A Woman's Place Is ...
ROBERTS, STEVEN V.
National Reports A WOMAN'S PLACE IS... BY STEVEN V. ROBERTS Washington When Congress convenes next January, the United States Senate will consist of 99 males and one female. Of all the major...
...Small women, she said, felt their lack of physical stature worked against them...
...and Martha Keys (D.Kan...
...The theory is that these women will then percolate up to higher levels of responsibility...
...Shy women felt inhibited about campaigning in taverns and other "male" hangouts...
...Mary Ann Krupsak gave up a major job as lieutenant governor of New York to make a quixotic run for the gubernatorial nomination...
...For example, the changing composition of the work force is one of the great revolutions going on in this country...
...Fifty-six per cent of all women are currently working, and as the figure continues to grow the country will be faced with a whole range of public policy choices involving the way we structure working life...
...But in politics, male chauvinism still reigns...
...Who else is going to make sure the candidate's clothes are clean, take the kids to the dentist, remember the names of big contributors, and soothe rivalries between campaign factions...
...Fewer than that could afford polls and other professional campaign services...
...01ympia Snowe (R.-Ma...
...Alice Reed, former chairman of the Wisconsin Republican Party, recently told David Broder of the Washington Post the results of a study she conducted among women candidates...
...Moreover, the lack of women in Congress means that everyone loses something very important...
...were defeated...
...Bella Abzug's abrasive personality has probably done more to set back the progress of female politicians than any other single factor...
...For one thing, polls show that at least 10 per cent of the population, perhaps more, simply will not vote for a woman -and the nay-sayers are by no means all men...
...Although the percentage of females in the lower chamber has remained steady at around 5 per cent for many years now, three of the 18 incumbents-barbara Jordan (D.Tex...
...Moreover, women don't have what every good politician always needs-a wife...
...Two of the five women ever to sit in the Cabinet are Carter appoinSteven V. Roberts is a Washington reporter for the New York Times...
...Humphrey decided not to run and Mrs...
...Women friends tell me this mentality still lingers, even if the custom does not...
...Women are rarely plugged into the business and banking network that traditionally provides a lot of the financing for political races...
...Women legislators, it seems to me, would be most likely to push for flexible work hours and other innovations designed to make it possible for working couples to care for their children, and each other...
...Shirley Pettis (R.-Calif...
...If you do not play golf at the country club or attend Kiwanis meetings, you are at a distinct disadvantage when it comes to raising the funds a candidate requires to buy expertise...
...Women seem to be making headway on the local level as well...
...Few men have been willing to disrupt their careers-the way women have always done-to accommodate their wives' ambitions...
...Two others, Helen S. Mey-ner (D.-N.J...
...Too many men with that son of attitude still run the government...
...Jane Eskind, who won the Democratic nomination to run against Senator Howard Baker in Tennessee, never had a real chance despite spending gobs of her own money on the race...
...Finally, women of a certain age still must grapple with the lingering notion -bred into them by years of brainwashing-that they should not be too smart or too aggressive...
...Old cliches die hard, and some voters truly believe that a woman's place is in the home, not on the hustings...
...did not run again...
...The last session ended with two women in the upper chamber, Maryor Allen (D.-Ala...
...That's good, she says, but not good enough...
...Third, women are held back by practical considerations...
...On its face, this situation is not fair...
...Of course, not all women are wonderful...
...Four of Maryland's eight representatives in the next session will be women-the first 50-50 split in any state...
...Many of them only made the plunge when they realized that they were just as able as the incumbent males, if not more so...
...and Beverly Byron (D.-Md...
...and Muriel Humphrey (D.-Minn...
...In a survey of 55 women who ran for major offices in 1976, Audrey Sheppard and Jill Buckley found that only half had campaign managers...
...Significantly, women have introduced the main bills aimed at making Social Security fairer to females, and a woman legislator is the leading advocate for Federal laws to aid battered wives...
...There are signs that things may be changing...
