Women yielding political power. Im with cspan, American History on tv on cspan 3 every weekend is happy to coordinate with the organization of american historians to moderate this panel discussion. And of course it could not come at a better moment in history with the 19th amendment granting women the right to vote passed by the house u. S. And u. S. Senate in 1919 and then ratified in 1920. Here we are a hundred years later, the 116th congress has the highest percentage of women ever making up a roughly quarter of each chamber. And we have a female speakr for the second time, and we have four women so far running for president. Todays panel will look at women, the role of women and the key turning points of women in american politics. I want to introduce each of our panelists and come back through and have each of them talk about their books or the period of time theyre writing about for about five minutes and then well open up the conversation to all of you. So let me introduce you to david perry, journalist and historian working at the university of minnesota. Hes a descendant of and wrote the book, feminine politics and exercise of power. David helped publish his mothers time book after the vote feminist politics in la guardias new york. Felicia is a university of Vermont History professor and coauthor of the book with gwendolyn mink ensuring poverty, welfare reform and feminist perspective. Mary ellen curtain is history professor and director of american studies at American University and the author of the forthcoming book from virtue to power Barbara Jordan and the rise of black Women Leadership in modern america. And finally susan carol who is a Political Science professor at rutgers university, a senior scholar at the center for american women in politics, coauthor of the book a seat at the table congress womens perspectives on why their presence matters. David perry, lets begin with you. Thank you so much. This book right here available at the book exhibit begins with a line, this book is about the women who went to my grandmothers funeral. Thats the first line here. My mothers last work which came out two days ago took decades for her to get to that first line. In the 1980s my mother, Elizabeth Perry, turned her attention to the biography of bell mauskowitz, but she broadly destroyed her papers, so it took my mother a lot of time to dig through haystacks and find copies she sent whereby looking for references for her to put together the story in her own time and context and her own name. So she went from being the famous mrs. M. To being bell moskowitz. And she found in the early late 80s, 1990s its just not a story she had the wherewithal to tell. It was really only the rise and a conversation she and i had a lot in her final years of searchable databases, of l laptops, newspapers online that enabled her to put together this book of all these amazing women that came out of the Suffrage Movement and into political life. I got a little taste of that on literally her last day of consciousness, excuse me, where i got to read with her 1918 i think brooklyn daily eagle, this little local newspaper which i see many people nodding. It was amazing. I could just search through this database and find the exact day of the exact article so we could track down a single footnote for this book. It was not actually a bad way to spend that day. This book jacket shows a photo of the women at a banquet on december 6, 1987. My mother also found and published in its entirety a skit these women put on for themselves and also the mayor in attendance called 50 women and one man, a play in three scenes with one ax. And its an amazing document. These women coming together, celebrating their achievements, celebrating the mayor thats brought them into Political Office but also recognizing they are vice commissioners and not commissioners. Recognizing theyre second in command and not in command. It ends with the mayor played by one of the women of the administration saying youre right ill fire all the men and swear you all in as commissioners tomorrow. So its a fantasy, but its a fantasy i think carries us down the road in establishing the trajectory of this panel of 100 years of ambition and success but also of glass ceilings and of patriarchy. Thank you so much. Elizabeth perry and i shared deep and abiding interests in womens political history and feminist biography and im proud to be on this panel to honor her leckacy. But i want to start with a shout out to upcoming centennial of the 19th amendment, because if women hadnt gotten the vote in 1920 we wouldnt be having this panel. But having said that i think its important to remember that getting women elected to office was not a terribly high priority for the women Suffrage Movement. Their focus was on the franchise, on womens new identities as voters and citizens, and on getting a foot inside the door of politics which was generally seen as a male preserve. Now, of course there were some dramatic early examples of women winning Political Office such as Janette Rankin and sometimes but not very often being able to power lay that into political power of her own. But the big story of the immediate post suffrage era is not women being elected to office, it was women being appointed to office to prominent government positions. And instead of wielding political power and shaping Public Policy behind the scenes which was generally her preferred way to operate they did it in full public view. And case in point is the politics and government of the new deal where the dramatic expansion of social programs to combat the Great Depression provided jobs and opportunities for women reformers long active in that field. Led by first lady Eleanor Roosevelt, secretary of labor francis perkins, the first woman to serve in the cabinet, and head of the Womens Division of the Democratic National committee, a Womens Network of high level appointees influence the social welfare policies of the new deal especially in the Works Progress administration and Social Security administration. Women also took on larger roles in the revitalized Democratic Party. Even though the results were far from achieving gender parody womens interests and issues might have been overlooked if not completely forgotten in the 1930s without the effective moebalization of the Womens Network. So the new deal i think truly was a break through for women in public life. Many of these women were firsts in whose appointments were widely reported in the press, but unfortunately it proved difficult to ins tullize their progress. Women found many opportunities during wartime in the 1940s than they had in the depression of the 1930s. And reminding those in positions of power that women could serve with distinction at the very highest levels of politics and government remained an uphill battle. Indeed it still remains one today. And without an Eleanor Roosevelt or molly dusan to constantly press womens case too often the jobs defaulted back to white men. But a major reason i think to remember the contributions that women made to the new deal is to situation the story of women wilding power as part of a much longer continuum that stretches from the women Suffrage Movement actually from before the womens Suffrage Movement through the new deal all the way to the 2018 elections and beyond. Women have always yielded political power, but where and how and which women have changed over time, and as we assess where women are today and where they might be heading we should always remember they are standing on the shoulders of the political women who came before. Thank you. I also am very happy to be here. David, i didnt know your plaurt personally but i knew her work and it was a really important book for me. Im going to speak about the representative patsy toomey of hawaii who was my collaborator on the book i just published. And i draw here on material that appears in our book, ensuring poverty, welfare form and feminist perspective which is available from the university of pennsylvania press. Entered politics on the wings of the japanese American Civil Rights and the womens rights movements. Trained as a lawyer she won election to the territorial house of representatives in hawaii in 1956 before hawaii was a state. In 1964 she won without the backing of her local Democratic Party. She became the first asianamerican woman and first woman of color from any background to serve in the house of representatives. During Lyndon Johnsons presidency mink strongly supported the antipoverty programs that were under the umbrella of the great society, but she was a fierce critic of the war in vietnam and battled with her president and party continuously over that. She advocated for womens causes in congress. Among many other achievements shes known as the primary author of title 9 of the educational amendments of 1972 which barred sex based discrimination and institutions of Higher Education that receive federal funds. She left the house in 1977. She ran for the senate, served as an undersecretary of state in the Carter Administration and then as a member and ultimately chair of the honolulu city council. She returned to the house of representatives in 1989 and during her second career in the house she again debated with members of her own party and stood up for women especially those with the least political and economic power, and we see these two tendencies most clearly in the role she played, welfare reform while bill clinton another democrat was president of the united states. As many of us remember clinton called himself a political new democrat. And what that meant in part is that he was willing