09-29 TABLE of CONTENTS: India Edwards showed how to influence presidents Feminists wrong in refusing alimony U.S. Supreme Court brief that explains why women's and male single sex PRIVATE colleges are legal but not publically funded VMI (and the Citadel) are not DATES, ANNIVERSARIES, and EVENTS QUOTES by Ann Landers, Gabrielle I. Edwards, and David Horowitz. India Edwards Exerted Influence After Hard Work       "Sometimes I feel like a ghoul. I'd read the obits, and as soon as a man had died, I'd rush over to the White House and suggest a woman to replace him," India Edwards wrote in her memoirs. She was the first woman to exert major influence in party politics and did it through hard work, toiling in the primaries and for every candidate she could.       At one point in President Truman's come-for-behind victory in 1948,Truman turned to her and sighed, "India, sometimes I think there are only two people who believe I will win. You and me."       "That's enough," she replied.       Largely because of Mrs. Edward's influence (showing future women would-be politicians how to work in a campaign to get later benefits), Truman appointed more women to top jobs than any other president to that time - 15 women who needed Senate confirmation. It would be more than 30 years before that many women were again appointed by a president.       Among the appointments she influenced were Eugenia Anderson as Ambassador to Denmark, Perle Mesta as Minister to Luxembourg, Ruth Bryan Rohde as alternate delegate to the United Nations and Georgia Neese Clark as Treasurer of the U.S.       She rose to the vice presidency of the Democratic National Committee (an honor almost automatic today, but unheard of in her day). She was unanimously elected to the national committee in 1950. Edwards was one of the best fund raisers ever for the Democratic Party. She had been society editor and women's editor at the Chicago Tribune.       She said that John Kennedy looked upon women as "nothing but sex objects." Kennedy made only 10 appointments of women that required Senate confirmation. In the same period of their administrations, Truman made 15 and Eisenhower made 14. | PRIOR DATE |        | HOME |       | WOA INDEX |       | NEXT DATE |   | RETURN TO TOP OF PAGE | The last Sunday of September is Gold Star Mothers Day to honor women whose sons and daughters died in line of duty in the Armed Forces of the United States. Married Women Who Supported Husbands Deserve Alimony "Many feminists are too generous. We rush to give up the meager protections we have before we've gained anything approaching equality that might make such protections unnecessary.       "A woman who has taken herself off the job market, put her husband through college or graduate school, serviced and served him, raised his children, and failed to develop her own marketable skills, is most certainly entitled to alimony, lots of it--every penny she can get.       "I am deeply puzzled and alarmed to hear some young feminists denounce alimony. It seems they have no knowledge or understanding of the plight of many older women, nor do they seem to recognize that even the woman who has good job skills earns less than a man with the same training, seniority, and competence.       "A feminist wouldn't think of giving up alimony until women have truly achieved equal pay for equal work, as well as a genuine co-division of child care and household responsibility in the family."             -- Barbara Seaman       "...alimony is back pay, reparations, payment for past services, and should not terminate on the wife's remarriage any more than a retired employee who receives a private pension for past consideration and for time and work and money already invested should lose the pension if the worker obtains a new job..."             -- Emily Jane Goodman | PRIOR DATE |        | HOME |       | WOA INDEX |       | NEXT DATE |   | RETURN TO TOP OF PAGE | Public Institutions Must Admit Women; The Ruling Does Not Affect Private Women's Colleges The twenty-six undersigned private women's colleges submit this brief as amici curiae, urging reversal of the decision of the court of appeals. [1] These are all private women's colleges whose mission is to increase educational opportunities for women.       The colleges have found, through their various activities and experiences, that women's colleges are particularly effective in preparing women for the many roles they will assume in life. Women's colleges offer an excellent academic education, challenge women to realize their full potential, and connect women into networks that will serve them during the course of their professional and personal lives.       Single-gender education for women greatly increases the chances that a woman will succeed academically, pursue a career in a field traditionally associated with men, or assume a leadership role in society. According to literature compiled by an organization of women's colleges, 30% of the 50 women recognized as rising stars in corporate America by Business Week received their baccalaureate degree from a women's college.       One-third of the women board members of the 1992 Fortune 1000 companies are women's college graduates.       Of 54 women in Congress, 13 attended women's colleges.       One of every seven women cabinet members in state government attended a women's college.       Nearly three-quarters of all women's college graduates are in the work force, and almost half of those graduates hold traditionally male-dominated jobs, at the higher end of the pay scale, such as lawyer, physician or manager. Women's College Coalition, A Profile of Recent College Graduates (1993).       