document introduced the list. The statement read as follows, “The history of mankind is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations on the part of man toward woman, having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over her.” She then went into the list of the specifics, which included: Women not being allowed to vote, married women being dead in the eyes of the law and having no property rights, women having to submit to laws they had no choice in, and husbands having legal power and responsibility for their wives to the extent that could imprison or beat them. These were just among the few of the eighteen grievances that were listed. I think that what Stanton was trying to point out was that these practices of mistreatment were considered to be the norm, not but 70 years after the new, idealistic democratic American Government was formed. That in essence, women were fighting for that same thing that the forefathers of our country were fighting for when they wrote the Declaration of Independence, freedom and equality. The next speech I will analyze is “Home Life”, which is a speech Stanton gave on marriage and divorce. In this speech that Stanton delivered during lecture tours in the 1870’s, she speaks of morality, motherhood, and the shaping of children’s character (Dubois 131). She touched on the subject of the role that religion plays in keeping women oppressed. This controversial belief would eventually be the cause of Stanton losing many followers. “Home life” starts off by talking about the problem at hand, “whether a man and woman are equal, joint heirs to all the richness and joy or earth and Heaven, or whether they were eternally ordained, one to be sovereign, the other slave…” (DuBois 132). Ultimately, this is the same problem that she addressed in the “Declaration of Sentiments” speech. She just says it in a much more realistic, a...
