Women, Shwomen
The number of females in Congress has never been proportional, and will be even worse after this election.
by Eleanor Clift
For all the ballyhoo about this being “the year of the woman,” the number of women in Congress looks certain to decline for the first time since 1978. Women lawmakers are dominantly Democratic, and a lot of them are in tough races. More Republican women have broken through as serious candidates than ever before, but there aren’t enough of them to make up for the anticipated losses among Democrats. There are now 56 Democratic women in the House and 17 Republicans, with 13 Democratic women in the Senate and 4 Republicans. That adds up to 90 seats occupied by women out of the 535 seats in Congress, far less, of course, than their share of the population. After the election, there will likely be eight to 10 fewer women lawmakers.
Speaker Nancy Pelosi sent out a fundraising plea to underscore what a setback these results would be in terms of women’s leadership in a body that is still overwhelmingly male. (The prime example being her own likely dethroning by John Boehner.) Until now, women have steadily gained seats in Congress, and in 1992, the first “year of the woman,” more women were elected at one time than ever before, or since. The assumption at the time was that women voters were galvanized by the recent spectacle of an all-male Senate judiciary panel grilling a black woman, Anita Hill, about her accusation of sexual harassment against Clarence Thomas, who had been nominated for the Supreme Court. (He denied the charge, famously calling the hearings “a high-tech lynching,” and went on to narrowly win Senate confirmation.) When the wave of women was swept into the House and Senate, it was taken for granted that their numbers would always go up. This year, while Republicans tout their newly visible women candidates, only four of the 46 “Young Guns” the GOP showcases as leaders are women.
But it’s more than a numbers game that worries the traditional pro-choice women’s groups that have been at the forefront of the battle to increase the representation of women in Congress. It’s the potential impact on policy and hard-won legislative battles where they fear there will be damage. “Women members are more likely to understand the importance and relevance of the women’s health agenda, and having fewer of them would have an impact,” says Democratic pollster Geoff Garin.
By that measure, a Congress that has more Republicans and fewer women is double trouble, since women are supposed to bring a different perspective, particularly on women’s health issues. But unlike ’92, when progressive women led the charge, this year’s stars are socially conservative women, and they are testing the thesis that women vote differently—i.e., on the liberal side, because of their gender. Women have been the keepers of the flame certainly on reproductive issues, and their reduced numbers will be felt most keenly in the area of abortion rights.
Story Compliments Of Newsweek.com