to shed some of the Traditional Democratic commitments to the alleviation of poverty especially the poverty of the families. She dissented from her president and organized other progressiveb feminist and race conscience members to do the same. And she played this role at three different moments in the career of welfare reform. First when president clinton first introduced his own welfare reform legislation shortly after he was elected on a pledge to, quote, end welfare as we know it. Then when the republicans came into the majority after the november 1994 elections and they introduced a more conservative welfare policy, at that point what mink did was organize democrats to keep president clinton from signing the bill that the republicans were on the verge of sending him. That effort failed. But then she came back at the very end of the 1990s into the early 21st century and organized progressive democrats again to replace welfare reform with a more progressive feminist alternative. She didnt just critique what others were doing, what other democrats were doing. She produced a bill called hr 3113 that became this feminist progressive and antiracist proposal for welfare reauthorization at the turn of the 21st century. And this was a proposal that placed women and mothers especially low income mothers at the center and that honored the caregiving work that they did as mothers. For minks perspective it was inadequate to have a policy that simply matched people up with jobs or that pushed them into the labor market without also honoring and respecting and supporting the work that they did as mothers in their homes. The democratic leadership in the house of representatives honored minks efforts and ultimately 40 of the democratic cot squs the house supported her bill. But finally the leadership decided that they were going to back a much more conservative bill than minks and they encouraged other democrats to follow their lead. Ultimately reported to a colleague that, quote, maxine waters, the democrat of california, and patsy mink herself went to democratic majority leader richard geppard, and he told them essentially its more important to hold onto the new than to accommodate progressives and people of color, unquote. There was no equivalent to the bill in the u. S. Senate even though democrats had a slight majority in the senate, and ultimately congress stalemated on the issue unable to come to an agreement between the parties and often unacknowledged with debate still roiling even among democrats. Just days before an anticlimactic agreement until after the 2002 elections representative patsy mink passed away in honolulu from a Viral Development dwie chickenpox. Good morning. What an honor it is to be here today celebrating the life and work of Elizabeth Perry and reflect on the past and present state of women in american politics. Professor perrys 1992 biography inspires because of its candor and interpretive verb. Perry argues that moskowitz succeeded because of her adherence to feminine rather than feminist behaviors. Her aimlike mind was to make the state an instrument for the welfare of the people said governor smith. And though she cooperated with men in political life she was essentially a wife and a mother, a womanly woman. And although enormously influential bell accepted women should serve men not lead them. Such beliefs and practices contrasted sharply and then became the first black woman from the south elected to congress before retiring in 1978. Perrys study illuminates why it ushered in a new era for leadership in america. First Barbara Jordan was not a social worker but a lawyer and a political activist in the early 60s who worked with the naacp and liberals to integrate schools, overturn it white primary, open up the political system to black voters and black candidates. Jordans involvement in activism le led her to Political Office. She competed with men for Political Office. When another black politician curtis graves also sought to enter the congressional primary jordan stated if theres a coalition course between mr. Graves and me i shall not defer. I shall not defer to him or anyone else if i think i can win. Third, Barbara Jordan was ambitious. Though she was defeated twice for Political Office she persisted. She showed tremendous personal strength and did not give up and always wanted to go higher. Fourth jordan did not work behind the scenes but was a very public figure who inspired black historians and served as a role model for those in her community and later who saw her on television. Six he created her own family ties with close friendships and same sex relationships, personal independence and Financial Independence were extremely important to her. And finally although a democrat jordan also bypassed the Party Political machine creating her own Political Organization of block workers who went doortodoor, many of whom were black women and all of whom were extremely loyal to her. Two final points, one of the great achievements of the most recent congressional midterms of course was the election of many young women of color to congress. And it is indeed exciting but it has happened before. Barbara jordan was not a loaner. When she came to congress in 1972 she joined three other black women. Shirley chisholm of new york, and Curtis Collins of illinois. And it was these four black women who compromised the first cohort in congress. To divert all of her attention to the Judiciary Committee these four women appeared on public panels and worked on legislation together. Although we all recognize the long history of womens involvement in american politics our work here today should be dedicated to writing a new narrative of american women and that it was the advent of the civil rights movement, the feminist movement and the Voting Rights act that expanded american democracy and enabled women such as Barbara Jordan to change the face, the political face of the nation. Thank you. This is wonderful. Im the organizer of this panel, and i gave the instructions to people to hold it to five minutes, and by gosh, people are holding it to five minutes. Thank you. Besides wanting to honor Elizabeth Perry, the election of 2018 inspired me to organize this session. In 1990 i began work on a coauthored book with two coauthors running as a woman. My coauthors and i felt in 1990 that maybe there were certain changes in the air. We didnt have our fingers exactly on what it was that was changing. We just felt change, and as we began to work we had more definition. And bear in mind we started before anita hill. Anita hill, that whole episode mobilized women in a really remarkable way. We began work in 1990, and in january of 1991 we traveled, we were all in bay area in california. We traveled to washington, d. C. Where we were going to interview some congressional women. A woman hostess in washington who had connections had a dinner party for us, and at that dinner party was owen malcolm of emilys list, pioneering Fundraising Group for liberal democratic, prochoice women. Ellen malcolm had just come from Anne Richards inauguration, and it was a huge celebration and she was full of enthusiasm, she told us this story. She said that in the campaign in 1990 in texas, and youll recall Anne Richards had this wonderful updo, Anne Richards posed for a picture with her hairdresser and it said we defy gravity. And that picture was sent to 45,000 beauty shops in texas. And when we heard that story it was like, yes, this is what our book is about. But now we have a woman candidate whos comfortable doing Something Like that. Whereas the wonderful margaret j. Smith had told one of my coauthors i was never a woman candidate. And in her memoir jerry furoaro said that in 1984 she was embarrassed at telling her aides she needed a haircut, and now in 1990 we defy gravity. So we started thinking about the different aspects of running as a woman. I mean you look at pictures of the early women and i dont want to denigrate them because they made some wonderful contributions, but they all look like hundrederary men. Theyre wearing dark suits, and thats what struck me so much about 2018. These are not hundrederary men who got elected. I mean alexandria ocasiocortez is only the most well publicized. There are certainly many other women with a range of selfpresentations. One is she presented herself as an honorary man and or play down her gender, does she try to mobilize women voters, and three, does she advocate Public Policy needed by women . And so those were the things that we were looking for. And i want to now explain what we identified as ipdicators of change that we identified back in 1991. But before that i should say one interesting example before Anne Richards of running as a woman was Helena Douglas who was a congresswoman in california in the 40s. She was a glamorous woman. She had been a broadway star, and in the movie she was married to a movie star melvin douglas. And she in 1947 gave a Market Basket speech on the floor of congress where she walked in with a Market Basket and gave a speech about the impact of postwar inflation on house wives. That was a dramatic moment. So there were other women, and time does not permit talking about all the many contributions of congresswomen, but i want to talk now about generational change as of 1981. In 1972 title 9 gave womens athletics a huge boost thanks to patsy mink, and girls began to play team sports. And why is this important because women of my generation, young women we didnt have the experience of you win some you lose some. We werent playing team sports. And so often we argue in our book a woman candidate would personalize