Beginning of Women’s Suffrage

The Women’s Suffrage Movement had officially begun after the Seneca Falls Convention which occurred in 1848. As the movement gained popularity and publicity, more strides were made in furthering the Suffragette agenda. At the 1896 Hearing of the National American Woman Suffrage Association, Susan B. Anthony made her argument for women’s suffrage in front of congress. To summarize her initial statement, she mentions a proposal for an amendment that would give women the right to vote. She emphasizes how the wording of this proposed amendment would be worded similarly to wording is similar to the fifteenth amendment, where black men were given the right to vote, which had recently been passed. Susan B Anthony provides a chain of events that led up to the proposal, starting with her mentioning the 1866 petition that called for the removal of the word “male” from the fourteenth amendment. Anthony likens the treatment of women in America to the treatment of children, given the fact that they are governed so strictly with no representation. Other important leaders of the early Suffrage movement like Elizabeth Cady Stanton helped organize the National Women’s Suffrage Organization and was an influential speaker encouraging women to join the movement. She and Lucretia Mott are credited with starting the Women’s Suffrage Movement.