and philadelphia. >> good morning everyone. welcome to this morning's discussion, from the -- moscow with. to nancy pelosi. around the table on women, wielding the political power. i'm greta brawner from c-span, american history tv, on c-span three every weekend. it's 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 minute granting the women the right to vote. passed by that u.s. house in the un that senate in 19, and ratified in 1920. if we are 100 years later, the 116th congress has the highest percentage of women ever making up -- ever, making up a quarter of each chamber. and we have a female speaker for the second time. we have four women still for running for president. today's panel will look at women, the role of women, and the key turning points for women in the wake of politics. others you do see to our panelists, i will come back through and have each of them talk about their books, with a period of time that the writing the. we, for about five minutes. and then will open up the conversation to all of you so we get to that point for that questions i'd like each of you to go the microphone lineup, behind a microphone to ask questions. ,. ,,. she was also historian and wrote the book bell moscow it's feminine politics, an exercise of power and the age of alfred a smith. david helped publish his mother's final book, after the vote feminist politics and laguardia's new york. susan weir, its author of beyond suffrage women in the new deal. and also, the book why they marched, untold story of the women who fought for the right to vote. felicia coren blue, university of vermont professor, gender sexuality and women's study professor. coauthor of the book -- and shrink prophesy, welfare reform, and feminist perspective. mary allen curtain, is a history professor and the director of american studies at american universities and the author of the forthcoming book, from virtue to power barbara jordan and the rise of black women's leadership in modern america. glenn matthews who helped organize this morning's panel, is the author of the rise of public women, women's power, and women's place in the united states, and the coauthor of the book, running as a woman, gender and power in american politics. and some -- site who is a political science professor at records university, a senior scholar at the center for american women in politics, coauthor of the book a seat at the table, congresswomen's perspectives on why their presence matters. david perry let's begin with you. >> thank you so much. this book. right here available, at the book exhibit. begins with the line, this book is about the women who went to my grandmother's funeral. that's the first line here. my mother's last work which came out two days ago, took decades for her to get to that first line. in the 19 eighties, my mother -- turned her attention to the biography of bill moscow. it's one of the most important and powerful women in new york, and perhaps a national political history in the first few decades of the 20th century. people knew about bell, but her papers, she broadly destroyed her papers, and so it took my mother a long time to dig into haystacks and find a lot of needles looking for copies of letters that she sent, looking for references to her, to put together the story in her own time in our own context in her own name. so she went from being the famous misses am, -- to being bell mosque with. but my mother found another needles -- scat about -- moved into political life in the same air after suffrage. she found in the sort of early late eighties, early 1990s, that is just not a story that she had to wear it all to tell. these multi layer networks of women who have moved into political life. it was really only the rise, and it's a conversation that she and i had allied in a final, years surgical databases of laptops, newspapers online, that enabled her to put it together and to put together this book about all these amazing women who came out of the suffrage movement, and into political life. i got a little taste of that on her literally last day of consciousness. excuse me. where i got to read with her, 1918 i think -- brooklyn daily eagle, this local newspaper which i see a lot of people nodding. i'm a medieval historian, news to me. i could search these database, and find the exact date, and exact articles, and track down exact footnote for this book. it was not a bad way to spend that day. this book jacket as you can see on the screen, shows a photo of the women of the laguardia administration, at a banquet on december six 1937. my mother also found that it's published its entirety here, a skit that these women put on for themselves and also for the mayor who was in attendance. called 50 women and one man, a play in three scenes with one acts. and it's an amazing document, it says everything that we want to say, it's as women who are coming together, they are celebrating their achievements, they're celebrating the mayor who has brought them into political office, but they are also recognizing that their vice commissioners. and not commissioners. they are recognizing that their second in command, and not in command. the whole play is that, if we give the men a break, new york is gonna run better and it ends with the mayor played by one of the women of the administration, saying you are right. fire all the men, and elsewhere you all his commissioners tomorrow. so, it's a fantasy, but it's a fantasy that think carries us down the road establishing the trajectory of the panel. 100 years from delta nancy pelosi, of ambition and success, but also of glass ceilings and patriarchy. thank you so much! we (applause) >> elizabeth perry, and i shared deep and abiding interest in women's political history and feminist biography. i am proud to be on this panel, with my distinguished colleagues to honor her legacy. but i want to start with a shout out to the upcoming centennial of the 19th amendment, because if women hadn't got the vote in 1920, we would not be having this panel. but having said that, i think it's important to remember, not getting women elected to office was not a terribly high priority for the women's suffrage movement. their focus was on the franchise, women's new identities, as voters and citizens, and on getting a foot inside the door of politics, which was generally seen as a male preserve. of course, there were some dramatic early examples of women winning political office, such as jeannette rankin of montana, who was the first woman elected in office in 1916. but for years the far more common path for women, to elective office was the windows route. the being selected to fill the term of a late husband, and sometimes, not very often, being able to parlay that into political power of her own. but the big story of the immediate coast suffrage here, was not the 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 bell mosque to its preferred way to operate, they did it in full public view. and the 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, who are long active in that field. laid by the triumvirate of the first lady, -- roosevelt, secretary of labor frances perkins, the first woman to first in the candidate, molly dusen, the women's division of the -- the woman's whack were of high-level appointees influence the social welfare policies of a new deal. especially in the works progress administration and the social security administration. women also took on larger roles in the revitalize democratic party. even -- the results were far from achieving gender parity. women's interest and issues might have been overlooked, if not completely forgotten in the 1930s, without the effective mobilization of the women's network. so the new deal, i think, truly was a breakthrough for women's in public life. many of these women were first whose appointments were rightly recorded in the press. but unfortunately, it proved difficult to institutionalize their progress. women found many fewer opportunities during wartime in the 1940s than they had in the depression of the 19 thirties. and reminding those in position of power, that women could serve with distinction, at the very highest level of politics in government. remained an uphill battle, and indeed it still remains one today. and without an eleanor roosevelt, or mueller dusen to constantly press women's case, to 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 situate the story of women wielding power as part of a much longer continuum. this stretches from the women's suffrage movement, actually from before the women's suffrage movement, through the new deal, all the way to 2018 elections and beyond. women have always wielded 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 that they are standing on the shoulders of the political woman who came before them. thank you. >> (applause) we i also am very happy to be here, david i did know your mother personally, but of course i knew her work and the