Document 5: Woman: 1977: The Status of American Women (Washington, D.C.: International Women's Year Commission, 1977).
Introduction
Drawn from fact sheets distributed at the 56 State and Territorial Women's Meetings held prior to the 1977 Houston conference, this information was assembled in newspaper format for the conference. It provides a good overview of the documents read by State conference delegates, and shows how data presented at the State conferences became available at the national meeting.
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INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S YEAR WORKSHOP GUIDELINES
These FACT SHEETS were taken primarily from workshop guidelines developed and written by the International Women's Year Commission to provide basic information for the 56 State and Territorial Women's Meetings held during the last year and from To Form a More Perfect Union, the 1976 Commission report. Although references are not included, they may be found in the individual workshop guidelines or by contacting the IWY Policies and Plans office: D/IWY, U.S. Department of State, Washington, D.C. 20520. Additional references are noted at the conclusion of each section.
THE AMERICAN WOMAN: A NEW PERSPECTIVE
— At the turn of the century, men constituted 51.1 percent of the total U.S. population; in 1950, for the first time in any decennial census, women outnumbered men. In July 1975, the female population was about 109.4 million, representing 51.3 percent of the population and outnumbering males by 5.6 million. With increases in the total population, by the end of the century women are projected to outnumber men by 6.9 to 7.9 million.
— Between 1900 and 1973, the average length of life of females increased from 48.3 years in 1900 to 75.3 years in 1973. The expected extension of a woman's life by over 25 years indicates the need for changes in life planning. Life expectancy for women now exceeds that of men by almost eight years.
— The age distribution of the female population has changed considerably. The median age of women in 1900 was 22.4 years while in 1975 it was 30 years. The proportion of the female population in various age groups has shifted between 1900 and 1975;
| Under 15 years | — | 34.8 percent to |
| 24 percent | ||
| 15 to 24 years | — | 20.2 percent to |
| 18.2 percent | ||
| 25 to 44 years | — | 27.4 percent to |
| 24.9 percent | ||
| 45 to 64 years | — | 13.3 percent to |
| 20.8 percent |
One-fourth of the female population is between the ages of 25 to 44 while those 45 and older have constituted a larger share in every decade since 1900.
— Black women have a lower life expectancy than white women. The black woman is nearly six times as likely to die as a result of homicide as the white woman, about four and half times as likely to die from tuberculosis, and more than twice as likely to die from diabetes or cirrhosis of the liver, but less likely to die from suicide.
— About 29 percent of all women were living on farms in 1920, but in 1970 only about 4 percent of the women were farm residents. In 1970 about three-fourths of all women lived in urban areas as compared with less than half in 1910.
— Black women are overrepresented among the female residents in central cities of metropolitan areas and underrepresented in the suburbs.
— The majority of Spanish origin families headed by women lived in metropolitan areas in 1974, mostly residing in the central cities. The proportion varied according to type of Spanish origin; about one of every two families headed by women of Mexican origin lived in a central city while 86 percent of families headed by a woman of Puerto Rican origin lived in a central city.
— Recent trends in marriage and divorce have resulted in an increasing proportion of women who are single or divorced. Between 1950 and 1975 the proportion of women 20 to 24 years old who were single increased from 28 to 40 percent; during the same period the proportion of women 25 to 34 years old who were divorced and not remarried increased from 2.5 to 6.8 percent.
— As the number of divorced women increased, the number of female-headed families has also increased. In 1975, such families constituted 13 percent of all families and approximately a 73 percent increase since 1960.
— Between 1950 and 1975, the proportion of white women who were single increased from 20 to 22 percent of all white women: the proportion of black women increased from 21 to 31 percent.
— Among ever-married black women, only about 54 percent were living with their husbands in 1975, a substantial decline from the 1950 level of 64 percent. Corresponding to this decline has been an increase in the percentage of black women separated and divorced and in the percent of black families headed by women.
— The proportion divorced among Spanish women was about the same as for all women. However, a larger proportion of Puerto Rican origin women were either divorced or married with spouse absent than were women in other subcategories of Spanish origin.
— Female-headed Spanish families tended to be larger on the average, than female-headed families in the overall population. About 45 percent of all families headed by a woman had only two persons in the family, compared with one of every three for corresponding Spanish origin families.