a loss because this might be the first time shes had a devastating loss in her life. Number two, by the early 90s there was more than one fundraising network. There were actually attempts to organize Fundraising Efforts for women, and of course emily is an acronym. So the idea was out there and show your support for a woman candidate by actually giving money to her. Number three, in 1990, we now had a generation that had benefitted from access to professional schools because of affirmative action. And because of other Public Policy. So now we had, i mean, you had an occasional woman lawyer. Martha griffiths, patsy mink, but often, women were, as has been suggested, social workers or they were widows. Now, we had a generation of women with the same kind of professional backgrounds that a male candidate might have. And finally, i want to mention that in as we were working on the book, we found out there was a series of breakfasts being held in San Francisco organized by the womens campaign fund. And they were speeches by women candidates with some of the high flying women in San Francisco as the audience. And it was so revealing to go and see all these clearly affluent women who had come together, and there were dozens and dozens of women who attended these breakfasts. The candidate i remember the best was anna eschew, who is still in congress from the peninsula. And so we thought, you know, here you have a generation earlier, you would not have had this kind of a network with women who could write a check for more than 5. So as of 1992, then you had anita hill in 91. You had the fruits of generational change, and you had a large rise, ill let sue be the impericist and tell you as a political scientist, but you had well, just another anecdotal indication, we interviewed nancy kassbaum, republican senator from kansas, and she said, this is 1991, probably, she said, oh, im on the Senate Foreign relations committee, but im never interview interv interviewed on television. She also told us sometimes she would sit and fantasize murder mysteries, and i dont want to tell you who the victims were, but they might have been in the room. So she felt, you know, even though she was in the senate, she felt big changes beginning in 1992. And then, you know, in 2018, not only did we have a recordbreaking number of women, but we had women with so we had two native american women, some out lesbians, we had two muslim women. And so on. And when i saw that, i felt that this was now another generational leap that needed to be analyzed by historians, ergo this panel. [ applause ] well, 1992 elections were certainly important, called the year of the woman, but my guess is that 2018 will likely go down in history as the most significant election for women since women achieved the right to vote. Record numbers of women ran for and were elected to office throughout the country. Im going to focus on congress, but similar patterns were evident at the state level as well. Currently, a record 127 women serve in the 116th congress. Compared with 108 who served just before the 2018 elections. And percentage terms, women now constitute 23. 7 of all members of congress. Most of womens gains in 2018 were in the house of representatives, where 102 women now serve compared with 85 before the election. And the gains were concentrated among democrats, not republicans. The number of Democratic Women increased by 27 following the elections while the number of republican women actually decreased by ten. A Record Number of women of color also were elected in 2018, 43 women of color, all but one of whom is a democrat, currently serve in the house. I want to focus my remarks this morning on the question of how having more women in congress may make a difference, and i want to do so by reviewing some findings from a book entitled a seat at the table, congresswomens perspectives on why their presence matters which i coauthored with two of my colleagues. The book is based on inperson interviews with 83 congresswomen who served in the 114th congress, thats the congress that took place during the last two years of the obama administration. Our interviews with the congresswomen indicated that they see themselves as making a difference in at least three ways. First, by bringing distinctive perspectives to bear on Public Policy, second, by having a distinctive work style, and third, by serving as role models for other women. I want to talk briefly about each of these and illustrate them through the words of the congresswomen themselves. Let me begin with the fact that women in congress see themselves as bringing different perspectives to bear on Public Policy based on their Life Experiences. Senator jeanne shaheen, democrat from New Hampshire, explained, quote, womens Life Experiences are different from mens. Theyre not better, theyre not worse, but they are different. It is important for us to have people who have those experiences at the table so that we can talk about those and we can respond to the challenges that half of the population in this country face, end quote. Similarly, kirsten gillibrand, democrat from new york, suggested, quote, were all very different. We all have different priorities, different interests, different areas of expertise, but there does seem to be a commonality that we all do care about our families, we care about our communities. Theres an interest in protecting the most vulnerable, so theres Common Ground there, and a lot of our legislation gets built from there, end quote. I want to elaborate on two aspects of gillibrands quote. The first is her observation that women care about families. Perhaps more than any other life experience, congresswomen pointed to their roles as mothers and caregivers as a source of their distinctive perspective. For example, representative christy nome, republican from north dakota, told us, quote, im a mom, and i just think we bring a completely different perspective to the conversation. A lot of the women that i know are juggling lots of different responsibilities. Theyre not just working jobs. Theyre caring for their parents, theyre raising children. Theyre making their Household Budgetary decisions. They are making the Health Care Decisions for their family, theyre feeling stressed and stretched in many different directions. And that perspective needs to be at the table when were talking about bills of legislation, end quote. The second aspect of the gillibrand quote that we heard echoed over and over fwagain wa the idea of women protecting the vulnerable, being a voice for the voiceless, providing representation for those who otherwise lack representation in the halls of congress. For example, representative gwen moore, democrat from wisconsin, told us, quote, im here because the people i represent dont have well paid lobbyists to represent their interests. Im very, very proud to fight for food stamps and social services to meet the needs of people when they are down and out. End quote. Of course, congresswomen had very different ideas about who the voiceless were, ranging from children to single mothers to regular citizens to less affluent constituents, to minorities, to even in one case, the case of one congresswoman, the unborn. But being a voice for the voiceless was a common theme. In addition to bringing different perspectives to bear on Public Policy, congresswomen expressed a view that they conduct legislative business differently than their male colleagues. Suggesting that they have a distinctive work style. Over and over, the women claim that they were problem solvers who were more concerned about achieving outcomes than advancing their own personal ambition. For example, senator tammy baldwin, democrat from wisconsin, observed, quote, more women go into politics to get something done, to solve a problem, to fix something than men do. Very few of my female colleagues got into politics bah they just wanted to be a u. S. Senator. Were not there for the power of politics, end quote. Similarly, representative anna eschew, who is still there, democrat from california, told us, quote, i dont think women come here to be somebody. I think we come here to get things done. End quote. In addition to the idea that women are problem solvers, congresswomen frequently told us they believe the women are more collaborative than the men. As one example, senator susan collins, republican from maine, noted, quote, i want to dispel the notion that somehow we think alike or we share the same political views. Just as the men in the senate span the idealogical spectrum, so do the women. But i do believe the style of the women senators is more collaborative, end quote. A majority of women expressed the view that they are more bipartisan than the men, more likely to collaborate across party lines. One of the ways bay partisanship is fostered among the women is through the annual charitable softball game. Representative suzanne bone amaechi, democrat from oregon explained, quote, when the men play softball, the democrats play the republicans and walk over to the big stadium, and the democrats sit in one section and wear blue, and the republicans sit in one section and wear red. And the democrats wave donkey flags and the republicans wave elephants. And then a few weeks later, the women play their softball game. Instead of playing each other, the women in the house and the senate, democrats and republicans, all form one team and play against the press. And it just exemplifies it just exemplifies the difference in the more collaborative approach. Rather than saying lets play each other, its lets play together. Finally, the third way women in congress see themselves