It was a long and difficult struggle for women to gain the right to vote in the United States. Equality between the sexes has been an issue for centuries, not just in modern times. A British author even wrote in 1792, "The Vindication of the Rights of Women" because she felt that women were not treated equally. The modern day struggle was kicked off though in 1848. This was the year of the first women's rights convention, which was held in Seneca Falls, New York. It was not until over 70 yeas later that women were finally given the right to vote when the 19th amendment was completely ratified in 1920.

             The Seneca Falls convention was called by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott out of their anger with male abolitionists and the patriarchal system that they represented. In 1840, when Stanton and Mott attended the World's Anti-Slavery Convention, the predominately male convention refused to seat female delegates. Stanton and Mott, along with other activist women in the U.S. started to see the similarities between their own status and that of the slaves. The convention at Seneca Falls lit a fire among women who were determined to change their legal and political status. These conventions went on regularly throughout the 1850's but the Civil War halted these meetings when women had to turn their energies to war work.

             After the Civil, many women felt their patriotism, hard work, and feelings against slavery would be rewarded with the right to vote. They were wrong. Congress and the public felt that this time should be "the Negro's Hour", and that by doing something as outrageous as allowing women to vote, would jeopardize all of this. Three new amendments were passed and African Americans were now eligible to vote, but how long would it be before women were eligible too?.

             By the end of the 19th century, women where starting to use a new position on gaining the right to vote-the qualities of women's nature.