— Approximately 53 percent of all women 65 years and over in March 1975 were widowed, a fact that has profound implications for social and economic policy.
— During the past quarter-century, the fertility of American women has shown wide fluctuations from the record highs for the 20th century in the last half of the 1950s to all-time lows in recent years. The long term trend toward early marriage and early childbearing was reversed about fifteen years ago. Only 17 percent of the women born between 1950 and 1955 had married by age 18, in contrast to approximately 30 percent of the women born between 1935 and 1939. The decrease in early marriage paralleled a drop in fertility. In 1967 wives 18 to 29 years old expected to have an average of about 2.9 children each. Wives who had advanced into this age group by 1974 expected to have only 2.2 children. Therefore, women under 30 years old are increasingly favoring the two child family. Between 1967 and 1974 the percentage of young wives who expected to remain childless or to have only child also increased. The number expecting large families of three, four, or more children also dropped sharply during this period.
— In 1974, black women still had higher rates of children ever born than white women. However, in recent years black women, on the average, have given birth to fewer children than in the past and expect to have few children in the future. Among the younger black women (18-24 years old in 1974) the lifetime birth expectations of black women are the same as those for white women.
Source: Bureau of the Census
CHRONOLOGY OF WOMEN'S HISTORY. 1770-1960.
THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION
— Women's groups, such as the Daughters of Liberty, organized to boycott tea and later to provide clothing and supplies for the Army. Molly Pitcher, Deborah Sampson, and others served as soldiers.
— Groups of New Jersey women took vigorous action against husbands who abused their wives. Entering the home of a known wife-beater in the evening, they stripped the man and spanked him severely with sticks as they shouted "Woe to the men that beat their wives."
1814 — Deborah Skinner operated the first power loom, factories were established, and large numbers of women and children became employed in the textile industry.
1821 — Emma Willard founded a female seminary at Troy, N.Y., the initial effort to provide serious education for women. Mount Holyoke College, founded by Mary Lyon in 1837, provided expanded opportunities.
1839 — After this time, most states began to recognize through legislation the right of married women to hold property. In New York State Ernestine Rose led the campaign, one of the first women to attempt to secure the rights of women through legislative action.
1841 — The first woman graduated from Oberlin College, having completed the same college curriculum provided for men. At Oberlin, however, female students were required to wash male students' clothing, clean their rooms, serve them at meals, and were not permitted to recite in public.
1845 — Woman in the Nineteenth Century, written by Margaret Fuller, was an early and influential publication urging women's rights. Fuller wrote, "We would have every arbitrary barrier thrown down. We would have every path laid open to Woman as freely as to Man."
1848 — Led by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott, the first woman's rights convention was held July 19-20 at Seneca Falls, N.Y. The Declaration of Sentiments, adapted from the Declaration of Independence stated that "all men and women are created equal." Eleven resolutions were approved, reflecting women's determination to secure equality in education, employment, and the law. The resolution urging women to campaign for voting rights passed only by a narrow margin.
1849 — Elizabeth Blackwell received her medical degree at Geneva, N.Y., becoming the first woman doctor. Although women had traditionally served as healers and midwives, the practice of medicine became professionalized in the years preceding the Civil War and was soon dominated by men. In the field of law, men also took over legal functions previously performed by women before the Revolution. In the twentieth century, positions of leadership in schools and libraries previously held by women would be taken over by men.
1854 — The first American day nursery opened in New York City for children of poor working
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1855 — When Lucy Stone and Henry Blackwell were married, they issued a public protest against the legal dominance of the husband in marriage. Lucy Stone kept her own name.
THE CIVIL WAR
— Dorothea Dix, Clara Barton, and Mother Bickerdyke served as nurses. From their efforts to organize and train other women came the first professional nurses. Dr. Mary Walker was one of several women who served as doctors and surgeons at the front. Over 400 women fought in the war disguised as men. Others were effective spies and scouts.
— During the war, women were employed in government offices for the first time. Following the invention of the typewriter (1867), they secured white collar business positions in increasing numbers.
1865— Vassar College opened, offering the first college-level curriculum for women. Ten years later, Wellesley and Smith Colleges were founded. Although women were admitted to some coeducational institutions, their opportunities to study with men were limited until the University of Michigan admitted women in 1870 and Cornell University became coeducational in 1872.