In short, as summarized by Elizabeth Tidball, a pioneer in the field of evaluating the productivity of academic institutions with respect to women in science:       "Graduates of women's colleges are more than twice as likely as graduates of coeducational colleges to receive doctorate degrees, and to enter medical school and receive doctorates in the natural sciences." -- M. Elizabeth Tidball, Baccalaureate "Origins of Entrance into American Medical Schools," 57 Journal of Higher Education (1986). The literature is persuasive that the intellectual development of women is enhanced when they have, at least, a few years to learn and study with each other in a single-gender environment. See, e.g., Women's College Coalition, A Profile of Recent College Graduates (1993). As a result of these colleges' focus on the benefits and promotion of single-gender higher education for women, they are particularly interested in this litigation involving the Constitutionality of the all-male admissions policy of Virginia Military Institute ("VMI"). They submit the amici brief in this case not because they believe that a ruling here will have an impact on their own admissions policies, but in order to make clear that the result in this case would not have any such effect.       VMI is a public institution; it has an admissions policy that limits enrollment to men; and it has a mission that perpetuates the traditional stereotype of men as soldiers, who learn from adversity, while women need "cooperative confidence building program[s]." United States v. Virginia, 44 F.3d 1229, 1234 (4th Cir.), cert.granted, 164 U.S.L.W. 3267 (Oct. 5, 1995).       For all these reasons, the decision below, which provides that VMI may maintain its public status while continuing to exclude women applicants, should be reversed. A ruling that VMI cannot remain a public, all-male institution, however, does not in any way suggest that private women's colleges cannot continue to provide single-gender educational opportunities for women who choose to attend these institutions. (Full brief to be added at a later date.) | PRIOR DATE |        | HOME |       | WOA INDEX |       | NEXT DATE |   | RETURN TO TOP OF PAGE | 09-29 DATES, ANNIVERSARIES, and EVENTS B. 09-29-1787, Catherine Elizabeth McAuley, founder of the Religious Sisters of Mercy in 1831, a Roman Catholic order devoted to social services, orphans, and the poor. She headed the order until her death ten years later. B. 09-29-1810, Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell, English author who was a major chronicler of social conditions during the Industrial Revolution. Her realistic writing was much admired by Charles Dickins and probably influenced him. Her first novel was in 1830.       Her best known work Ruth (1853) is a condemnation of sexual hypocrisy. Her Life of Charlotte Bronte (1857 who was a close personal friend is sensitive but has been made controversial by claims of inaccuracy - although some views may be just the difference between men's and women's interpretations. This difference also influences the value placed on her works that bring prejudices against women's rights into sharp focus. B. 09-29-1848, Caroline Ardelia Yale - U.S. eductor and principal of the Clarke School for the Deaf for 63 years. She favored the speech method (lip reading) for the deaf rather than signing. B. 09-29-1866, Gertrude Barnum, U.S. social worker and labor reformer. GB gained her first experience with Jane Addams' Hull House in Chicago and became convinced that improved labor conditions were necessary to eliminate poverty.       She became the national organizer of the National Women's Trade Union League and supervised several important strikes by women seeking human working conditions during the first decade of the 20th century. She was particularly prominent in enlisting society women to aid the notorious "thread" strike in New York City.       She also seved in several capacities with the federal government. She was a prominent suffragist and an officer of Harriot Stanton Blatch's Equality League of Self-Supporting Women. B. 09-29-1871, Emma Wold - U.S. lawyer, reformer, legal authority on women's rights, and leader of the National Women's Party. B. 09-29-1912 (1908?), Greer Garson - British-American film actor. GG won the of Academy Award for her portrayal of Mrs. Miniver in the movie of the same name and was nominated six other times. B. 09-29-1923, besmilr brigham, U.S. poet. (no caps in name) B. 09-29-1931, Anita Ekberg, actor. B. 09-29-1942, Madeline Kahn, comedic actor. B. 09-29-1944, Anne Patricia Briggs, British folk singer and songwriter. Event 09-29-1974: The U.S. Congress passed the Equal Credit Opportunity Act designed to equalize credit opportunities for women and men. Under the new law, women's income had to be counted in the same way as men's income for credit ratings. It also decreed no one should be refused credit on account of sex or marital status.       Up to this point, women's income was seldom recognized in loan applications, or at least discounted - sometimes a woman with a take home pay of $150 a week would have that income discounted to $75 or less). Loans to women were regularly denied simply because they were women.       Although the law made great changes, some lending institutions and banks in 1999 are quietly ignoring the rules and putting women at a financial disadvantage. A woman who is refused credit that she believes she deserved is urged to try other institutions and to get her credit history in order to combat the prejudice. There are federal programs to help and one's local congressional representative should be able to help locate them. | PRIOR DATE |        | HOME |       | WOA INDEX |       | NEXT DATE |   | RETURN TO TOP OF PAGE | QUOTES DU JOUR LANDERS, ANN:       "My advice to a woman who is going with or married to a male who becomes violent is this: one strike and you're out."             -- Ann Landers. EDWARDS, GABRIELLE I.:       "Abusive men, whether rapists, batterer, or sexual harasser, can be likened to members of terrorist groups - their control and power are bolstered by fear of violence created in women. As long as women exist in a state of terror, abusive men feel greater power."             -- Gabrielle I. Edwards, Coping with Discrimination (1992). HOROWITZ, DAVID:       "Whatever money conservative groups (on campus) get from foundations is nothing compared to the millions spent annually on... rape crisis centers and other groups that promote a leftist agenda."             -- Journalist David Horowitz addressing the conservative First Amendment Coalition. ??? A rape crisis center is a leftist center???? Also, study after study has shown that conservative and right wing organizations are receiving up to 80% of all donations. | PRIOR DATE |        | HOME |       | WOA INDEX |       | NEXT DATE |   | RETURN TO TOP OF PAGE |