elective franchise, thereby leaving her without representation in the halls of legislation, he has oppressed her on all sides.
"He has made her, if married, in the eye of the law, civilly dead.
"He has taken from her all right in property, even to the wages she earns.
"He has so framed the laws of divorce as to what shall be the proper causes, and, in case of separation, to whom the guardianship of the children shall be given, as to be wholly regardless of the happiness of women the law in all cases going upon a false supposition of the supremacy of man, and giving all power into his hands.
"After depriving her of all rights as a married woman, if single and the owner of property, he has taxed her to support a government which recognizes her only when her property can be made profitable to it.
"He has monopolized nearly all the profitable employments, and from those she is permitted to follow she receives but a scanty remuneration. He closes against her all the avenues of wealth and distinction which he considers most honorable to himself. As a teacher of theology, medicine, or law, she is not known.
"He allows her in church, as well as state, but a subordinate position, claiming Apostolic authority for her exclusion from the ministry and, with some exceptions, from any public participation in the affairs of the church.
"He has created a false public sentiment by giving to the world a different code of morals for men and women, by which moral delinquencies which exclude women from society are not only tolerated but deemed of little account in man.
"He has usurped the prerogative of Jehovah himself, claiming it as his right to assign for her a sphere of action, when that belongs to her conscience and God.
"He has endeavored, in every way that he could, to destroy her confidence in her own powers, to lessen her self-respect, and to make her willing to lead a dependent and abject life.
"Now, in view of this disfranchisement of one-half the people of this country, their social and religious degradation; in view of the unjust laws mentioned, and because women do feel themselves aggrieved, oppressed and fraudulently deprived of their most sacred rights, we insist that they have immediate admission to all the rights and privileges which belong to them as citizens of the United States." —
Of course, this declaration, modeled after the immortal Declaration of 1776, did not fail to create a sensation everywhere. Other conventions were held in Rochester and Syracuse, N. Y., and in Salem, Ohio. They brought to the front
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