15 Empowering Quotes From Elizabeth Cady Stanton

Elizabeth Cady Stanton was born on November 12, 1815 and dedicated her life to progressing the women’s rights movement in America. She organized, she rallied, advocated, protested, wrote, and, most importantly, spoke. Here are just a few of the activist’s most powerful words.

1. ON THE LIFE OF FRIEND SUSAN B. ANTHONY

"To live for a principle, for the triumph of some reform by which all mankind are to be lifted up—to be wedded to an idea—may be, after all, the holiest and happiest of marriages."

— From The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony

2. ON HER HOPES FOR YOUNG WOMEN

“I would have girls regard themselves not as adjectives, but as nouns.”

— From an 1870 lecture called “Our Girls”

3. ON THE IMPORTANCE OF POLITICAL EQUALITY

“To throw obstacles in the way of a complete education is like putting out the eyes; to deny the rights of property is like cutting off the hands. To refuse political equality is to rob the ostracized of all self-respect, of credit in the market place, of recompense in the world of work, of a voice in choosing those who make and administer the law, a choice in the jury before whom they are tried, and in the judge who decides their punishment.”

— From “Solitude of Self”

4. ON HOW THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE COULD USE AN EDIT

“We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men and women are created equal.”

— From "The Declaration of Rights and Sentiments"

5. ON THE CHANGING TIMES

“Come, come, my conservative friend, wipe the dew off your spectacles, and see that the world is moving.”

— From The Woman’s Bible

6. ON TRUTH

“Truth is the only safe ground to stand upon.”

— From The Woman’s Bible

7. ON KEEPING BUSY.

“In a word, I am always busy, which is perhaps the chief reason why I am always well.”

— From Stanton’s diaries

8. ON INDEPENDENCE

"Whatever the theories may be of woman's dependence on man, in the supreme moments of her life, he cannot bear her burdens. In the tragedies and triumphs of human experience, each mortal stands alone."

— From “Solitude of Self”

9. ON GETTING OLDER

“... the hey-day of woman's life is on the shady side of fifty, when the vital forces heretofore expended in other ways are garnered in the brain …”

— From Elizabeth Cady Stanton as revealed in her letters, diary and reminiscences

10. ON COURAGE

“The best protection any woman can have ... is courage.”

— From Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony: Fighting Together for Women's Rights

11. ON BETTERING ONESELF

“Put it down in capital letters: SELF-DEVELOPMENT IS A HIGHER DUTY THAN SELF-SACRIFICE. The thing that most retards and militates against women’s self development is self-sacrifice.”

— As told to a reporter, via In a Different Voice

12. ON THE BOSTON TEA PARTY

“It was just so in the American Revolution, in 1776, the first delicacy the men threw overboard in Boston harbor was the tea, woman's favorite beverage. The tobacco and whiskey, though heavily taxed, they clung to with the tenacity of the devil-fish.”

― From The Women’s Bible

13. ON HOW TO BECOME A BETTER PUBLIC SPEAKER

“Dress loose, take a great deal of exercise, and be particular about your diet and sleep sound enough, the body has a great effect on the mind.”

— As told to Susan B. Anthony

14. ON LIVING YOUR TRUTH

“The moment we begin to fear the opinions of others and hesitate to tell the truth that is in us, and from motives of policy are silent when we should speak, the divine floods of light and life no longer flow into our souls. Every truth we see is ours to give the world, not to keep for ourselves alone, for in so doing we cheat humanity out of their rights and check our own development.”

— From an 1890 speech to the National American Woman Suffrage Association

15. ON MOTHERHOOD

“We are, as a sex, infinitely superior to men, and if we were free and developed, healthy in body and mind, as we should be under natural conditions, our motherhood would be our glory. That function gives women such wisdom and power as no male can possess.”

— From Stanton’s letters