biography of moscow it's was a very important look for me. i am gonna speak about representative patsy, teammate of hawaii. who was the mother of my collaborator, on the book just published. patsy was the mother of glendale in -- the public scientist. i draw here material that appears in our book, ensuring poverty, welfare reform and pena feminists perspective which is available in the university -- of. that's a top omoto and, and to politics on the wings of the japanese american civil rights and the women's rights movements. trained as a lawyer, make one election to the territorial house of representatives in hawaii, in 1956. before hawaii was a state. in 1964, she won a seat on the u.s. house representative, without the backing of her local democratic party whose dictate she refused to follow. she became the first asian american woman, and first women of color from any background to serve in the house of representatives. during lyndon johnson's presidency, make strongly supported the anti poverty 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 her party continuously over that. make advocated for women's causes, in congress, among many other achievements, she's known as the primary author of title ix, of the educational amendments of 1972, which barr sex based discrimination and institutions of higher education that receive federal funds. make left the house in 1977, she ran for the senate, served as an under secretary of state in the carter administration, and as a member and ultimately chair of the honolulu city council. she then returned to the house of representatives in 1989, and during her second career in the house, she again debated with members of our own party, and stood up for women especially those with the least political and economical power. we see these two tendencies most clearly in the role that she played, welfare reform. while being clinton and other democrats -- who was president of the u.s.. as many of us remember, clinton called himself quote unquote, new democrat. and what that meant in part was that, he was willing to shed some of the traditional democratic commitments to the alleviation of poverty especially the poverty of women headed families. make dissented from her president, and organized other progressive feminist and race conscious members of congress to do the same. and she played this role, at the three different moments in her 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 and welfare as we know it. then, when the republicans came into the majority, and both houses of congress, after the november 19th 1994 elections and then they introduced a more conservative welfare reform policy. at that point what make did, was organized 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 19 nineties into the early 21st century, and organize progressive democrats again to replace welfare reform with a more progressive feminist alternative. >> patsy formulated or own bill, she just did not critique what others were doing, what other democrats are doing. she produced a bill called hr 30 1:13. that became the feminist progressive and anti racist 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 honor the caregiving work that they did as mothers, from mixed perspective, it was inadequate to have a policy that simply matched people up with jobs or that pushed him 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 makes efforts and ultimately 40% of the democratic caucus and the house supported her bill, but finally the leadership decided that they were going to have a much more conservative bill than mix, and encourage other democrats to follow their lead. gondolin mannock, ultimately reported to a colleague that quote, maxime waters the democrat of california, major owens democrat of new york, and patsy mink herself, went to democratic majority leader richard get part, and he told him essentially that it's more important to hold on to him -- hold on to the new, more conservative anti democrats, that to accommodate progressives and people of color. unquote. there was no equivalent to the make bill in the u.s. senate, even though democrats had a slight majority. and ultimately, congress stalemate it on the issue, unable to come to an agreement between the parties and often on an acknowledged with debate still roiling even among democrats. just days before an anti climactic agreement that deferred legislative actions on welfare until after the 2002 elections, representative patsy make passed away in honolulu, a viral pneumonia develop from chicken pox. the new york times to remember her as articulate, strong willed, and willing to fight for causes large and small. thank you. (applause) good morning. good morning. what an honor it is to be here today, celebrating the life of work of is less a it is real peril, and reflect on the past and present state of women in american politics. professor perry's 1992 biography of bill moscow it's, inspires because of its candor and interpretive. perry argued that moscow it's, a great progressive reformer of the earliest 20th century, who served as a close adviser to governor al smith, succeeded because of adherence to feminine rather than feminist behaviors. her aim like mine was to make the state an instrument for the welfare of the people, sent governor smith. and though she cooperated with many political life, she was essentially a wife and a mother. a womanly woman. and although enormously influential, bell moscow it's accepted that women should serve men, not lead them. such beliefs and practices contrasted sharply with those held by politicians such as barbara jordan, of houston texans, who served in the texas legislature in 1976 1982, and became the first black woman in the south elected to congress until retiring to 1978. perry's -- study of moscow it's -- ushered in a new era for black women and political leadership in america. i'd like to list a few of the key differences that distinguish joined from other -- barbara jordan was not a social worker. but a lawyer. and a political activist in the early sixties who worked with the naacp to integrate schools, overturn the white primary, open up the political system to black voters and candidates. jordan's involvement in activism led her to political office. second, george and sought leadership. she competed with man for political office. when another black politician curtis graves, also sought to enter the congressional primary, jordan stated, if there is a collision course between mr. graves and me, i shall not differ. i shall not defer to him, or i shall not defer to anyone else who 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 then i give up, and she always wanted to go higher. he said her ambition was still indeed to be, -- fourth jordan did not work behind the scenes, but was a very public figure, who inspired -- and served as a role model for black -- elated for those who saw on television. fifth yes join work for the public good, but as a politician a role she relished, that meant gaining the respect of colleagues in communities, and -- arc of pressure and compromise -- to energize voters. jordan shoes the role of mother and wife. she created home ties with -- same sex relationships. personal independence, and financial independence were extremely important to him. and finally, although a loyal democrat, jordan also bypassed the party, political machine. creating her own political organization of black workers, who went door to door many of whom, were black women and all of whom were extremely loyal to her. to a 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. it is indeed exciting, but it has happened before. barbara jordan is not alone or, when she came to congress in 1972, she joined three other black women, surely chisholm of new york, even breezeway burke of california, and cards collins of illinois. and it was these four black women who comprise the first cohort of african american women in congress. before the watergate crisis -- divert all overt attention to the judiciary committee, these four women appeared in many public panels, and work in legislation together. although we all recognize the long history of women's involvement in american politics, i'll work here today should be dedicated to writing a new narrative american women, that recognizes that the 19th amendment did not guarantee suffrage from all 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. (applause) this is wonderful. i am the organizer of this panel, and i gave the instructions to people to hold it to five minutes, and my gosh people are holding it to five minutes. (laughs) thank you. besides wanting to honor elizabeth israel perry, the election of 2018 inspired me to organize the session. in 90 90, i began work on a coauthored book, with two coauthors, running as a woman. my coauthors and i felt in 1990, maybe there were certain changes in the air, we were not -- we did not have our fingers exactly what it was