as making a difference is that they act as role models for other women and for girls. Encouraging them to get involved in politics and perhaps run for office themselves. Almost uniformly, they want to see more women of both parties representative jackie walorski, republican from illinois told us, quote, i think there should be more women on both sides of the aisle. Every chance i have, whether im speaking to girls in hue school or civic groups, speaking to women, moms, im also talking about the need for more women to get involved, end quote. Similarly, representative joyce beady, democrat from ohio, observed, quote, having more women of color in Congress Makes a difference when little africanamerican girls can dream that they too can serve in congress. On that optimistic note, i will end. Thank you. [ applause ] wonderful. So as i said, ill kick off the conversation, but i would like all of you, if you have questions, to line up at the microphone so we can get to those comments as well. I would like to begin with having each of you respond to this question. The women that you write about, do you think that they would be pleased or disappointed or Something Else looking at the 116th congress and the number of women that are there . As you noted, its a Record Number, but were still at 23 . Around there. Yeah. David, why dont you begin, actually. Well go down the line. Sure. I like to again, im a medieval historians and im the successor author for my mother. I mean, i definitely think that the challenges that we encounter in this book would remain, that these particularly, i reread the play last night boss its funny and enjoyable, and also because its so 1937, these women, you can see them here. These women gathering, and some are scowling and theyre really clear that theyre proud of what their accomplished but so aware of how far there is to go. I think thats pretty much where they would be today, too, of saying great, good progress, but speaker of the house is good. Now lets talk about, you know, president. Lets talk about president of the united states. Al always looking towards, proud of their accomplishments but looking towards the places they havent yet gotten. I would say thinking back to women in the 20s and 30s, they would be rightly amazed if all of a sudden they fast forwarded to 2018 and amazed and proud and hopefully i hope they would have taken some credit for being part of this. I also have a sense that if somehow they could have been transported up here and they had one of those gatherings, either in a womens bathroom or for drinks later and started talking about what it was like being a woman in public life and women in politics, i suspect that there would be a lot more commonalities, and i always think of a quote that molly deucen wrote to Eleanor Roosevelt about jim farley, who was head of the mens Democratic National convention in the 1930s, and she wrote to eleanor, men are the slipperiest of eels. So some things dont change. I think patsy mink would be thrilled. I think she felt a little lonely as an Asian American woman, a woman of color, a woman, a progressive woman, a race conscious woman, doing the work she did. And it would be great for her to have more people to work with. But i also think that theres a way in which our politics still havent fully revisited the politics of the 1990s. So what mink was doing in her second congressional career was trying to articulate a Democratic Politics that was different from what was becoming at that point coalescing into the mainstream of the Democratic Party, the new democratic sometimes called neoliberal approach to the Democratic Party, and i think even in the wake of the Bernie Sanders campaign and with ocasiocortez and others articulating a more left Democratic Politics, i think we still havent fully revisited the earlier politics and gone back to ground zero, especially where gender is concerned, where we could call it racialized gender. So i think thats where she would tell us to look. Yeah, i agree that she would be really thrilled. She would be thrilled to have nancy pelosi at speaker. She would be thrilled to see the grassroots activism, i think, because so much of her own support came from women who went door to door and did that kind of organizing at a local level. You know, changes that were seeing in house, in local races, particularly state races, she would be especially thrilled. I think she might be a little surprised women are being still so apologetic for wanting powder because people want power to do good. That was her attitude. Its ridiculous to think you can, you know, you need power to do what you want to do in congress. And she was really clear about that. And not appaologetic about it. And also, i think she would be agreeable that there needs to be more of a classbased politics in the Democratic Party, which it was in the early 70s, and that has gotten lost. Well, theres no one specific woman that i wrote about, but lets take, for example, nancy case abom, who told us how marginalized she felt in the u. S. Senate. And fast forward, i dont know about the people in this room, but i can speak for myself that it has been thrilling to see Nancy Pelosis use of power. It has been thrilling to see her march into the oval office and be one of the very first if not the first people to look our president in the eye and kind of put him in his place. And that is absolutely extraordinary in American History. She makes actually, there was one woman we interviewed, barbara quenelly, who was the daughter of john bailey, who had been the chair of the dnc, and she was familiar with politics, and she didnt say anything about, oh, i dont want to be a politician. She said i love being a politician. And she smiled broadly and just, you know, loved having some power. But mostly, in American History, even when women have been powerful, they have been sheepish about it. And to me, personally, it is thrilling to see Speaker Pelosi be so unapologetic about her capacity to wield power. I guess there are two things i want to say. First, i would say that i think all of the women in the 114th congress would say that its great that were now up to 24 . But were not at 50 . We still have a long way to go. And they, you know, ill just reemphasize this point. Almost uniformly, they said regardless of their partisan identification, that they wanted more women of both parties. So i think you would find them a little upset that the number of republican women in the house, for example, actually declined by ten, because when the republicans are in control, the Democratic Women want some women there. They want some women in leadership in that party. They want some women who can exercise and influence and, of course, the republican women have a variety of, as they do the Democratic Women, a variety of idealogical perspectives, but they want some women there who can help to talk about the impact on women and families and maybe affect policy in some way regardless of whos in leadership. The other thing i want to say is that i think the Democratic Women in particular would be thrilled with the fact that they are now their party is in power in the house, because it makes a tremendous difference in terms of the number of women in leadership positions in the house of representatives. There are a lot of women who have seniority, who have been around for a while, as well as the younger, you know, the new generation, the newcomers who are getting a lot of attention right now, but if you look around, you will see there are a lot of women now who are chairing committees. Theyre committee chairs. Theyre in leadership positions throughout the institution. So women have a lot more power in that institution right now than certainly they had in the Republican Party where there just were fewer women, not only in leadership, but fewer women generally. And then i would like you to each talk about the women at the time and who were their allies who helped them push their agendas. One of the really interesting stories in this book is of the investigation, and some of the new york historians will know more about it than i do, but really the broad sweeps of investigations that pushed away tammany hall and sort of defeated the machine and allowed for the rise of laguardia, and if theres a new york historian, im getting things wrong, im like eight centuries off my specialty, so bear with me. What was interesting, there were a lot of people in power who were trying to do reform. Men, organizations, courts. And that women were involved in this all the way through the process in both promoting the investigation and pushing it in certain kinds of directions, and then as that swept away the machine, at least for a while, enabling women to move into the spaces that were created as a result of it. So one of the real challenges for them, though, was, and it echoes what other people are saying. Theres a chapter here on embracing partisanship, and that Suffrage Movement was explicitly not a partisan effort. And so that transition was a big challenge. I have been thinking a lot about what we were saying at the end, sort of the movement of away from female representation in the Republican Party. And how there are moments like this, again, where womens political efforts are moving in one direction or another. I think in a lot of the work i have done on women in politics, what has really struck me is women turning to other women as allies. And certainly, the whole idea of Womens Networks, which you see in all kinds of areas, beyond just politics, but theyre really important. Theyre important personally, to have the support groups so you have people to talk