1869 — After passage of the 14th and 15th Amendments granting suffrage to all males, both black and white, leaders of the women's movement determined to press their own claims more vigorously. Because of differences over strategy, two organizations were formed. The National Woman Suffrage Association was led by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony while the more conservative American Woman Suffrage Association was directed by Lucy Stone and Julia Ward Howe. Unification of these two groups was not achieved until 1890.
1870 — Women gained the right to vote and to serve on juries in the Territory of Wyoming.
1872 — Susan B. Anthony attempted to vote in Rochester, N.Y. She was tried and convicted of voting illegally but refused to pay the fine.
1874 — Under the leadership of Frances Willard, the Women's Christian Temperance Union became the largest women's organization in the nation. During this same period, the Young Women's Christian Association evolved to meet the needs of working women away from home. Other women organized for cultural purposes and by 1890 the General Federation of Women's Clubs was formed. The Association of Collegiate Alumnae, organized in 1882 to investigate the health of college women, eventually became the American Association of University Women.
1878 — The Knights of Labor advocated equal pay for equal work, the abolition of child labor under the age of 14, and in 1881, opened their membership to working women. By 1886, 50,000 women were members.
1890 — Elizabeth Cady Stanton was elected first president of the unified suffrage organization, the National American Woman Suffrage Association. She also studied organized religion as a major source of women's inferior status and in 1895 published The Woman's Bible. This analysis was scorned by most other women.
1896 — The National Association for Colored Women, the first national organization for black women, was established and Mary Church Terrell served as first president.
1898 — Charlotte Perkins Gilman published Women and Economics, in which she decried the wasted efforts and the low economic status of the housewife. Gilman advocated the socialization of housework.
1900 — During the period up to 1910, there was the greatest increase in the female labor force of any period prior to 1940. New groups were formed to protect women and children from exploitation by industry. The National Consumer's League (1899), led by Florence Kelley, mobilized consumer pressure among upper and middle class women to promote shorter working hours, fair wages, improved working conditions, and the abolition of child labor. The National Women's Trade Union League (1903) including both upper class and employed women, was the only national organization concerned primarily with women in trade unions. Several unions were organized at this time composed largely of women in the garment trades.
1907 — The landmark case, Muller v. Oregon, established sex as a valid classification for protective legislation. The statistical data, assembled by Florence Kelley and Josephine Goldmark to prove that overlong hours were harmful to the health of women working in Oregon laundries, provided a model brief for later legislation oriented to human needs. Although this case involved only women workers, it played an important role in the later extension of protective legislation to male workers.
1909 — The first significant strike of working women, "The Uprising of the 20,000, " was conducted by shirtwaist makers to protest low wages and long working hours. The NWTUL mobilized public opinion and financial support for the strikers.
1911 — The publication by the Bureau of Labor of a comprehensive study of the conditions under which women and children worked in industry led to the establishment of the Children's Bureau (1912) and later the Women's Bureau of the Department of Labor (1920).
1915 — Margaret Sanger, having studied birth control clinics abroad, returned home to campaign against the legal barriers to the dissemination of contraceptive information. She and other women, such as Emma Goldman, were jailed for their efforts.
1916 — The National Woman's Party was organized under the leadership of Alice Paul. While other woman suffrage organizations worked at the state level, the NWP undertook militant activities to promote a federal suffrage amendment. In 1917, they picketed the White House and many women were sent illegally to jail.
1920 — On August 26, the 19th Amendment was ratified and women finally achieved the right to vote. Two major women's organizations were founded at this time, the National Federation of Business and professional Women's Clubs (1919) and the League of Women Voters.
1923 — The Equal Rights Amendment, advocated by Alice Paul and the NWP, was introduced in Congress for the first time. Most women did not support this effort because they feared it would threaten protective legislation for women workers. Also, women's organizations now directed their attention to social welfare and educational programs, rather than political action.