was changing. we just felt change, and as we began to work, we had more definition. bear in mind, we started with -- anita hill. anita hill with a whole episode mobilized women, in a really remarkable way. we began work in 1990. and in january of 1991, we traveled -- all along the bay area in california. we travel to washington d.c., where we were going to interview some congressional women. a woman, a hostess in washington, who had connections, had a dinner party for us and at that dinner party was owen malcolm of emily's list. pioneering fund-raising for liberal democratic pro choice women. malcolm had just come from and richards inauguration. it was a huge celebration, and she was full of enthusiasm. and she told us the story, she said that, in the field -- in the campaign, in 1990, in texas. and you recalled and richards had this wonderful, up do me, and richards posed with her hairdresser. and 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 who is comfortable doing something like that. whereas, the wonderful margaret j smith told one of my coauthors, i was never a woman candidate. and in our memoir, jerry farrow said that in 1984, she was embarrassed about telling -- that she needed haircut. and now 1990, we defy gravity. so, we started thinking about the different aspects of running as a woman,. one i mean, you look at pictures of the early women, and i don't want to denigrate them because they made some wonderful contributions, but they all look like honourary man. they're wearing dark suits, and that's what struck me so much about 2018. these are not honourary men, who got elected. alexandria ocasio-cortez is only the most well publicized, there are certainly many other women with a range of self presentations. so one does ship presenter self as an honourary man, and or play down her gender, that she tried to mobilize women voters? and three, does she advocate public policy needed by women? and so those are the things that we were looking for. i want to now explain now as what we ended identify as indicators of change, that we identified back in 1991. but before that, we should say, one interesting example before and richards of running as a woman, was held in megan douglas, who was a congresswoman in california in the forties. she was a glamorous woman. she's been a broadway star, in the movies, she was married to movie star, melbourne douglas. and she in 1947, gave am -- speech on the floor of congress. where she walked in, with a market basket, and gave a speech about the impact of inflation on housewives. that was a dramatic moment. so, there were other women -- and john does not permit to talk about all of the many contributions of congresswomen, but i want to talk now about generational change as of 1991. number one, in 1972, title ix gave women's athletics a huge boost. thank you patsy mink. and girls began to play team sports. and why is this important? because for women of my generation, young women, we did not have the experience of doing your view with some you lose some. we were not playing team sports. and so, often, we argued in our book, a woman -- personalize a lost because it was the first time she had a devastating loss in alive weber. to, me by the early nineties, there was more want than one fund-raising network. found in 1985 it was not unique, there was actually attempts to organize fund-raising efforts for women. of course emily, it is an acronym for early money is like yeast. get 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 been a fitted from access to professional schools, because of affirmative action. because of other public policies. so now we had, we had an occasional woman lawyer, martha griffith, patsy make, but often women were has been suggested, social workers or they were windows. now we have a generation of women with the same kind of professional background, and their male candidate might have. and finally i want to mention that, matt as we were working on the book, we found out that there was a series of breakfasts being held in san francisco organized by the women's campaign fun. and they were speeches by women candidates with some of the women san francisco as the audience. 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 had attended these -- i remember the who was still in congress, from the peninsula. and so, we thought you know here you have, a generation earlier, you would've not have had this kind of network. with women who could write a check for more than five dollars. so alam, as of 1992, and you had anita hill in 1991, you had the fruits of generational change, and you had a large rise, all at suubi the imperial cyst to tell you as a political scientist, but -- just another anecdotal indication, we interviewed nancy cast bomb republican senator from kansas and she said, and this is 1991 probably, she said i'm on the senate formulations committee, but i'm never interviewed on television. and she also said sometimes, she would sit and fantasize murder mysteries. and i don't want to tell you whose victims were, but they might have been in the room. so she felt, even though she was in the senate, she felt big changes beginning in 1992. and then you know, in 2018 not only do you have a record breaking number of women, but we had a women with -- two native american women, some out lesbians, we had two muslim women, and so on. when i saw that, i felt that this was now another generational leap that needed to be analyzed by historians, or go this panel. >> about that (laughs) one of the 1992 elections were certainly important, called year the woman. my guess is that 2018 likely go down in history as the most significant election for women since women achieve the right to vote. record numbers of women ran for, and were elected to office throughout the country. i want to focus on congress, but similar patterns were evident at the state level as well. currently, a record 127 women served in the 116th congress, compared with 108 who serve just before the 2018 elections. and percentage terms, women now constitute 23.7% of all members of congress. most of women's gains in 2018 where the house of representatives, where 100 and on two women now served in compared to 85 with the election. and the games were now concentrated among democrats, republicans. the number of democratic women increased by 27, following elections as well the number of republican women actually decreased by ten. a record number of women of color were also elected in 2018, 43 women of color, all but one of whom is a democrat. currently served in the house. i want to focus on my remarks this morning, on the question of why having women in crawling greece may have a difference. i want to do so by redoing some funding from a book entitled, the seat at the table. congresswoman's perspective on why their presence matters. which i coauthored with to my colleagues at the center for americans -- kelly dip maher and curiously monster. the book is based on in-person interviews with congressman, who served in the hundred 14 congress. that's the congress that took place during the last two years of the obama administration. our interviews with the congresswoman indicated that they see themselves as making a difference in at least three ways. first by bringing distinctive perspectives to be on public policy, second by having a distinctive work style, and third by serving as role models for other women. i want to talk about briefly about each of these, and illustrate them through the words of the congresswomen the 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, explain quotes, women's life experiences are different from men's. they are not better, they are not worse, but they are different. it is important for us to have -- people who have experiences at the table, we can talk about those, we can respond to the challenges that half of the population face. and quote. similarly, kristen gillibrand, democrat from new york suggested quote, we are all doubt very different, we all have different priorities, different interests, different areas of expertise. but it does be a commonality that everyone cares about their families, and their communities. there's an interest in protecting the most vulnerable, and there is common ground there, and a lot of our legislation gets built from their. and quote. i want to elaborate on two aspects of jill brands quotes. the first is your observation that women care about families. perhaps more than any other life experience, congressman pointed to the roles as mothers, and caregivers as a source of their distinctive perspective. for example, representative kirsty noem, publican from north dakota told us, i'm a mom and i just think we bring a completely different perspective to the conversation. a lot of the women i know -- and certainly a lot of the five different responsibilities, they are not just working jobs, they are caring for the pants, they're raising children. they are making their