to at the end of the day. But theyre important politically, because its a way of getting things done. And so i think just having started off my career looking at Womens Networks and the new deal, i have always been on the lookout for them ever since. And i think that there is a way in which when you have groups of likeminded women in the right place at the right time, its a really powerful combination. Having said that, Womens Networks will only go so far. You need to have male allies. And the Womens Network in the new deal would not have gotten anywhere without Franklin Roosevelt in the white house. So i think that it behooves us to be looking not just at how women come together in their networks but who strategically theyre aligned with and often there are key men who are there, not always publicly, but theyre there, and theyre part of the story. I learned a lot from susan wares work on this, and did think about it in terms of patsy mink and particularly why and how she was able to buck her own party and descent from her own pa party, and networks both within gres and outside congress enabled her to do that, and they werent all Womens Networks, but they were supportive networks. The Congressional Black Caucus was a persistent ally, the progressive caucus usually was an ally of hers, and then also, she had this wide network of organizations on the outside ranging from the aclu to the ywca, who supported her efforts and who organized letter writing campaigns in support of her perspective, even when she was opposing a democratic president , and i think thats absolutely essential. Similar to patsy mink, Barbara Jordan had many allies. On the ground, black churches and black womens organizations did the groundwork for getting out the vote. Organized labor, believe it or not, back in the day, in the 70s, texas was a very strong, extremely strong aflcio organized labor, particularly in houston. Those white men supported her to the end. They were extremely important allies for her. From the time she was a senator, all through the time she was in congress. And she was a very strong proponent of organized labor. And she was also very friendly with other texas politicians, of course, no matter what their political stripe, she always had a very Good Relationship with everyone. And she did Committee Politics really well. She was loyal to her chairs. She worked really well with committee chairs, no matter who they were. I think she had lots of different kinds of allies. Once again, i dont have specific women, so let me give a shout out to a couple of men who i think should be acknowledged. One is john f. Kennedy. S he does not go down in history as a big feminist, but he appointed the president s commission on the status of women, which brought together well, Eleanor Roosevelt was the titular chair of that which lent enormous prestige. Esther peterson was the one who did a lot of the organizing, but that led to networks of active women in every state in the union, and it is generally credited with having been a catalyst for many kinds of feminist Development Like the creation of the National Organization for women. And the other man that i want to mention is senator birch bayh, who we recently lost. In the 1970s, bayh sponsored important legislation for women, and so i think that, you know, it really makes a difference to have men who are wholeheartedly supporting feminist causes. Ill just continue that with another contemporary example, which is believe it or not, joe biden. Who is in some hot water these days for, you know, his behavior in terms of touching women. And you know, many of us can never quite get out of our memories the image of joe biden going after anita hill in the Clarence Thomas and anita hill hearings. And his treatment of anita hill and the way he let other people go on, because he was chair of the Judiciary Committee at that point and treated her. So people are complicated. But one of the things about joe biden that is important, i think, for folks to remember is that he was the primary proponent of the violence against women act, which is just been in the news the past couple days because the house just passed the reauthorization of the violence against women act. And it was first passed back during the clinton years. And joe biden was actually, he was the person who was the primary the primary out front person on this and leader on this issue. So you know, so hes one of the male allies. Of the women we interviewed in the 114th congress, almost all of them had worked as cosponsoring legislation with men. In other words, they work with men, certainly in their party, and frequently with men of the other party. And frequently with people from their own states in the case of senators. And you know, one of the things that research has shown is women actually have an effect on the men, that over time, as women have brought new issues to the forefront and as women have worked with men, its raised the consciousness of some of their male colleagues and the men have discovered some of these socalled womens issues, some of the policy proposals to advance women, actually are very popular with their constituents back home, too. So the women have had an important effect on changing the attitudes of their male colleagues over time. Any questions from our audience . Please, go to the microphone. Absolutely. Come on up. Good morning. Im charlotte. Hello, david. Elisabeth perry was an enormous influence on my life when i had the pleasure of getting to know her as i was able to hire her and lou to be the first couple ever to hold an endowed chair in history. And since then, she was an enormous influence on my life. She and i also shared the affection for Hillary Clinton, who is kind of the big cloud in the room that nobody has addressed. And i would be interested for our panelists to address her. Shes a complicated figure, obviously. And somebody who all of us, i think, expected would win and didnt. And all of us have been puzzling as to what in the hell happened. Thank you. Well, as a contemporary person, i will definitely Say Something about Hillary Clinton. You know, i think Hillary Clinton is going to be, as historians look back on this time, Hillary Clinton is going to be an incredibly important figure. And i think, you know, right now, i think shes going through sort of a bad moment, but i think shell be resurrected. You know, because what she did was quite phenomenal in terms of, you know, actually running being the first woman to gain the Democratic Party nomination and then, you know, and also the first woman one of the first women to run seriously. We cant forget shirley chisholm, back in 1972, but run seriously through the primary contest. And certainly, she was the first to come out the victor, in 2008, almost the victor, having lost to obama. But you know, i think shes going to leave she will be a very influential and important figure. I think a lot of what we have seen in terms of, you know, i think we underestimate, we attribute kind of what happened with in this election more to trump and trumps policies, i think, in terms of the reaction to those as stimulating women to run for office and stimulating the mobilization, but for many women, and i can say this even for many of the women who are students who i have taught, or dealt with, the disappointment over the fact that the first woman president ial candidate wasnt elected when everyone thought she would be elected played some role in that as well. Perhaps not the role that trumps policies have played, but i think we cant fully discount that as well. So i think she deserves some credit, you know, in sort of a, you know, strange way, for some of the mobilization thats taken place since the 2016 election. I just want to add, were talking about Hillary Clinton, and i did just see bill chafe come in, and i know hes written on bill and Hillary Clinton. So you might consult his work as well, but i think hillary is so important, you know, i cant as a historian, im not going to assess good or bad, but much more as a lens through which to understand the period were living in and the very recent past, and you know, the enormous ambivalence that our culture still has about women in power. And the range of stereotypes that were mobilized around her campaign, i think, are still enormously revealing. And its an important thing to know about 21st century america, that certain gender stereotypes that i think some of us as historians thought were relics of the past, arent, or werent in 2016. And i think we have to understand what produced the kind of feminist absence or lucroona that seems to have existed in that period, and maybe theres something to think about in terms of the trajectory of the feminist movement itself and its weaknesses and its incomplete victories. I think about that, the idea of Hillary Clinton as a lens. You think about how much changed in American Society in her lifetime, from when she started off as a kid in suburban chicago in the 40s and 50s, to now that it really, i think its this half full half empty glass where you can see enormous changes and yet there is so much that hasnt changed. And i found that so much when i was doing research on title ix. You just can look in individual life spans of the opportunities especially for athletics, and yet are we anywhere near parity in terms of athletics . No. Its this balancing act, and i think shes going to be a perfect lens for trying to sort that all out. I would like to speak to that question, too. I have to confess that im still personally bitter about the way she was treated by the press. And one of the things that really angered me is that