Elizabeth Cady Stanton and her daughter Harriot

This photograph shows Elizabeth Cady Stanton (1815-1902) with her daughter Harriot (1856-1940)—a future suffragist. Born into an elite, slaveholding family, Stanton helped organize the Seneca Falls convention in 1848. She produced the Declaration of Sentiments for the convention, using the Declaration of Independence as a model and invoking its principles to guarantee equal liberty for women. During the Civil War, she led a petition drive with her friend Susan B. Anthony to end slavery; however, after first supporting universal suffrage, she later prioritized the rights of educated white women over newly freed African Americans.