The main goal of the Seneca Falls Convention in 1848 was to call for an end to all laws that discriminated against women. In July 1848, Elizabeth Cady Stanton (see image) and Lucretia Mott, who were both active abolitionists, organized the first women's rights convention in Seneca Falls, New York. The convention is remembered for issuing The Declaration of Sentiments, which declared that all men and women were created equal. Modeled after the Declaration of Independence, it demanded that women be allowed to enter into male trades, professions, and businesses.
The most controversial issue at the Seneca Falls Convention concerned suffrage or the right to vote. Elizabeth Cady Stanton insisted that a demand for women's suffrage be included in the Declaration of Sentiments, a view that was supported by abolitionist Frederick Douglass. Eventually it was added after a debate, and the Seneca Falls Convention paved the way for the growth of the women's rights movement in America.