— In later years, the momentum of women's aggressive campaign for access to equal education, employment, and professional achievement waned. The conflict between marriage and career became obvious. For example, only 12.2 percent of all professional women were married in 1920 and 75 percent of the women who earned Ph.Ds. between 1877 and 1924 remained unmarried. Discrimination against women intensified. The 1920 American Medical Association Directory listed only 40 out of 482 hospitals which would accept women interns and from 1925-1945, medical schools placed a quota of 5 percent on female admissions. The Law Schools at Columbia and Harvard refused to consider women applicants. As late as 1937, the New York City Bar Association excluded women.
1930 — The Depression encouraged reaction against any change in woman's traditional domestic role. Legislation restricted the employment of married women. There was strong public disapproval of women working when men were unable to find employment. The opportunities for women to secure college educations and graduate training were limited by lack of financial support.
1940 — The percentage of working women was almost the same as it had been in 1910. After 1941, wartime needs required the employment of large numbers of women and after the war, many women remained in the labor force. Between 1940-1960, the number of working women and the proportion of working wives doubled. More women over 35 were employed in rapidly expanding business and industry. Inequities in pay and advancement opportunities became more obvious limitations, affecting large numbers of women.
CHRONOLOGY OF THE NATIONAL WOMEN'S CONFERENCE: 1975-1978
1975 — On January 9, President Gerald Ford created the National Commission (Executive Order 11832) and stated that "… Americans must now deal with those inequities that still linger as barriers to the full participation of women in our national life." Thirty-five members from the private sector and four Congressional members were appointed to the Commission. The Department of State established the IWY Secretariat to prepare for the IWY Conference in Mexico City and to act as staff for the National Commission.
— Over 200 nongovernmental organizations concerned with women were consulted by the Commission
regarding areas of interest for investigation and later thirteen committees called expert
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— Members of the Commission sought a ruling from the General Accounting Office to define the acceptable limits of their activities. The Comptroller General, Elmer B. Staats, ruled that the Commission had wide discretion under the Executive Order to promote equality between men and women and that activities planned to promote understanding of the impact of the Equal Rights Amendment were permissable under the law.
— Public Law 94-167, passed by Congress on January 14, authorized the National Commission to organize and convene a National Women's Conference, preceded by state conferences, to evaluate the status of women and issues of concern to them. (See Public Law 94-167 for goals of these conferences and the constituencies to be included.)
— The World Conference was held during the summer in Mexico City and drew 1,300 delegates from 130 countries. The World Plan of Action, formulated at this meeting, was later endorsed in part by the U.N. General Assembly. (See World Plan of Action.)
— By the end of 1975, International Women's Year had been celebrated in diverse, numerous programs across the country.
1976 — The Commission published a report, " … To Form a More Perfect Union …": Justice for American Women which included recommended actions to promote equality between men and women and documentation of the need for social, political, and legal change.
1977 — 56 women's meetings were held in each State and Territory to vote on resolutions and delegates to send to the National Women's Conference in Houston.
— The Comptroller General affirmed the Commission's advocacy of ERA in a letter to Senator Jesse Helms on August 10. He concluded that Commission activites had not violated the antilobbying provisions of any Federal statute. Public Law 94-167 specified that the Commission activities must include "a mix of representatives from local, State, regional, and national agencies, groups, etc. which work to advance the rights of women" and of members of the public "with special emphasis on the representation of low-income women, members of diverse racial, ethnic, and religious groups, and women of all ages." Nowhere, he stated, was there a legal requirement that those involved "must represent different points of view on the ratification of the ERA."
1978 — The Commission's final report and recommendations for accomplishing the goals specified in Public Law 94-167 must be submitted to the President and the Congress.
SOURCES
Chafe, William H. The American Woman: Her Changing Social, Economic, and Political Roles, 1920-1970. New York: Oxford University Press, 1972.
DePauw, Linda Grant. Fortunes of War. New Jersey Women and the American Revolution. Trenton: New Jersey Historical Commission, 1975.
Flexner, Eleanor. Century of Struggle: The Woman's Rights Movement in the United States. New York: Atheneum, 1972.
Lerner, Gerda, "The Lady and the Mill Girl: Changes in the Status of women in the Age of Jackson." American Studies Journal, Spring 1969.
O'Neill, William L. Everyone Was Brave: A History of Feminism in America. Chicago: Quadrangle Books, 1971.
Wertheimer, Barbara Mayer. We Were There: The Story of Working Women in America, New York: Pantheon Books, 1977.