they kept talking about the baggage, the baggage. Well, what was the baggage . The baggage im about to launch into a soap box, forgive me, but from the beginning of her husbands administration, it was travel gate, it was, what was her role in the death of vince foster. It was a narrative that was pushed by, as she once referred to, a vast rightwing conspiracy, and instead of identifying a lot of these things as what they were, lies and malicious rumors, they were reported kind of, you know, verbatim, not critically, so if there was baggage, i think the press coverage played a great role in it. Which isnt to say she didnt make some mistakes of her own, but what political candidate has never made a mistake . And hers were treated as somehow, you know, mortal sins rather than venial sins. And so i feel i completely agree with sues point that i think shell go down in history as a remarkably important figure. I just think of the fact that even as a graduating senior at wellesley, that she had so much going for her that she became really in a way a National Figure just as a graduating senior. And so she was, has been, is a remarkable figure in american life. One last thing. I dont think jordan would have seen this through the lens of gender. I think she would have seen it through the lens of race as well and looked and seen as a backlash, not just against women but against the obama presidency. And you cant take that out of the equation. And i think, you know, she was close to the clintons. I think she would have seen the number, the size of the electoral victory, which is enormous, 3 million votes. At the same time, you know, she was also very realistic about how conservative america is at its root and how hard democrats really have to worth to outorganize, she would have come back to that. We have to outorganize the opposition. Taking a really long view, which i like to do, and then also in conversations during the election with my mother, we were struck as other people have said, with kind of the consistency of narrative. Im a historian of narrative, its what i work on, and im a journalist, so im producing narrative, hopefully good narrative and useful narrative in my daily practice. Theres a wonderful medieval historian, womens historian, judith bennett, who is well known, who writes about the patriarchal e aa aal equilibriu. Things change all the time, but Power Dynamics dont. I thought about that a lot in 2016 campaign and im thinking about it now as im watching narratives proliferate that feel very familiar but not comfortably familiar. And susan, you can answer this question in the context of Hillary Clinton if you would like or other women. But im wondering if the women or the times you write about, if theyre contemporaries at that time, understood the work that they were doing and the importance of their work. Which susan . This susan . Thats you. Im sorry. I said you could answer it in the context of Hillary Clinton if you would like. Do you think Hillary Clintons contemporaries or the generations of women today understand what Hillary Clinton did for womens rights and the movement . I dont think people really fully appreciate that. I think that takes some time and some distance. You know, in order for that to happen. I think thats true for any political figure. It takes time and distance. Before ewe fully appreciate wha they have contributed. So you know, i think theres just such strong emotion right now still attached to Hillary Clinton. Both pro and anti you know, a disappointment for those disappointment among those who were strong supporters, and you know, theyre still shouting lock her up at trump rallies. So on the other side, theres clearly a lot of strong emotion there about her, too. So i do think its just going to take time. I do want to echo what felicia said about it was revealing. Your comments made me remember how much, how shocked i was actually by the 2008 election, where we really saw even more so, i think that the 2016 election, how stereotypes that we thought were something of the past in terms of women were actually brought out in that election and repeated by the media. Not only and by culture generally. There was, you know, the Hillary Clinton nutcracker. There were comments about there were comments about her pant suits. I mean, serious articles there was a serious article in the new york times, you know, about her cackle. Right . About is it real or is it, you know, is this somehow inauthentic that she would the way she laughed. You know, and on and on and on. You can come up with lots and lots of examples of them, but things where we thought we were past that point. I think the media did learn some. I think their coverage was better, i have to say, you know, in 2016 than it had been in 2008, but we still had examples where, you know, she was called she was shrill. As she spoke up, she was called shrill. Bernie sanders was like shouting, you know, and waving his hands around, and all you have to do is imagine if Bernie Sanders had been a woman, you know, what the reaction would have been. And you can or donald trump had been a woman well, he wouldnt have even been on this stage. But to see that those stereot e stereotypes are still very much alive. We can come back to my question for all of you in a bit, but lets get an audience question in here. Could you speak to any historical or current barriers to having a woman at the top of the ticket and as the Vice President ial nominee as well . And it could be from society, it could be within the Democratic Party as an institution. What would prevent it, what would prevent us seeing two women as democratic nominees . Any takers . Ill have a talk about it as a journalist because im covering it and i was at the klobuchar announcement in minnesota. It was great. It waw a blizzard. It was a fantastic day. I covered a lot of the 2016 election. I went to New Hampshire and spent time there. The Democratic Party is both, its just as sexist as america, but it is in denial often about its weaknesses. Its hard sometime in progressive spaces to have conversations about progressive sexism. And i think that to me is the big, i mean, its not the big barrier, but its one of the first barriers because we cant even talk about the gender dynamics, and i have spent a lot of time being yelled at i have written a lot about a lot of different political candidates, but when i write about Bernie Sanders, thats the one that results in my email box filling up and my twitter feed being filled with people very angry with me, and it seems like an obstacle to even start having the conversation. And for sure, this last week, not very historical, but the last week with joe biden, as we were talking about, you know, people saying it made me uncomfortable, and defenders saying, it wasnt sexual assault. Its not as bad as trump, which is true, but if we cant even begin to have the conversation because democrats arent willing to even begin to talk about it, that seems like a real obstacle. I want to say i think that theres still some discomfort with female authority. I think we have come a long way because women are, for example, when drew foust became president of harvard, i thought wow, this is modeling female authority in a significant way. But i look back to, i was spending time doing research at the schlessinger library in cambridge in the early 80s, and mateena horner then was the president of ratcliffe, and she talked about some kind of a meeting where she was the only woman, even though she was the president , and somebody saying to her, well, i have some numbers to present, and im going to have to simplify it for you, mateena. And she said, her response was, well, as it happens, i happen to have made a study of that very subject. So she put that person in his place, but i think for a lot of people, you know, its the Elementary School teacher, its the nurse who gives you the shot, whatever. I think female authority is uncomfortable for some. And i think its gotten a lot better, but i dont think its a problem that has vanished. Please, go ahead. Hi, thank you very much. Advancing womens rights advances us all. And yet that truism seems to be pushed back quite a bit. And my question deals with, i guess my interpretation of being a radical therefore is being someone who promotes rights for all. Were seeing that there are many new representatives, female representatives who are doing that, aoc, pramila jayapal, ilhan omar and others. My question to you, therefore, is given all the pushback theyre getting as being radicals, what is your thought, what are your thoughts on if women in our body of legislature have what difference can these women make, and have they made, on the floor in just realistical realistically . Thank you. Im going to start on that just because i actually want to take issue with the framing of womens rights are good for us all. As a historian of the 1960s and 70s primarily, i actually think its important to go back to the understanding of that generation of feminists, that they were vol involved in a power conflict with masculinity as a social fact, with men as a class. And that their sense that if they were going to gain in power, that men as a class were going to lose. And that they should not expect that power should be given up easily. And i think that any Political Movement or political actor who has lost that understanding, and i think thats part of the story of the late 20th century and the career of the u. S. Womens movement, is about downplaying that understanding because it was unpopular, not surprisingly. You know, i think that that has been a great loss. Im just thinking about interviewing