household budgetary decisions. they are making that health care decisions for their families, they are feeling stressed and stretched in many different directions. and that perspective means to be at the table when we are talking about bills and legislation and quote. the second aspect -- that we've heard echoed over and over again, was the idea of women protecting the vulnerable. being a voice for the voiceless. providing representation for those who otherwise would lack representation in the halls of congress. for example, representative more -- democrat from wisconsin told us quote, i'm here because of people i represent on don't have well paid lobbyist support represent their interests. i am very very proud to fight for food stamps, and social services, to meet the needs of people when they are down and out. and quote. of course congresswoman had different different ideas of who the voiceless were, ranging from children, the single mothers, to regular citizens, to the less affluent constituents, to minorities, to even 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 our public policy, congresswoman expressed -- that they conduct legislative business them differently than their male colleagues. suggesting that they have a distinctive work stop. over and over, the women claim that they were problem solvers, who are more concerned about achieving outcomes, then 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 the men do. very few am i met -- my colleagues got the policies they want to be a u.s. senator. we are not there to be the power politics. similarly, and a eschewed who is still there, democrat from california told us, quote, i don't think women come here to be somebody. i think we come here to get things done, and quote. in addition to the idea that women are problem solvers, congresswomen frequently told us that women are more collaborative than men. as one example said -- susan collins, republican from maine noted quote, i want to dispel the notion that somehow we think alike or that we share the same political views. just as the man in the senate spanned the ideological spectrum, so do the women. but i do believe the style of the women senators is more collaborative, and quote. a majority of women expressed the view that they are more bipartisan than the man, more likely to corroborate across party lines. one of the ways bipartisanship is fostered among the women is through the annual channel rubble softball game. representative suzanne bonamici, democrat from oregon explained and quote, when the man play softball, the democrats play the republicans and walked over to the big stadium, and the democrats sit in the one section and wear blue, and that republicans where in the one section where red. and the democrats where donkey flags, and the republicans wave elephants. and then a few weeks later, the women play this off all game, instead of playing each other, the women in the house and senate democrats and republican, all form one team and play against the press. and that just exemplifies, it just exempt supplies the difference in the more a collaborative approach. rather than saying let's play each other, let's play together. finally the third -- see differences that they act as role models for other women and four girls. encouraging them to get involved in politics and perhaps run for office themselves. almost uniformly they want to see more women in both parties represented in congress. as just two quick final examples of this commitment, representative jackie real or ski, republic from illinois told us, i think this should be one more women from both sides of the aisle. every chance i have, whether i speak to girls from a, highschooler civics groups. what i'm speaking to women imams, i'm always talking about the need for more women to get involved and quote. similarly, representative choice beady democrat from ohio observe, quote, having more women of color in congress makes a difference when little african americans can dream that they can to conserve in congress. and on that optimistic note, i will and thank you. >> oh my wonderful. so a kick off the conversation, but i'd like all of you if you have questions, to line up at the microphone so we can get to those comments as well. i'd like to begin with having each of you respond to this question, the women that you write about, do you think they would be pleased or disappointed or something else? looking at the hundred and 60 in congress and the number of women that are there, as you noted it's a record number but we are still at 23%? around the? >> >> david when you begin actually? >> sure, i am a medieval historian, i'm a successor officer from a mother. i definitely think that the challenges that we encounter in this book, would remain. that these particularly -- i read the play last night because it's funny. it's enjoyable, but also because it is so 1937, these women you can see them here, these women gathering, some are scowling, some are smiling. there is the mayor in the back. they are really clear that they are proud of what they've accomplished, but so aware of how far there is to go. i think that's pretty much where they would be today, saying gray good progress, but speaker the house was good, let's talk about senate president. let's talk about president united states. proud of their compliments, but they're looking to the places where they have not yet gotten. >> i would say thinking back to women in the twenties and thirties, they would be rightly amazed. all of a sudden if they fast forwarded to 2018. 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 women's bathrooms, or four 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, i always think about quote that molly dusen wrote to eleanor roosevelt about jim far lee who was head of the men's democratic national could've mentioned in the 1930s, she wrote to eleanor, man are the slipperiest of eels. so some things don't change. >> i think patsy mink would be thrilled. i think she felt a little lonely. as an asian american woman, a woman of color, as a progressive woman. a race conscious woman. doing the work that she did. and it would be great for her to have more more people to work with. but i also think that there is a way in which our politics still haven't fully re-visited the politics of the 1990s. so, what mike was doing, and our second congressional career was, trying to articulate a democratic politics that was different from what was becoming at this point coalescing into the mainstream of the democratic party, the new democratic -- sometimes called neo-liberal approach to democratic party. i think even in the wake of bernie sanders campaign, and with kasia cortez and others articulating a left of democratic politics, i think we still fully having result revisit it -- gone back to ground zero especially were genders concern. we could call it racialized gender. so i think that's where she would tell us to look. >> yeah i agree that she would be really thrilled, should be thrilled to have nancy pelosi speaker. she would be thrilled to see the grassroots of activism, 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. changes that were seen in-house -- and local races especially thrilled that. i think she might be a little surprised that women are being so still apologetic for wanting power, because people want power to do good. and that was her attitude. it's ridiculous to think that you can -- you need power to be able to do what you want to do in congress. she was really clear about that, and not apologetic about it. and also, i think she would be agreeable that there needs to be more of a class space politics in the democratic party, which it was in the early seventies. that has gotten lost. >> well there's no one specific woman that i would write about, but let's take for example nancy castle bomb who told us how marginalize she felt in the u.s. senate. fast forward, i don't know about people in this room, but i can speak for myself, that he has been thrilling to see nancy pelosi's use of power. it has been thrilling to see who borger into the oval office, and be one of the first, if not the first people to look at president in the eye and put him in his place. that is absolutely extraordinary, in american history. she, makes no -- there was actually no it was actually one woman interview, barbara canal, who was the daughter of john bailey who had been the chair -- of dnc. and she was familiar with politics, and she didn't say anything about oh, i don't want to be a politician. she said i love being a politician. and she smiled broadly, and she loved having some power. but mostly, in american history, even when women have been powerful, they have been sheepish about it. 