Her father wished she had been a boy

Daniel Cady, the father of Cady Stanton, was a judge on the New York Supreme Court as well as a member of Congress and the New York State Assembly. Eleven children were born to him and his wife Margaret; five daughters—including Elizabeth—and one son would live to adulthood. Elizabeth's father allegedly stated to her, "Oh my daughter, I wish you were a boy," when her brother Eleazar passed away at age 20.

In Elizabeth Cady Stanton: An American Life, Lori D. Ginzberg writes that her father may have been lamenting the difficulties she would face as a woman, but Elizabeth responded by devoting herself to learning Greek, chess, and horse riding, vowing "to make her father happy by being all a son could have been." When his intelligent and assertive daughter expressed disappointment that one of his female clients could not be helped by the law, Daniel Cady gave her advice: "When you are grown up and able to prepare a speech, you must go down to Albany and talk to the legislators," he said. "The old laws will be a dead letter if you can get them to pass new laws."