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Apr

6

The case for the Presidential Commission on Women


Last week, I participated in a conference call with United States Congresswoman Jackie Speier (D-Calif) and WomenCount Executive Director Stacy Mason regarding the effort to resurrect the Presidential Commission on Women, started by JFK nearly a half century ago.  On Thursday, April 2, Speier introduced legislation (HR 1887) to create the commission -  the same day on which Jeannette Rankin was sworn in as the first woman congressman in 1917 (only three years before women got the vote – and people keep telling us that men can represent our issues, and us, just fine? but they didn’t elect a woman until 1917? okay – that’s another post).

Politico and Roll Call were among the many outlets covering Speier’s action.

A great recap of the bill came to me after the call and it answers just about any question interested parties might have (and who would not and should not be interested in this issue?). My main focus will be to ensure that the netroots remain involved and have a voice relative to the size and viral impact we can have.

The key facts:

Diifferences between the Presidential Commission on Women and the White House Council on Women and Girls:

To help support this effort, please consider signing the Presidential Commission on Women petition, tweeting about it at Twitter by following WomenCount (http://www.twitter.com/WomenCount) and then tweeting the following or something similar:

I signed petition to support legislation for presidential commission on women. Have you? http://www.womencount.org/its_our_time #womencount

And to the extent you tweet about the effort, add the #womencount hashtag to your relevant tweets.

Many thanks to Rep. Speier, WomenCount.org and the many others who’ve helped bring attention to this action.

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By Jill Miller Zimon at 7:48 am April 6th, 2009 in Civil Rights, Congress, Gender, Government, Law, Media, Politics, Sexism, Social Issues, Women, leadership 

Comments

One Response to “The case for the Presidential Commission on Women”

  1. 1 oengus on April 7th, 2009 1:46 pm

    Wouldn’t that be a back slide? The original effort evolved into a larger dispersed network of regional commissions. That being the National Association of commission for Woman. Notice that your state has no commission.

    I do not think that a presidential commission will fly, I do not think this administration is without information, we are light years ahead of the generation that created the first.

    Of the specific topic, the British passed equal right legislation in 2006, broad legislation and then a commission to address all those rights as they are defined within the law. That’s the key, that the laws are not long and complex legal essays. That the laws are open to interpretation but also not open to the extent as to burden the courts excessively. That is a process driven public commission that did not feel like it needed to keep looking at equality. It just defined it and then offers resolution, by clearly displaying the laws and then offering avenues of discussion and recourse.

    It sound like a power play to me, a group that would like to get closer to the presidency and not much else.

    I am actually an advocate of an equal right amendment, it need to be clear and concise. It could be modeled after the British, why reinvent the wheel.

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