AS A CHILD, Elizabeth Cady Stanton was exposed to reform movements through her cousin Gerrit Smith and received informal legal training from her father, a respected lawyer. In part due to these early influences she became active in the abolitionist movement at a young age, and later married anti-slavery orator Henry Stanton in 1840. Soon after their wedding, they traveled to London, England, for the World Anti-Slavery Convention where Henry was a delegate. When women delegates were denied official standing at the convention, Elizabeth Cady Stanton met with another delegate, Lucretia Mott, a Quaker teacher involved in temperance, the anti-slavery movement, and women's rights. Together, they decided to organize a women's rights convention in Seneca Falls, New York.

As part of the Seneca Falls Convention, Stanton ...