ELIZABETH CADY STANTON, "ADDRESS ON WOMAN'S RIGHTS"
Elizabeth Cady Stanton's first major public speech, in which she grounds her arguments in natural rights, adopts an embellished speaking style, and employs a narrative form in her conclusion to invite her audience to participate in her prophetic vision of massive transformation.
Stanton's 1848 "Address on Woman's Rights" should be understood as both a historical artifact of gender ideology and an example of Stanton's own personal tenacity. Her address allowed her to constitute herself as a leader, asserting her voice through three rhetorical strategies: first, Stanton strengthened her natural rights arguments by elaborating on the ideology embedded in the Declaration of Sentiments and by invoking arguments of moral authority; second, she fully developed her natural rights arguments through the sentimental style; and third, she adopted a Christ‐like persona in a narrative of redemption and transformed herself and her audience into woman's rights leaders. Stanton's address incorporated predominant beliefs regarding natural rights, which date back to eighteenth‐century political thought and directly inform the Declaration of Independence. Stanton's strategy, as Ellen Carol DuBois notes, "involved the extension of natural rights egalitarianism from men to women—especially the principles of individualism, the universal capacity for reason, and political democracy." During the nation's founding, few were yet ready to extend these natural rights principles to women.
During the late 1700’s, the colonies in America were upset and resentful of the British tyranny. In order to make the separation between the two groups official, Thomas Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence. Two hundred years later, women were facing the same injustice, only it was from men; and to protest against the unfair treatment, Elizabeth Cady Stanton wrote the Declaration of Sentiments and Resolutions. Both parties of oppression fought against the same outcome, unjust treatment, yet, each fought against different causes and in different ways.
Stanton's address extended the natural rights arguments made in the Declaration of Sentiments, which strategically co‐opted the natural rights ideology embedded in the Declaration of Independence. The Sentiments included a systematic listing of grievances and resolutions modeled after America's revolutionary founding document. Understanding how the Sentiments functioned in comparison to the Declaration of Independence shows that the purpose of Stanton's speech was to both elaborate and enact the Sentiments' promises. In doing so, Stanton did not make simple natural rights arguments, but rather she rhetorically transformed revolutionary thought into public moral action for the betterment of women's lives.
