of the 
women's rights movement epitomized the strength of the American woman 
and exhibited the courage necessary to put an end to a great injustice. 
They understood the road before them would be long and hard. Little did 
they know, however, that it would be more than 70 years before women 
would be granted suffrage in the United States. Today the movement is 
symbolized by the unfinished marble carving of the Suffrage advocates 
now displayed in the Capitol Rotunda.
  The calling of the Seneca Falls Convention and the passion of those 
involved forever changed the course of American history. All Americans 
should honor the efforts of these intrepid women and learn from their 
commitment to a cause in which they so deeply believed. Without the 
fortitude shown throughout this arduous struggle for equality, I could 
not be standing before you on the Senate floor today.

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