mary rose okhar, who was a congresswoman from ohio, i believe, and she told us what it was like to advocate for funding for Breast Cancer research. And she said that there was just tremendous discomfort from the male members when the word breast was used. So i think thats a good instance of how having women in congress has made a difference in policy. But did she get the legislation through . Yes. I think you were sort of asking about the new freshmen members of congress to some degree and what kind of difference they could make, too. Yeah, and the past, but in terms of the freshmen who are coming in now, you know, who are receiving all this outside publicity, i think theyre actually having more of an impact outside than perhaps inside the institution because we have to remember that congress is an institution that operates on still largely based on seniority and certain norms about being there and learning the ropes. And these women are posing some challenges to that, but theyre going to have to make decisions at some point about whether they are going to be insiders and try to operate within the and rise within the institution, or whether theyre really going to be more sort of mavericks who stimulate the outside. And you know, there are different roles that different members of congress adopt. And you know, i thought it was i thought it was interesting when alexandria ocasiocortez, aoc, as she goes by nowadays, when she actually ended up voting for pelosi. You know, even though she said she wasnt going to vote for pelosi during her campaign. You know, and i thought that was actually a good sign. I read that as a good sign of her potential for having some influence on the inside as well, because it suggested that she was willing to, you know, to understand how the institution functions and the need to function within the institution in order to get the kinds of things done that you need to get done for your constituents. Its a delicate balance, but you know, i think that one of the things im going to watch for is whether these women, to the extent the women in the freshmen class actually come together and try to operate more collectively, because i think their power resides more collectively. Theres so many of them, it resides more collectively than individually in a lot of ways. So as the most junior members of the institution, thats really a way they could have some interesting impact. Earlier, you talked about women in congress. And i was wondering if you could elaborate on how being a mother in congress would add a different perspective. I would like to address that, because not many people know that the first woman in congress to have a child while a congresswoman was a black woman, yvonne burke, and that was in the 70s. That was 75. Thats a really great question. It wasnt and for her, given the era, the 70s, its so important, that moment, right . That context, that we lose, and then we have lost it. And then when these things happen again, they all seem new all over again. But the feminism of the 70s, i think, was very real. It really did promote a certain kind of woman entering politics where it seemed like, yes, this is something black women can do, something mothers can and should do, and but then things wax and wane. And you know, we forget that there was this cohort of black women in the 70s and there were mothers in congress. So i think your question is great. And also, i think it does bring matters, who is at the table, and to have those policies that are supportive of working families and working mothers, you know, be very real for the people who take on those issues in congress. And one thing i have learned from studying patsy mink is that i dont know if it was rhetoric or not, but it was very useful rhetoric for her to get to a different kind of feminist politics than the one that is usually seen. You know, it wasnt just about formal equality or simple equality in the labor market. She was actually calling for a feminist politics and a policy that also respects motherhood or for caregiving, really. And she would have been perfectly happy if it wasnt gender specific, but she also would have pointed out that in our society, it is gender specific, statistically, more of that work is done by women. So i think she may have learned from her own experience as a mother and as someone who was trying to juggle that with her political career. But regardless of whether she was learning it from her own experience, she used that as a way to have a different kind of feminist conversation, which i think is a very important one. I want to point out, again, talking about nancy pelosi, i dont know how many of you saw the report that when mr. Barrs summary, attorney general barrs summary of the Mueller Report was released, nancy pelosi was in San Francisco, helping supervise one of her granddaughters birthday parties, and i think its so important to american women to see this woman who is unabashedly able to use power but also willing shes not in her Office Drinking with the president , as sam rayburn used to do, as i recall, but she is at home in San Francisco in her district interacting with her grandchildren. And i think thats a powerful message. Good morning. Thanks for the panel. The tone of what we have been talking about feels very optimistic, which is like a wonderful tonic in this moment where the National Political climate seems so toxic. But to that end, you know, we talked about Belle Moskowitz and Barbara Jordan and patsy mink, certainly, i would think, of the left. And that got me thinking about women of the right. And im wondering how, i would just like to hear your thoughts on perhaps we should be thinking of women like phyllis shu laughry laugh ly as part of the story. Are they addatory to the story, or do they detract from it, if were having this conversation 50 years from now and theres somebody up there talking about sarah palin or now even ivanka trump, and i think its an important question to be asking because 62 , i think, of white women without a College Degree voted against Hillary Clinton and for donald trump. Well, im affiliated with the schlessinger library at ratcliffe, and one of the things we have really been trying to do is reach out to conservative women. In the past, they have been reluctant to share their papers with what is seen as a liberal harvard institution. And yet, without having those papers of the various groups that you can trace back, you know, to the 20s, all the way through, we arent going to be able to get those stories. And i think those stories of conservative women are a central part of the story and that we really we need to collect the sources. We need to engage with the stories and include them in the conversation. I think youre right. I think phyllis schlafle is one of the most important Women Political organizers of the 20th century. You cant underestimate her influence, the role she played in defeating the equal rights amendment was, you know, unquestioned. And she mobilized women. And i think what Barbara Jordan would have said, to your question, is there is no such thing as an inherently conservative woman. Theres a woman jow havent persuaded. She would say we need to reach out to those women because those women could be democrats if we were good enough at persuading them that our policies really were the ones that would benefit their families, and they should. Because these are working women, these are the women that the Democratic Party should be reaching out to. We have failed to do that. She said that in houston when there was a counterdemonstration in 1977. You had the Womens Convention there in houston and then you had a counterdemonstration at the same city, and she said we are losing those women, and we cant ignore them. So i think she would say there is a fluidity there, and what this shows is we have not succeeded. They have outorganized us. And we have to do better. One of the places im really interested in, first of all, we havent really talked about abortion and politics except for glenna, with a brief message, which i think its one of the pieces of the conversation here, the dominance of that discourse in recent not just in the last few years but in the last however many decades since roe v. Wade. The dominance of that discourse among politically active conservative women. One of the places i look at this, im the father of a boy with down syndrome. I think about sarah palin and kat Cathy Mcmorris rodgers, both mothers of sons with down syndrome, theyre both sort of 11 to 13, as my son is 12. I think about that discourse and the disability rights movement, and that touches on the last question as mothers, the ways in which the specific motivation around disability rights, sarah palin and Cathy Mcmorris rodgers and i agree on a lot of things related to disability in schools and disagree on so many other things. Anyway, i dont know exactly what the point is there, but clearly, that is part of the history as well, part of the role of motherhood and this engagement in disability rights as a place of actual connection. We have got about five to ten minutes left. Please come up. Thank you. This is more of a comment. Elisabeth perry was president of the society for historians of the gilded age in the progressive era. She and i served on that bodys executive committee for a number of years and i just wanted to recognize the importance of her leadership in that organization. Second of all, i want to emphasize one of the things that comes out of her work on belle moskowi moskowitz, which is there are many ways of wielding political power other than being elected to federal office. And that runs