As a child of the 1960’s, I witnessed, and personally
experienced, discrimination on basis of my gender when I entered the college in 1969. At that time, women were commonly required to demonstrate far superior
qualifications (far above those expected of men) in order to even be considered
for admission to medical and other professional schools.
We were told:
Men were supposed to
be doctors. Women were supposed to be nurses.
Men were superior to
women in math and science so they make better engineers, scientists, and
so forth.
The vast majority of CEO’s, politicians and people in
positions of authority were men, and they controlled the policies and practices
that perpetuated the status quo. So, when I joined in the movement demanding
equal rights for women (the ERA), I believed I was in on the ground floor of a
radical effort. Oh, the naiveté of a young, farm girl.
As I’ve been researching the women’s suffrage movement for
my new novel, I’ve learned that I was just one of the countless foot soldiers
in a long, wearisome, undertaking.
The first women’s rights convention in U.S. history was held July
19 & 20, 1848, in Seneca, New York. At the time,
women were considered property of their husbands with no rights of their own.
The convention organizers wanted to overturn the “code of true womanhood” which
proclaimed, “Man was made for himself, woman was made for him.”
On July 19,
two hundred women attended. Men were not allowed. Elizabeth Cady Stanton
presented her treatise, the “Declaration of Sentiments,” based on the
Declaration of Independence, which proclaimed that all men and women are
created equal. The document detailed the most egregious injustices suffered by
women.
Men were
allowed to attend the second day of the convention, and about 40 did. The
attendees adopted the DECLARATION OF SENTIMENTS & GRIEVANCES. Resolutions
were listed. Examples include, married women should be able to hold property in
their own name, married women should be able to divorce their husbands and have
custody of their children, women should receive equal pay for equal work, and
women should have equal access to education and the professions. All of these
initial resolutions passed unanimously.
But when the
resolution for women’s suffrage was proposed, it met with powerful opposition
and was subjected to a lengthy debate. The African-American abolitionist
Frederick Douglass spoke in favor of suffrage stating that without the vote,
women would be unable to change the laws that treated them unfairly. The
resolution passed.
Innumerable
future-focused, selfless women worked hard for many years to secure women’s
suffrage, knowing they probably would not survive long enough to personally benefit
from their efforts.
It was 72
years before passage of the amendment granting women the right to vote. Next
year, 2020, will be the 100th anniversary of U.S. women winning the
right to vote.
Granted,
progress has been made on the resolutions passed at the Seneca Falls
convention. I am grateful to those who started the women’s movement and to all
who have worked for women’s equality, as I have reaped benefits from their
sacrifices. But we still have a long way to go.
Today, women
still do not receive equal pay for equal work.
Almost every
week we learn of Title IX violations involving educational institutions’
failure to address sexual harassment of women, sexual assault of women or
inequity in athletic programs.
And, women in power are not immune. as a study referenced in the Harvard Business Review shows.
Interruptions are attempts at dominance. In reviewing 15 years of Supreme Court oral argument transcripts, they found that "women do not have an equal opportunity to be heard on the highest court in the land. In fact, as more women join the court, the reaction of the male justices has been to increase their interruptions of the female justices. Many male justices are now interrupting female justices at double-digit rates per term, but the reverse is almost never true. In the last 12 years, during which women made up, on average, 24% of the bench, 32% of interruptions were of the female justices, but only 4% were by the female justices."
And, women in power are not immune. as a study referenced in the Harvard Business Review shows.
Interruptions are attempts at dominance. In reviewing 15 years of Supreme Court oral argument transcripts, they found that "women do not have an equal opportunity to be heard on the highest court in the land. In fact, as more women join the court, the reaction of the male justices has been to increase their interruptions of the female justices. Many male justices are now interrupting female justices at double-digit rates per term, but the reverse is almost never true. In the last 12 years, during which women made up, on average, 24% of the bench, 32% of interruptions were of the female justices, but only 4% were by the female justices."
This summer marks 161
years since the Seneca Falls convention, and 99 years since women were granted the right to vote. We still haven’t
had a female President of the United States, and women are woefully
underrepresented in national and state governing bodies.
I wish I had a simple remedy for these and other examples of
the inequality of women in our country. I don’t. But based on our history, we
clearly must keep fighting for equal rights – if not for ourselves, for our
daughters and granddaughters.