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 let's say, i think all the women in the 104th congress would say it's great that we are now up to 24%. but not a 50%. we still have a long way to go. i'll just reemphasize this point, almost uniformly, they said regardless of their partisan identification, 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, but democratic women want some women there. they want some women and leadership in that party. they want some women to do some exercise, and influence, and of course the republican women have a variety of, as they do the democratic women, of variety of ideological perspectives. but they want someone in there who can help to talk about the impact on women and families, and maybe affect policy in some way, regardless of who is in leadership. the other thing i want to say is, i think the democrat, the democratic women in particular i think would be thrilled with the fact that they are now, their parties empower 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 younger, the new generation -- the newcomers who are getting a lot of attention right now. but if you look around, you will see there a lot of women right now who are sharing committees. their committee chairs, their leadership positions, throughout the institution. so women have a lot more power, in that institution right now and certainly they had in the republican party, where they were just fewer women, not only in leadership but only fewer women and general. >> then i'd like each of you to talk about the women at the time, and who were there allies that help them push their agendas? >> one of the really interesting stories from this book it is of the sea barry investigation at some of you -- are historians or will know more about it than i do. but really the broad sweeps of investigations that boost to a ten we haul -- and allowed for the rise of laguardia significant things wrong -- i'm like eight centuries off my specialty, bear with me. but what was interesting was there were a lot of people in power who are trying to do reform, man organizations, courts, that women were involved in this all the way through the process. promoting the sea bearing investigation, and putting it in certain kind of distractions, and has 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 the real challenges for them though echoes what other people are saying, is a chapter here on embracing partisanship. and that suffrage movement was explicitly not a partisan effort. so that transition was a big challenge. i've been thinking a lot about what we were just saying in the end, sort of the movement of away from female representation in the republican party. how there are so moments like this again, and were women's political efforts are sort of moving and one direction or another. >> i think in a lot of the work i've done with women in politics, what has really struck me is women turning to other women as allies, and certainly the whole idea of women's networks which you see in all kinds of areas, beyond just politics. but they are really important. they are important personally, to have a support group, to have people to talk to at the end of the day, they are important politically because it's a way of getting things done. and so i think, just having started off my career looking at women's networks in the new deal, i've always been on the lookout for them ever since. i think that there is a way, when you have groups of like-minded women in the right place at the right time, it's a real powerful combination. having said that, women's networks will only go so far. you need to have male allies. and the women's network in the new deal would not have gotten anywhere without franklin roosevelt in the white house. so i think it behooves us to be looking not just how women come together and their networks, but who strategically they are aligned with and often there are key men who are there, not always publicly, but they are there and they are part of the story. >> i learned a lot from susan wears work on this, and it think about it in terms of patsy mink. and particularly why and how she was able to buck her own party, and dissent from her own party. and i think that, you know that the network spoke within and outside congress enabled her to do that. they were not all women that work, 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 wind alicia, who supported her efforts and new organizing riding letter campaigns in support of a perspective even when she was opposing a democratic president. and i think that's absolutely essential. >> similar to pets and make, robert jordan had many kind of different allies, on the ground. black churches, black women organizations did it help to get out the vote. organized labor, believe it or not, back in the day texas was a very strong, extremely strong acl oh -- particular in houston. those white man supported her to the end. they were extremely important allies for her, from the time she was a senator, all to the time she was in congress. she was a very strong proponent of organized labor. and who is also very friendly with other texas politicians, no matter what the political stripes, she always had very good relationships with everyone. and she did committee politics really well, she was loyal to her chairs she worked really well committee chairs, no matter who they were. so i think she had a lot of different kinds of allies. once again, i don't have specific women, so let me give a shout out to a couple of men who i think should be acknowledged. one, john f. kennedy. he does not go down in history as a big feminist. but he appointed the presidents commission on status of women, which brought together, eleanor roosevelt was the titular share of that, which led enormous prestige. esther peterson was the person who did a lot of organizing. but that led to networks of, active women in every state in the union. and it is generally credited for having -- for many kinds of's feminist development, like the creation of the national organization for women. and the other man that i want to mention is similar birch by, who we recently lost. in the 1970s buys -- sponsored some very important legislation for women. and, i think it really makes a difference to have a who are wholeheartedly supporting feminist causes. >> i'll just continue that with another contemporary example, which is believe it or not, joe biden. who is in the summer hot water these days, for his behavior in terms of touching women. but, -- many of us can never quite get out of our memories the images of joe biden going after in anita hill and -- 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 share. so people are complicated, but one of the things about joe biden that is important i think, for focus to remember, is that he was the primary component of the violence against women act. which is just been in the news the past couple of days, because the house just passed the reauthorization of the violence against women zach. and it was first passed during the clinton years, and joe biden was actually, he was the person -- the primary person on this. and the leader on this issue. so, he is one of the male allies, and i will just say of the women we interviewed, of the hundred 40 of congress almost all of them had worked as, co-sponsor legislation with men. , in other words they work with men certainly in the party and frequently with men in the other party. and frequently with people from their own states in the case of senators. one of the things that we research is showing that women actually have an effect on the men that over time as women have brought new issues to the forefront and as women of work with nine, it's raised the consciousness of some other male colleagues. men have discovered that some of the so-called women's issues, some of the policy proposals to advance women actually are very popular with their constituents back home to. so the woman they've had have had an effect on changing the attitude of their male colleagues from time to time. >> any questions from our audience? please go to the microphone. absolutely come on up. >> good morning. i'm charlotte burst. hello david. elizabeth perry was an enormous influence on my life and i had the pleasure of getting to know her as i was able to hire her and looped to be the first couple to hold an endowed chair in history. since then, she was in an enormous influence on my life. she and i also shared the affection for hillary clinton who's kind of the big cloud in the room that nobody's addressed. i would be interested for our panelists to address her. she's a complicated figure obviously. somebody who all of us expected would win and didn't allow all of us have been puzzling as to what if heck happened? thank you. >> well i will definitely say something about hillary clinton. you know, i think hillary clinton as historians look back in, hillary clinton is going to be an important figure. i think right now she's going through sort of a bad moment. but i think she'll be resurrected. because what she did was quite phenomenal in terms of actually being the first woman the game on again the democratic party