5.9: Women in Politics

Women Firsts in Politics

The first woman to be elected to the House of Representatives was Jeannette Rankin from Montana, which had just recently voted to allow women the right to vote in their state. She was an avowed pacifist and voted against United States’ entry into both World War I and World War II. Rankin was also a lifelong advocate of women’s rights and was very active in the suffrage movement in both the National American Woman’s Suffrage Association and the National Woman’s Party, and she spoke in congress on behalf of the suffrage prisoners being held at Occoquan.

In 1922, Rebecca Latimer Felton became the first woman to serve in the United States Senate, although only for a single day as a symbolic gesture for her late husband. In similar fashion, Hattie Caraway of Arkansas was elected to complete her late husband’s Senate term in 1932, but she was reelected two more times, becoming the first woman to serve a full term in the Senate and the first woman to preside over the Senate.

In 1981, Sandra Day O’Connor became the first woman to serve on the Supreme Court. Her nomination hearing before the Senate was contentious at times and she faced backlash from the conservative media and religious leaders of the day. O’Connor said she felt a responsibility to women as a woman first, “I felt a special responsibility … as the first woman. I could either do an adequate job so it would be possible for other women to be appointed without [people] saying, ‘Oh, see, a woman can’t do it,’ so it became very important that I perform in a way that wouldn’t provide some reason or cause not to have more women in the future. That was very important to me.” (Quoted in Out of Order 2013).

In 2020, Kamala Harris became the first woman elected as Vice President of the United States. She had been Attorney General and a senator from California before becoming Joe Biden’s running mate for the presidency. As Vice President, Harris led an evenly split senate and made more tie-breaking votes than any other V.P. in history. She ran for president in 2024 but lost the election to Donald Trump. In 2019 she published a memoir in which she reflected, “My daily challenge to myself is to be part of the solution, to be a joyful warrior in the battle to come. My challenge to you is to join that effort. To stand up for our ideals and our values. Let’s not throw up our hands when it’s time to roll up our sleeves. Not now. Not tomorrow. Not ever.” (Harris 2019, 248)

1992: The Year of the Woman

Before the 1992, there were two women serving in the United States Senate. After the November election, there would be a record number of seven women serving in the senate. The large increase in women senators caused the media to dub 1992 the “Year of the Woman,” although the senators themselves were annoyed at the term. The photo below shows five of the seven female senators in 1993. While the addition of these seven women did not dramatically change politics, as many of their critics feared, their presence showed that women could serve in the senate and led to more women senators a generation later.

2018: The Year of the Woman 2.0

In the 2018 midterm elections, a record number of women were elected to the House of Representatives, over 90, which brought the total number of women in the House to 106 and 21 women in the Senate when all were sworn in in January, 2019. Below is a short video discussing this historic moment.

With more women serving in political office at the local, state, and national levels than ever before in history, it is easy to say that women have achieved equality with men, that there is nothing left for Feminists to do. However, nothing could be further from the truth.

Rights Gained Become Rights Lost

In 2022, the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, which forbid states from limiting a woman’s access to abortion within the first trimester and was based on the implied right to privacy in the Bill of Rights. In Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, the Court determined that since the Constitution didn’t mention abortion, it was not a protected right. Since this decision, twenty-five states or territories have passed either outright bans or severely limited access to abortion, while twenty-six have passed legislation to either protect or expand abortion, some even enshrining the right into their states’ constitution. There have also been attempts to prosecute health care workers for performing abortions and women who have abortions or even miscarriages.

While no laws have been passed to limit birth control access, some states have attempted to limit access to contraception and abortive medications by mail, similar to the Comstock Laws of the 19th century. In fact, supporters of these limitations have referenced the Comstock Laws as a legal way to limit access to reproductive health information and medications to induce abortion. Those who support such measures refer to themselves as “Pro-Life” while those who want women to be able to access reproductive information freely refer to themselves as “Pro-Choice.”

Since 1920, women in the United States have had the legal right to vote, and in the last thirty years, many states have expanded access to voting through mail-in ballots, ballot drop boxes, and extended days for elections. Expanded access has allowed more people, particularly marginalized people, people of color, and the poor, to vote in elections. However, a new bill referred to as the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act (SAVE) intends to reverse the trend by requiring strict identification in order to register and vote. These new identification requirements, if passed, would not only make it harder for marginalized communities to vote, it may also impact women, particularly those who choose to change their names when they marry. While this bill is not yet law, its passage could reverse decades of political gains by women in the United States.

Conclusion

Although women have been voting nationwide since 1920, they have only recently become a force in national politics. Women firsts, such as Sandra Day O’Connor and Kamala Harris, are inspiring. However, the Dobbs decision is a reminder that rights can be taken away if we are not vigilant in protecting them.

Question to Consider

What rights are you afraid to lose?