through some of the other comments that have been made here today. Obviously, being elected to federal office is important. I dont want to suggest that. But ill throw out another example of other ways of wielding power. You know, in california, women got the vote in 1911. And in the very next session of the legislature, the state federation of womens clubs organized the most powerful lobby in the state capital and put through almost entirely their political agenda. I think the only thing they didnt accomplish was world peace. Why dont we take this last question and we can wrap it up with final thoughts . I think my question kind of goes off of what he was saying about not just being elected to federal office. My question is more about a problem within the fact that we have 50 state legislatures that are run so very differently. Im thinking specifically, im fraught pittsburgh, and when i speak to the very few women who are in the pennsylvania legislature, they say it is very hard unless you are a widow or an empty nester to have a position in the Pennsylvania State legislature because theres nowhere for your husband to work in harrisburg, and the schools arent good enough for your kids, and so they get hit from both sides, from like they cant campaign well because theyre like, why do you want to move to harrisburg . Youre not a very good mother. M. And the disparate roles of state legislatures in accommodating and inviting women into statewide office. Who would like to take that and, also, your final thoughts. As well. Well, i guess ill Say Something about that. Youre absolutely right. These are still barriers women face. The moving to washington, right . Thinking about not moving to washington, because most members of congress out in dont move to washington, but, you know but thinking about, you know, going back and forth and whos and women still get asked on the campaign trail all the time, you know, well what about your kids . Whos taking care and men very rarely get asked that question. One of the interesting findings from our book is that we asked women, you know, what the obstacles that they faced in congress, and one of the most surprising things to us was that they they brought it up spontaneously. They said they faced more difficult obstacles getting there than they do once theyre there. So, you know, youre suit of alluding to some of those, but it does vary from state to state. Some states are more geographically compact. You know, some states, you know, the states just vary tremendously in terms of their legislatures. You know, youve got california then new york which are highly professionalized. You make a lot of money, whatever, you have New Hampshire. Very large legislature and other places, and you make very little money. Little staff. So there are a lot of different, a lot of different cultures a lot of different issues. Pennsylvania is a hard nut to crack. Weve had the same problem in new jersey over time, because the parties retain a lot of control there. A lot of slating of candidates and parties themselves, in my view, are an obstacle, you know to getting more women into politics in those kinds of situations. Where in other states, its not like that. That will be my final comment. Thank you. My final comment i want to mention, that up until recently, when the Republican Party has become really so conservative, there have been many wonderful republican, i mean, not liberal by any means but still solid republican women in the house and, of course, i think of Margaret Chase smith in maine. I want to mention a little known woman. The first jewish congresswoman in the country was florence prague cohn from San Francisco who was a widow, but who became the goto person in congress for the Business Community of San Francisco, and one piece i dont i cant recall off the top of my head, the exact specifics, but at one point she carried legislation on behalf of the immigration of chinese women, and so it was a very progressive thing to do, and it was on behalf of women. So there are the fact that now republican women are not seen as carriers of much legislation of value to women is not necessarily the way its been through American History. I think there are things we just dont know yet, because they have to play out. And the biggest thing i see we should look at the role of money and media. Right . Because for historically for women, politicians making the ask, raising money, was always the biggest barrier. Why should i invest in you . Are you going to win . Right . Having the confidence to be able to make that ask. Even Barbara Jordan had problems with it. Its tough. Now there are ways to in a way go around some of that. With social media. Right . And organizations like emilys list and other innovative ways. On the other hand, theres such a concentration of money we know where that money is lrgly going and also such a concentration of media. Media power right . And can social media be enough to circumvent that . I think you see the power of things like, that social media played in the Supreme Court nominations. That was really surprising. That things that, picture images people took of encounters in elevators. Right . Could have such an impact on the process. So i think theres a lot of unknowns still to be played out in the upcoming election. But theres no question that the concentration of money and media really does not work in progressive womens favor. The question about statetostate differences and state legislatures is really interesting and important i think. It makes me think of my own state in vermont. Im quite involved in fem nifrt a fem nif fem nifrt and Democratic Politics. I decided it was not for me after taking a course but thats a very interesting organization, which is its operating within and outside of the Democratic Party. And in a gentle maybe even a feminine way, the organization is really attempting to pressure the Democratic Party and to form an alternative structure. Alternative partylike structure, that has become very powerful in my state, and i think in some other states. And has been responsible not just for eleshcting women, but y women and trans women and women of color, and i think looking back historically, projecting that to the past thinking patsy mink, Barbara Jordan, i think they did need some external support in order to start their careers, get into state legislatures and then get into the pipeline for higher ochs. Office, and i think in the 60s and 70s the essential movements really serve that end. Black civil rights movement, japanese movement, womens movement, peace movement, et cetera. I think those were even more powerful than groups like emerge. Right . I think they made an even more, a more profound difference. But i think, i think progressive women do need some alternative to existing party structures, and probably will for the foreseeable future. My final word will be brief. Its a shoutout to a book that was published about women in political parties, and the title was we are here to stay. I just would like to thank you all for coming and glenna organizing this and my panelist are and cspan. Read this. A good book. I think that, i think, thinking a lot about what is feminine politics, the language of Belle Moskowitz. I can only tell you i think yesterday i saw a picture of the men from queer eye, ocasiocortez and nancy pelosi all standing together. I think feminine politics may be changing. Thank you so much. Thank you all for coming and thank you to our panelists. Every saturday at 8 00 p. M. Eastern on men history tv go inside a Different College classroom and hear topics ranging from the american revolution, civil rights and u. S. President s to 9 11. Thanks for your patience and for logging in to class. With most College Campuses closed due to impact of the coronavirus, watch professors transfer teemping to a virtual setting to engage with students. Gorbachev did most of the work to change the soviet union, but reagan met him half way. Reagan encouraged him. Reagan supported him. Freedom of the press, well get to later i should mention, madison originally calmed it freedom of the use of the press and it is indeed freedom to print things and publish things. Stepnot a freedom for what we now refer to institutionally as the press. Lectures in history on American History tv on cspan3 after saturday at 8 00 p. M. Eastern. Lectures in history is also available at a podcast. Find it where up listen to podcasts. Weeknights this month featuring American History tv programs as preview whats available every weekend on cspan3. Tonight a look at civil war objects. Historians at the New York Historical society hold a series of online talks about art fcts peach featured in their joint publication. In the first of hour of these programs shown tonight they discuss objects related to soldiers uniforms and accoutrement. Watch tonight and enjoy American History tv this week and every weekend on cspan3. Three scholars took part in a discussion called women and the vote the 19th amendment power, media and making of a movement. The National Archives hosted the eventen in conjunction with their centennial exhibit, rightfully hers. American women and the vote. Tonights discussion is part of a series of programs related to our recently opened exhibit, rightfully herself. American women and the vote. Rightfully hers commemorates the anniversary and tells of womens struggles for Voting Rights towards equal citizenship, explores how women across the spectrum of race, ethnicity and class advanced the cause of suffrage and follows struggles for Voting Rights beyond 1920. The decadeslong fight for the vote in the 19th and early 20th cent