nomination one of the first woman, can't forget surely chisholm back in 1972, that run seriously through the primary contest. certainly she was the first to come out the victor in 2008 almost a victory having lost to obama. but, i think she's going to leave, she will be a very influential an important figure. i think a lot of what have we seen, we kind of attribute what what happened in this election more trump and trump's policies in terms the reaction that stimulating women to run for office and stimulating the mobilization. for many women and i can say this for many women who are students who have taught or dealt with, the disappointment over the fact that the first woman presidential candidate wasn't elected when everyone thought she would be elected played some role in that as well. perhaps not the role the trump's policies a plane and i don't think we can fully discount that is well. so i think she deserves some credit in a strange way for some of the mobilization is taken place since the 2016 election. >> i just want to add. we're talking about hillary clinton i see bill chase committees ran or building hillary clinton. i think hillary is so important, as a historian unlocking assess good or bad but much more as a lens through which to understand the period that we are living in and the very recent past. the enormous ambivalence that our culture still has about women in power. the range of stereotypes that were mobilized around her campaign are still enormous sly revealing. it's an important thing to note about 21st century america that certain gender stereotypes that i think some of us has historians were relics of the past are really not. words at least in 2016. i think we have to understand what produced a feminine absence or lack tuna that seems to exist in that period. maybe there's something to think about in terms of the trajectory of the feminist movement itself and its incomplete victories. >> i think about that as well,. the idea of hillary clinton is a lens. you think about how much is changed in american society in her lifetime from when she started out as a kid in suburban chicago in the forties and fifties to now. it's this half full, half empty glass where you could see enormous changes and yet there is so much that has not changed. i found that so much when i was doing research on title ix. you can just look on individual lifespans the opportunities especially for athletics and yet are we anywhere near parity gender parity in athletics? no. so it's a balancing act i think she's gonna be a perfect lens for trying to sort that all out. >> i'd like to speak to that question to. i have to confess that i'm still personally bitter about the way she was treated by the press. one of the things that really angered me was that they kept talking about the baggage, the baggage. more what was the baggage? i'm about to launch into the self-box, forgive me. from the beginning of her husband's administration, it was travel day, what was the role of her death vince foster. it was a narrative that was pushed by what she referred to his right wing conspiracy. instead of identifying a lot of these things as what they were, lies and malicious rumors, they were reported verbatim not critically. so if there was baggage, i think the press coverage played a great role in it. which is not to say she did not make some mistakes of her own but what political candidate has never made a mistake? and hers were treated us somehow mortal sins rather than menial since. so i completely agree with sue 's point that i think should go down in history as a remarkably important figure. i just think of the fact that a graduating senior as well at wellesley that she had so much going for her that she became really in a way and national figure just as a graduating senior. so she was, has being, is a remarkable figure in american life. >> one last thing. i don't think jordan would have just seen this through the lens of gender, she were seen as through the lens of races. well looking at as a backlash not just against women, but against the obama presidency. he can't take that out of the equation. i think she's close to the clintons, she would've seen the size of electoral victory, 3 million votes. at the same time, she was also very realistic about how conservative america is at its root and how hard democrats have to work to out organize. she would come back to. that we will have to organize out organize a 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 with the consistency of narrative. i'm in historian of narrative, i'm a journalist so i'm producing narrative. hopefully good narrative and useful narrative in my daily practice. there is a wonderful medieval one is historian, judith bennett a feminist historian who writes about the patriarchal a quick lid rain. it's her phrase. it emphasizes the things change all the time, but that power of dynamics don't. thought about that a lot during the 2016 campaign and thinking about it now as i'm watching us gear up for the 2020 campaign and i'm watching narrative proliferate. feels very familiar not comfortably familiar. >> susan, you can answer this question in the context of hillary clinton as you like but i'm wondering if the women or the time the right about, it's their contemporaries at that time understood the work that they were doing and the importance of their work? >> i'm sorry. >> i said you can answer in the context of hillary clinton if you like. do you think hillary clinton's contemporaries or the generations of women today understand what hillary clinton did for women's rights in the movement? >> i don't think people really fully appreciate that. i think that takes some time and some distance. in order for that to happen. i think that's true for any political figure. it takes time and distance. before we fully appreciate what they fully contributed. i think there's just so much strong emotion right now still attached to hillary clinton both pro and anti, disappointment for those who were strong supporters. they're still shouting, locker up at trump rallies. on the other side there is clearly a lot of strong emotion there about her to. i think it's just gonna take time. i do want to echo what felicia said it was revealing. your comments made me remember how shocked i was by the 2008 election where we really saw even more saw and the 2016 election how stereotypes we thought were something of the past in terms of women were actually brought out in that election repeated by the media by culture generally, hillary clinton nutcracker, there were comments about, there were comments about her pantsuits. i mean there were serious articles in the york times -- about her cackling. it is a real, is this somehow inauthentic? that she would, the way she laughed. and on and on and on. come up with lots of examples of them, but things where we thought we were past that point. and i think the media did learn some between -- i think the coverage was better. i have to say, you know in 2016, then it had been in 2008. but you know, we still have examples where, you know, she was called -- she was shrill. she spoke, up she was called shrill. whereas bernie sanders was like shouting, and waving his hands around, and we know you have to do is imagine if bernie sanders had been a woman, what the reaction would have been. and uk or donald trump had been a woman, while he would not have been on the stage. but to see that those stereotypes are very much alive. >> we can come back to my question for all of you in a little bit, let's get into audience member questions. >> good morning, could you speak to an historical or current barriers to having a woman at the top of the ticket, and as a vice presidential nominee as well? it could be from society, it could be within the democratic party as an institution, what would prevent us from seeing two women as a deterrent democratic nominees? >> any takers? >> i'll talk about as a journalist, because i'm covering this, i was a klobuchar announcement in minnesota. it was a blizzard, it was fantastic. i covered a lot of the 2016 election, i went to new hampshire and spent time there. i think all the things that you are saying about the democratic party is both, it's just as sexist as america. but india is in denial often, about often about its weaknesses. so it's hard sometimes, to have conversations about progressive sexism. and i think that to me, it's one of the first barriers to talk about the gender dynamics. i spent a lot of time, over no up about a lot of different candidates. when i read about bernie sanders, that is the one that results in my email box filling up my twitter feed, being filled with people being angry with the. , it seems like an obstacle just to start having the conversation. but just this last, week with joe biden you were talking about, people saying it made me uncomfortable and then defenders -- it wasn't sexual assault. it was not as bad as trump, which is