Editing Lucy Stone (section)

== National Woman's Rights Convention ==
In April 1850, the [[Ohio Women's Convention at Salem in 1850|Ohio Women's Convention]] met in Salem, Ohio, a few weeks before a state convention met to revise the Ohio state constitution. The women's convention sent a communication to the constitutional convention requesting that the new constitution secure the same political and legal rights for women that were guaranteed to men.<ref>Stanton, Anthony, Gage, Harper (1881–1922), Vol. 1, [https://archive.org/stream/historyofwomansu01stanuoft#page/104/mode/2up p. 105].</ref> Stone sent a letter praising their initiative and said, "Massachusetts ought to have taken the lead in the work you are now doing, but if she chooses to linger, let her young sisters of the West set her a worthy example; and if the 'Pilgrim spirit is not dead,' we'll pledge Massachusetts to follow her."<ref>"From Lucy Stone," ''Anti-Slavery Bugle,'' April 27, 1850; ''National Anti-Slavery Standard,'' May 9, 1850.</ref>
Some of the leaders asked Stone and Lucretia Mott to address the constitutional convention on their behalf, but believing such appeals should come from residents of the state, they declined.<ref>"Women's Deputation to Columbus," ''Anti-Slavery Bugle,'' June 1, 1850; Stone letter to "Sallie B. Gove and Others," ''Anti-Slavery Bugle,'' June 22, 1850.</ref>

Women's rights conventions up to this point had been organized on a regional or state basis. During the annual convention of the [[American Anti-Slavery Society]] in Boston in 1850, with the support of Garrison and other abolitionists, Stone and [[Paulina Wright Davis]] posted a notice for a meeting to consider the possibility of organizing a women's rights convention on a national basis.<ref>Kerr, 1992, p. 58</ref>
The meeting was held at Boston's Melodeon Hall on May 30, 1850. Davis presided while Stone presented the proposal to the large and responsive audience and served as secretary. Seven women were appointed to organize the convention, with Davis and Stone assigned to conduct the correspondence needed to solicit signatures to the call and recruit speakers and attendance.<ref>"Women's Rights Convention," ''Liberator,'' [http://theliberatorfiles.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/The-Liberator-1850-06-07-Page-3.png June 7, 1850, p. 91]</ref>

A few months before the convention, Stone contracted typhoid fever, while traveling in Indiana, and she nearly died. The protracted nature of Stone's illness left Davis as the principal organizer of the first [[National Women's Rights Convention]], which met on October 23–24, 1850, in Brinley Hall in Worcester, Massachusetts, with an attendance of about a thousand.<ref>McMillen, 2008, pp. 106–109</ref>
Stone was able to attend the Worcester convention, but her frail health limited her participation, and she made no formal address, until the closing session.<ref>Stone's speech was not published in the official ''Proceedings'' and only briefly summarized in newspaper reports. But when Susan B. Anthony later credited Stone with converting her to the cause of woman suffrage, (''Report of the International Council of Women,'' Washington, D.C.: National Woman Suffrage Association, 1888, p. 47) she alluded to a phrase that appeared in the published accounts of that speech, and a legend arose that Anthony's conversion resulted from her reading Stone's speech at the first national convention. For a more probable dating of Anthony's conversion, see Million, 2003, pp. 132, 296 note 9.</ref>

The convention decided not to establish a formal association but to exist as an annual convention with a standing committee to arrange its meetings, publish its proceedings, and execute adopted plans of action. Stone was appointed to the Central Committee of nine women and nine men.<ref>"Women's Rights Convention," ''National Anti-Slavery Standard,'' October 31, 1850; ''Proceedings of the Woman's Rights Convention, Held at Worcester, October 23 and 24, 1850,'' Boston: Prentiss and Sawyer, 1851, pp. 16-18.</ref> The following spring, she became secretary of the committee, and, except for one year, she retained that position, until 1858. As secretary, Stone took a leading part in organizing and setting the agenda for the national conventions, throughout the decade.<ref>Million, 2003, pp. 116, 143, 146, 172-73, 225-277, 235, 239-42, 250-51, 260, 263-64.</ref>