Women Cleaned the House

Below the Belt: A Biweekly Column by NOW President Kim Gandy

November 15, 2006

Are you tired of hearing that "women cleaned House" in this election? For once, this pun harking back to a bygone era is music to my ears.

Make no mistake, on November 7, women and people of color provided the margin of victory in dozens of key races across the country. In fact, 56% of women voters chose Democratic candidates, and according to polls, unmarried women voted 2 to 1 for Democrats.

Concerned Women for America President Wendy Wright(second in line as official woman-hater right after the Coultergeist, of course) reliably responded: "Single women tend to trend Democrat. They usually rely more on government than married women." I guess that would be Wendy's way of saying that married women are one man away from government dependence? It's true that single women are more likely to be poor than women living with a partner, so perhaps are more sensitive to Bush's actions that have padded the pockets of the rich and left the poor working two jobs (at an unliveable minimum wage) to make ends meet. But for all these reasons and many more, women voters were behind the electoral sweep that changed the course of Congressional leadership.

As Eleanor Smeal, publisher of Ms. Magazine pointed out: "If only men had voted, Jim Webb (D-Va.), Jon Tester (D-Mont.), and Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) would have lost," referring to three of the new senators whose victories over incumbents gave control of the U.S. Senate to the Democrats. Women candidates not only provided the winning margin in elections across the country, but incumbent women in Congress will now step up to key positions. Much to Wendy Wright's and Ann Coulter's distress, I'm sure, it looks like those single women (and the married ones, too) will finally have a Congress they can count on to stand up for their needs and protect their rights.

While all of us have been celebrating the fact that Nancy Pelosi will be the first woman and self-identified feminist to become Speaker of the House, it has been little noticed that many progressive women (and supportive men of color), including Representatives Maxine Waters (D-Calif.), Louise Slaughter (D-N.Y.), Juanita Millender-McDonald (D-Calif.), Nydia Velazquez (D-N.Y.), Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Texas), Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.), John Conyers (D-Mich.)and Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.), are in line to replace House Republican (and mostly white male) chairs of committees and subcommittees, and gain integral influence over legislation, budgets, programs and services important to women. How great is this?

Notably, Velazquez will likely be chair of the House Small Business Committee, representing a step forward for women small-business owners; Conyers will chair the Judiciary Committee; and Rangel will take the chair of the powerful Ways and Means Committee. As for the House committee that controls committee assignments (among other things), Rep. Rosa L. DeLauro—just elected to her 9th term representing Connecticut's 3rd district—is expected to co-chair that one, known as the Steering and Policy Committee, another key move for women in Congress.

The least heralded of these new chairs (as in, not even mentioned in The Washington Post list), but one of the most significant, will be the ascension of long-time women's rights supporter Louise McIntosh Slaughter (D-N.Y.) to chair the House Rules committee. So powerful and important is this committee that it is always tightly controlled by the majority party. The current rules committee has 9 Republicans and only 4 Democrats, thus ensuring that the Republican leadership has been able to control the terms of every House floor debate (or refuse debate altogether), allow or refuse amendments, and even take up selected bills with virtually no notice. That's about to change.

The prospect of having all of these terrific allies working with Nancy Pelosi to introduce and pass pro-women, pro-families legislation makes me hopeful for women's rights in this country—and elsewhere.

Before we roll up our sleeves for the work ahead, let's take a moment to say a collective "yay."

With 83 women in Congress (and a few races yet to be decided), and many of these women in line to acquire greater influence, we've got a lot to celebrate, and even more to hope for. The sobering truth is, though, that we've only climbed about 2 percentage points in total representation of women in Congress (from 14 to 16%), so we're generations away from parity unless we pick up the pace.

But with each new woman leader, the number of girls and women who realize their very real potential to follow in their footsteps multiplies. So remember to share last Tuesday's victories with a girl in your life. There's much ground to take back and many issues to move forward on, and I think we can rely on the 110th Congress be our partner in that endeavor. Our job now is to work with them, hold them accountable and supply them the public and nationwide support for their work. Sounds like something NOW was born to do...

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