Compare And Contrast The Abolitionist Movement And Women's Rights Movement

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The United States was in a period of social and political adjustment in the early 1800s. Reform movements during this time period aimed to increase public awareness about their issues and to create social and political change. Groups such as blacks and women continued to be oppressed, so they created The Abolitionist Movement and The Women’s Rights Movement respectively, which aimed to fight for the rights that political leaders in the 19th century neglected. In the 1800s, the democratic values that most reform movements planned to obtain were free voting and public education. Most reform movements in the United States sought to achieve core democratic values such as liberty in different ways. The Abolitionist Movement aimed to emancipate all …show more content…

Lucretia Mott and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, two leaders of the fight for women’s rights, called the Seneca Fall Convention to express the views of oppressed women. Elizabeth Cady Stanton expresses her views in the Seneca Falls Declaration when she remarks, “to declare our right to be free as a man is free”. Stanton believes that the Women’s Rights Movement must achieve the democratic ideal of liberty to be successful, so she women can only gain liberty when they have the same rights as men. The Constitution of the Brook Farm Association also portrays many of the goals of the Women’s Rights Movement, especially on education when the document writes, “the benefits of the highest physical, intellectual and moral education”. The Brook Farm Association strives for equal education opportunities for all people, which gives women an ability to pursue a job. The Women’s Right Movement sought to achieve very specific democratic values because they valued voting rights and …show more content…

However, some reform movements did not attempt to progress democracy, and these movements instead vied to adjust religious and social norms such as the Temperance Movement, which went against the consumption of alcohol. A reform movement’s need for a clear plan to achieve their goal was essential in the success of the movement. The Women’s Rights Movement was very successful in its fight for democratic ideals because women gained suffrage in 1920. However, the abolitionists were unsuccessful in ending racial discrimination and achieving voting rights until the middle of the 20th century. The fight for liberty was often the driving force behind reform movements in the early

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