...and Yvonne Burke (D.-Calif...
...Key sub cabinet post are occupied by women like Barbara Babcock, assistant attorney general in charge of the Justice Department's Criminal Division, and Eleanor Holmes Norton, chairperson of the-Equal Employment Opportunity Commission...
...And 20 per cent of the young lawyers chosen in the last two years as Supreme Court clerks-one of the best roads to a top Establishment career-have been females...
...Marilyn Johnson of Eagleton: "If such trends continue with the same momentum, women will begin to assume a substantial share of political decision making in their communities...
...Of all the major Western governing bodies, only the College of Cardinals gives women less of a voice...
...That left two female Senate hopefuls on the ballot election day...
...One government professor I know recently offered an opinion at a dinner party about political patronage...
...Nonetheless, Washington needs women...
...As one of my favorite T-shirts puts it, "A woman's place is in the House...
...They might have to attend city council meetings at night, but at least they won't have to move to Washington...
...This largely explains, I think, why women tend to concentrate on local races...
...Then there is Indira Gandhi-back in Parliament following a by-election victory November 7-who did not do much to promote the notion that women are decent, peace-loving folk during her years as India's prime minister...
...Besides being no less educated or talented than men, they offer a special perspective and set of experiences on some crucial questions...
...Half the college students in the United States today are women...
...Allen was upset in the primary after giving an indiscreet interview to a newspaper reporter...
...A second issue is money...
...In addition to Governor Dixy Lee Ray and Governor Ella T. Grasso of Connecticut, just reelected to a second term, the Eagleton Institute of Politics reports that they now hold more than 700 seats in state legislatures, double the number in 1970, albeit still only 9 per cent of the total...
...Offsetting the five departures were three victories-by GeraldineFerraro(D.-N.Y...
...Nancy Landon Kassebaum, the Republican candidate in Kansas, was the one woman to break the men-only barrier, and she needed the reputation of her famous father, Alf Landon, to do it...
...tees-juanita Kreps at Commerce and Patricia Harris at hud...
...Fourth, women suffer from their own feelings of inadequacy...
...Concludes Dr...
...And in the Senate...
...Over 700 are serving as mayors, too, and better than 9,000 hold city council seats...
...The results on the House side were just as gloomy...
...Rural women complained about fears and depression on long, night auto trips...
...Female state legislators who met in Washington earlier this year agreed that it often took them many years to work up the courage to run for office...
...There are many reasons why women have had a difficult time in politics...
...Byron was placed on the ballot when her husband, Representative Goodloe Byron, collapsed while jogging just before the election...
...When her male partner rather rudely asked how she could possibly have the qualifications to speak, she replied calmly, "Well, 1 did write a book on the subject...
...Sarah Weddington, Midge Costan-za's replacement as the President's chief liaison with the women's movement, points out that about 20 per cent of the Administration's appointees also have been women...
...As Betsey Wright, executive director of the National Women's Education Fund, put it: "Until the number of women in the House hovers around 25 per cent, you are just playing tiddlywinks over whether the number of Congresswomen is 18 or 16...
...The Byron victory shows once more, however, that often women succeed in reaching Congress only as an appendage of a man, not on their own...
...Representative Shirley Chisholm (D.-N.Y...
...It was not too long ago that formal dinner parties in this capital divided by sexes after dinner, with the men concentrating on brandy and important talk, and the women going upstairs to look at linens...
...A female officeholder in New Jersey, the mother of three, tells me that she is constantly accused of abandoning her family while she is out campaigning...
...so are one-quarter of the law and medical students...
...has been a disappointment in recent years...
...The congressional vote to extend the ratification period of the Equal Rights Amendment was a triumph for the power of women in politics-with some of it supplied by Senate wives, who proved very effective lobbyists...
...The first women were recently named to the Federal Reserve Board and the Securities and Exchange Commission...
...both appointed following the deaths of their husbands...
Vol. 61 • November 1978 • No. 23