true. but if we can't even begin to have a conversation, because democrats are willing to even begin to talk about it, that seems like a real obstacle. >> i wanted to say, that i think there's still some discomfort with female authority. i think we've come a long way because women, are for example, when 2000 -- 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 during research at the library in cambridge, in the early eighties. and the tina horn or, 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 i'm gonna have to simplify it for you. she said her response was, as it happens, i've happened to made a study of every subject. so she put that person in his place. but i think, for a lot of people you know, it's the elementary school teacher, it's the nurse who gives you the shot. whatever, i think female authority is uncomfortable for some, and i think it's gotten a lot better but i don't think it's a problem that has vanished. >> please go ahead. >> hi thank you very much, advancing women's rights, advances us all. and yet that truism seems to be pushed back quite a bit. my question deals with, i guess my interpretation of being a radical therefore is someone who promotes rights for all. we are seeing that, there are many new representatives, female representatives who are doing that, aoc,. in how moe maher and others. my question for you there for, given all the pushback that they're getting, what do you -- what is what are your thoughts on if women and our body of legislation have what difference can these women make and have they made in on the floor? in realistically? what >> i want to start on that, because i want to take issue with the framing of women's rights are good for us law. i, as a historian of the 19 sixties and seventies primarily, i think it's important to go back to the understanding of that generation of feminists. that they were involved in a power conflict, with masculinity as a social fact. with a man is a class, and that their senses that, if they were gonna gain in power, that man as a class we're going to lose. and that they should not expect that power to be given up easily. and i think, that any political movement, or political actor who has lost that understanding, i think that's part of the story of the late 20th century. and the career of the u.s. women's movement is about downplaying that understanding because it was unpopular, not surprisingly. i think that that has been a great loss. >> i'm just thinking about interviewing mary rose omar, 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. i think that's 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 are sort of asking about the new freshman member of congress to some degree, and what kind of difference they can make to. yeah and in the past. but you know, in terms of the freshman who are coming in now, you know who are receiving all this outside publicity, i think there are actually having more of an impact outside than inside, perhaps inside the institution. we have to remember, that congress is an institution, that operates on the still, largely based on seniority and you know there are certain norms about being there, and running the ropes. and these women are posing some challenges to them, but they will have to make the some decisions at some point about whether they are going to be insiders, and try to operate within, and rise within the institution. or whether they are going to be more sort of mavericks, who stimulate the outside. and there are different roles of different prism progress adopt. i thought it was, interesting when alexandria a case your cortez, aoc as she goes by, now they -- win she actually ended up voting for pelosi, even though she said she wasn't going to vote for pelosi during a campaign, i thought that was actually a good sign. i read that is 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 needs to function within the institution. in order to get the kind of things done that you need to get done from your constituents. so it's a delicate balance, but i, i think that one of the things i'm on a watch for is whether these women to the extent in the women in the freshman class actually come together and try to operate more collectively. because i think their power resides more collectively, there are so many of them, that resigns more collectively than individually meant a lot of ways. so as the most junior members of the institution, i think that's really a way that they can 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'd like to address that, because not many people know that the first woman in congress to have a child, while the congresswoman was a black woman. and that was in the seventies, that was in 75. so, there is a tradition as a really good question. and for her see, given the area the seventies, it seems so important that moment right. that context, and then we've lost it. when these things happen again they all seem new all over again. but the feminism of the seventies i think was very real, it really did promote a certain kind of woman. it seemed like black women can do, mothers can do. but then, things waxed and waned. we forget that there was this cohort of black women in the seventies, and there were momentum others in congress. i think your question is great, and i think it does bring a matters, who is at the table, and to have those policies who are supportive of working families, and working mothers. be very real, for the pier people who take on those issues and congress. one thing i've learned from studying path seen make, is that i don't know if it was rhetoric or not, but it was very useful rhetoric for her to get to a different kind of feminists politics than the one that is usually seen. it wasn't 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 respects motherhood. for caregiving really. she would've been perfectly happy if it wasn't gender specific, but you would've also pointed out that in our society, it is gender specific. that statistically, more of that work is done by women. so, i think she may have learned from our own experience, as a mother, and as someone who was trying to judge juggle that with a political career. but regardless of someone who was really learning from her own experience, she use that as a way to have our own different kind of feminist conversation, which is a way that i think is a very important one. >> i want to point out again, talking about nancy pelosi, i don't know how many of you saw the report that when mr. barr's summary attorney barr's summary of the mueller report was released, nancy pelosi was in san francisco helping supervise one of her granddaughter's birthday parties. and i think it's so powerful to american women to see this woman who was unabashedly able to use power, but also, in our office drinking in a president as sam wray been used to do, as i recall. but she is at home, in san francisco in her district interacting with the grandchildren. i think that is a powerful message. >> hi good morning, thanks for the panel. the tone of what we have been talking about feels very optimistic, which is a wonderful tonic in this moment, where the national political climate seems toxic. but to that and, we talked about by moscow us, and barbara jordan, and patsy mink. women certainly -- from the left. hand that got me thinking about women of the right. i'm wondering how, i would just like to hear your thoughts about perhaps how we should be thinking of women like finished laughably, are they additive or contributory to the progression that you all are describing? or do they detract from it, if you having this conversation 50 years from now, and there is somebody talking about sarah palin or ivanka trump i think it's an important question to be asking because, 62% i think of white women without college degree voted against hillary for donald trump well i'm affiliated with the schlesinger library ratcliffe and one of the things that we really been trying to do is to reach out to conservative women. in the past, they've been reluctant to share their papers with what is seen is a liberal harvard institution. yet, without having those papers of the various groups that you can trace back to the twenties all the way through, we aren't gonna be able to get those stories. and i think those stories of conservative women are essential part of the story and that we really need to collect the sources, we need to engage with the stories and include them in the conversation. >> i think you're right. i think bill straggly is one of the most important political when political organizers of the 20th century. you can't underestimate her influence. her role in defeating the equal rights amendment was unquestionable. she mobilized woman, i think what barbara jordan would've said to question is no such thing is an inherently conservative. wind is a woman you haven't persuaded. she would say that 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 right? and they