[2] Because women were excluded from the American Anti-Slavery Society, Forten, with her mother Charlotte and sisters Sarah and Harriet, co-founded the Philadelphia Female Anti-Slavery Society with ten other women in 1833.
[3][5] She offered the Society's last resolution, which praised the post-civil war amendments as a success for the anti-slavery cause.
[6] Although the Society was predominantly white, historian Janice Sumler-Lewis claims the efforts of the Forten women in its key offices enabled it to reflect a black abolitionist perspective that oftentimes was more militant.
[7] Forten toured and gave speeches in favor of women's suffrage, as well as helping petition drives for the cause.
Having never married, Forten returned to her childhood home in Philadelphia following the death of her father.