Why did women’s issues suddenly become so prominent in American culture? There were always women who wanted more. They were secure with themselves and wanted to prove they were capable of doing more and being equal. There were people like Anne Hutchinson who was banished because of her challenging the way men dominated the church. During the nineteenth century women demanded more rights that started from solitary events to more organized protesting’s.
Immense changes came throughout the United States during the nineteenth century that changed the lives of all women of different social status. In the start of the 1820’s a lot of white women began working in mills. These women were working outside the home along with men of all social status, but middle class women were still held to the standard that they had to be homemaker’s and tend to the home, be submissive, and tend to her husbands’ needs at home. Because women were now working outside the home, doing work men were doing, this helped them to start acting politically. These women were referred to as “mill girls” that worked long hours and in dangerous conditions. In the 1830’s women started organizing rally’s because they wanted to have improved work conditions and higher wages. The women of middle-class status felt a sense of a well-organized unit because of those women, this would later enable them to work together to demand equal rights. These women were concerned about the well being of the poor, this made them feel like their work gave them a voice and social power. Women that worked in the abolitionist movement paved the way and played a huge role in the start of organized women’s rights movements. In the beginning the women began working the black women that escape slavery and wanted to better themselves by learning to read and write. These women were the first to speak publically about slavery and as a result they were attacked. Those women who had organized the schools for these women were met with constant harassment as well.
White women such as Lydia Maria Child and Sarah Grimké lobbied for abolition that informed them that they had very little say and the sexism they found proved this even more. In 1840 the World Antislavery Convention in London declined to allow women to seat delegates. This caused the launch of the women’s rights campaign in the United States. Three hundred people attended this campaign, where they endorsed the Declaration of Sentiments. This document announced that men and women were “created equally” and women will be equal socially and legally with men, this included the right to vote. Before these events, women could not do the same things as men, socially it was frowned upon. Even just the daily life was hard; it relied solely on physical strength like having to cut wood for the winter by hand. People started treating others with respect and not in a way that women were always treated and looked down upon. Women were becoming more educated and wanting to prove themselves and worked hard like men did.