should, because these are working women. these are women that the democratic party should be reaching out to. we have failed in doing that. she said that in houston when there was a counter demonstration and 1977. you had the convention there in 1977. but she said we are losing those women. and we can ignore them. i think she would say there was a fluidity there and what this shows is that we have not succeeded. they have out organized us. we have to do better. >> one of the places i'm really interested in this. first of all, we haven't really talked about abortion in politics, that's one of the pieces of conversation, the dominance of that discourse not only just here but in the of decade since roe v. wade, the dominance in that discourse among politically active conservative women. one of the ways i look at this on the father of a boy with down syndrome. i think about sarah palin who is a mother of a boy with down syndrome almost the same age as my son. i think about that discourse and disability rights movement and that also talks in the last question is mothers. the specific motivation around disability rights. sarah palin, kathleen morris and i agree a lot of things on disabilities in schools and we disagree in so many of the. things i don't know exactly what the point is but that is clearly part of the history, that's part of the role of motherhood, who or disability rights has a place of connection. >> we've got about five, ten minutes left so please come on up. >> this is more of a comment. elizabeth perry was president of the society for the historians of the gilded age in the progressive era. her and i served enough bodies executive committee for a number of years i just wanted to recognize the importance of her leadership and that organization. second of all, i want to emphasize one of the things that comes out of her work on muskets. there are many ways in wielding political power other than being elected to federal office. that runs through some of the other comments that have been made here. obviously, being elected to federal office is important. i don't want to suggest otherwise. i'll throw out another example of other ways of wielding power. when california women got the vote in 1911 and in the very next session of the legislature, the state federation of women's clubs organized the most powerful lobby in the state capital and put through almost an entirely their political agenda. i think the only thing they didn't accomplish was world peace. >> why don't we take this last question we can wrap it up with final thoughts? >> i think my question kind of goes off of what he was saying, not just being elected federal office. my question is more about a problem within the fact that we have state legislatures that around so very differently. i'm thinking specifically, i'm from pittsburgh and when i speak to the very few women that are in the legislature, they say it is very hard and last you are a widow or an empty-nester to have a position in the pennsylvania state legislature because there's no one for your husband to work and harrisburg. the schools aren't good enough for your kids. they get hit from both sides so they can't campaign well, because why do you want to move to harrisburg or not a very good mother? the desperate roles of state legislatures and accommodating and inviting women into state office. >> who would like to take that and also your final thoughts as well? >> well i, guess i'll say something about that. you're absolutely right. these are still barriers that women face. moving to washington, or not moving to washington, because most members of congress don't move to washington. i'm thinking about going back and forth and women still get asked on the campaign trail all the time, what about your kids? who's taking care? men very rarely get asked that question. one of the interesting findings from our book is that we asked women what the obstacles were that they faced in congress. one of the most surprising things to us is that they brought to up spontaneously is that they face more difficult obstacles getting their than they do once they're there. you're sort of alluding to some of those but it does vary from state to state. some states are more geographically compact. a varies tremendously in terms of their legislatures. you've got california and then new york which is highly professionalize. and you have new hampshire which is a very large legislature in and other places you make very little money, little staff. there are little lot of different cultures, a lot of different issues. pennsylvania is a hard not to crack. we've had the same problem in new jersey overtime because the parties still retain a lot of control there. there's a lot of slating with candidates in the parties themselves are an obstacle. obstacle to getting more women into politics in those kinds of situations. in other states it's not like that. >> my final comment i want to mention up until recently when the republican party has become really so conservative, there have been many wonderful republican, not liberal by any means, but still solid republican women in the house. of course i think of margaret chase smith and maine. i want to mention a little known woman, the first jewish congresswoman in the country was florence florence prague cotton who is a widow from san francisco but who became the go-to person in congress for the business community of san francisco. one piece i can't 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. so it was a very progressive thing to do and i was on behalf of women. fact that now republican women are not seen as carriers of much legislation of value is not necessarily the way it's been through american history. >> i think there are things that we just don't know yet because they have to play out. the biggest thing i see i think we should look at is the way role of money in. media historically, for women politicians making them ask raising the money. why should i invest in the? are you gonna win? having that confidence to make that ask. even barbara jordan had problems with that it's tough. but now we have ways to go around some of that. with social media right? organizations like families and other innovative ways. on the other hand, we have such a concentration of money and we know that money is actually going. it's such a concentration immediate. media power right? can social media be enough to circumvent that? you see the power of things that social media played in supreme court nominations. that was really surprising. pictures that people were taking that encounters with elevators have such an impact on the process. i think there's a lot of unknowns still to be played out in the upcoming election but there's no question that the concentration of money and media really does not work in progressive women's favor. >> the question about state to state differences in state legislatures is really interesting and important i think. it makes me think about my own state in vermont. i'm quite involved in feminist in democratic politics. i took the training program of a group called emerged vermont which trains democratic women to run for office. i decided it was not for me but that's a very interesting organization. it's operating both within and outside the democratic party in a gentle, maybe even edging feminine way. the organization is really trying to pressure the democratic party and form an alternative structure, and our alternative party like structure. that is become very powerful in my state and i think in some other states. it is been responsible not just for elected women but electing gay women and trans women and women of color. i think looking back historically, projecting that to the past and thinking about women like barbara jordan are patsy mink i think that they didn't need some external support in order to start their careers, getting to state legislators and they get into the pipelines for higher office. i think in the sixties and seventies, the social movements really serve that and. the black civil rights movement, the japanese movement to peace movement, the women's movement etc. those were even more powerful groups like emerge. i think they made it even more profound difference. but 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. it's a shout out to a book that was published about women and political parties and the title of it was we are here to stay. >> i just like to thank you all for coming and london for organizing this panel on c-span. like you to read this. it's a good book. i'd like to i think thinking a lot about what is famine in politics which is the language it bill moscow it's. i think it was yesterday a saw picture of the man from queer eye ocasio-cortez and ed say pelosi all standing together something feminine politics may be changing. thank you so much. >> thank you all for coming in thank you to our panelists. 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