Shakespeare Club hears about Stanton’s efforts
Trending
The Fredonia Shakespeare Club welcomed Elizabeth Cady Stanton back at the home of Mary Croxton during its recent meeting.
The Fredonia Censor first recorded Elizabeth Cady Stanton's visit on April 27, 1870. Mrs. Elizabeth C. Stanton (the name she used instead of Mrs. Henry Stanton) was on a Lyceum tour around the country.
The Censor wrote: "The beautiful weather of Saturday, April 23 made it pleasant for an attendance from the surrounding towns, and consequence was a house full of auditors to greet the great advocate of the cause of her sex. Not one was disappointed." The name of the lecture was "Open the Door." ... The argument of the lecture was strong and varied with flashes of wit, pathos and eloquence that retained the unwearied attention of the audience till the close of the two hours...most were unable to deny the brilliancy of the effort as a literary production."
Stanton gave this advice to the girls; "not to marry till they are twenty-five, for they are not fully developed mentally or physically till then. "Women must learn to depend upon themselves. Irving's picture of a stately oak, covered with a clinging vine...when the lightning strikes the oak, or the woodman's axe levels it to the ground, the vine dies with it and there the simile ends. Many a family's dependence is thus stricken down, leaving the mother with not only herself, but a half a dozen children to look out for, and the speaker exhorted the young girls to prepare themselves for such emergencies, instead of expecting and making themselves fit for nothing but "to twine."
E.C. Stanton gave a capital plea, for allowing women on juries, and gave a scathing denunciation of the abominable proceedings allowed in courts when women are on trial, also a review of the old laws of 1848 in reference to the rights of women to their own property and children. She advised the women not to pay taxes till they could have representatives. She went on claiming that the old text of "Wives, obey your Husbands," was of no more authority now than "Honor the King."
She proclaimed that women's suffrage is the paramount issue at present, just as she did in July 1848 at the first Women's Rights Convention in Seneca Falls, New York. Her Declaration of Sentiments: We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men and women are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness; that to secure these rights governments are instituted, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed."
"We insist that, in view of the disfranchisement of one-half of the people of this country, deprived of their most sacred rights; that women have immediate admission to all the rights and privileges which belong to them as citizens of the United States.
Proclaiming the right to vote was the most shocking proclamation made in the declaration.
Stanton went on today to tell us about her life and accomplishments, which were many.