EMPLOYMENT.
American women have always worked — since the founding of this nation. It is the nature and location of their work that has been transformed by social and economic change. Colonial women wove cloth, produced food, and made needed household goods. Responding to the rapid growth of industry in the nineteenth century and the increasing demand for cheap labor, women moved outside the home to perform the same work they had previously performed within it in order to secure added income. In addition to agricultural and domestic employment, they were clustered in the sewing trades, in the textile mills, in laundries, and in food service. Following the Civil War, women comprised the majority in two professions, teaching and nursing. By 1890, 8 out of every 100 women were in the professions. Women worked at home to increase family income: they were dressmakers, laundresses, took in boarders, or by making products such as clothing, cigars, or artificial flowers, often in tenement workshops. Later, women moved rapidly into newly created employment opportunities as clerks and typists. In 1900, 20 percent of American women were in the labor force. In every field, they held "women's jobs," those requiring less skill, providing less opportunity for advancement, and offering lower wages than men were paid for doing the same work.
THE WOMEN IN THE LABOR FORCE IN THE 1970s
— Between 1950 and 1974, the number of women workers nearly doubled while the number of men in the labor force increased by only about one fourth. The ratio of women per 100 men has risen from 41 in 1950 to 63 in 1974.
— For older women of working age, those 45 to 64 years old, the proportion in the work force rose dramatically between 1950 and 1960. In the 1960s, the increases leveled off somewhat and during the last few years the labor force rates for this age group have remained more nearly stable or even declined. During the 1960s and 1970s, younger women began entering the labor force in increasing numbers. The labor force rates for 20-to-24 year-olds increased from 46 percent in 1960 to 63 percent in 1974, and the rates of women 25 to 34 years old rose from 36 percent to 52 percent during the same period.
— Educational attainment is an important factor in labor force participation. About half of the women college graduates were in the labor force in 1952, but nearly two-thirds were working in 1975.
— Single women have always had high rate of labor force participation. However, married women living with their husbands have entered the labor force in increasing numbers since World War II. In 1950 only about one-fourth of the married women were in the work force, but in 1975 their rate of labor force participation reached 44 percent.
— About half (49 percent) of all mothers with children under 18 years of age were in the nation's labor force in March 1976. Their rate of participation surpassed the 47 percent rate of all women, and was over five times the 9 percent rate of mothers in 1940. Of the nearly 38 million women workers in 1976, 14.6 million were mothers. About 5.4 had children under age 6.
— Divorced women are more likely to be in the labor force than women of any other marital status. Widows are least likely to be workers, but this is largely attributable to their age.
— The number of women working 50 to 52 weeks a year at full-time jobs has grown dramatically. In 1950 there were only about 29 women for every 100 men working year round full time, but in 1974 this ratio has risen to 47 women per 100 men.
WOMAN'S WORK
— While the number of women in the labor force has increased very significantly, women remain concentrated primarily in "women's jobs." In both 1960 and 1970, over half of employed women were working in clerical, operative, or service positions. A higher proportion of employed women were clerical or service workers in 1970 than in 1960 (48 percent to 43 percent). Employment growth in these areas was primarily in traditionally female occupations (e.g., secretaries, stenographers, and typists, and health service workers) but was not entirely restricted to such areas. The number of women mail carriers and bartenders, for example, also increased.
— While men and women made strong employment gains among professional, technical, and kindred workers between 1960 and 1970, the vast majority of women professionals were employed in normally lower-paying occupations such as health workers, elementary and secondary school teachers. In 1970 about 30 percent of the men professional and technical workers were employed in the relatively high-paying fields of engineering, law, and medicine; only about 2 percent of women professionals were in these occupations.
— Women managers and administrators increased about 22 percent between 1960 and 70 but there were still approximately five times as many men as women in managerial positions in 1970. There was little change in craft, transport, equipment operative, and laborer groups and the proportion of women in these groups remained small.
— Nearly three-fourths of employed women between 25 and 64 years of age who had completed 4 years or more of college by 1974 were professional and technical workers; this is a higher proportion than that of male college graduates. However, approximately 14 percent of female college graduates in this age group were working in clerical jobs and only about 7 percent in managerial positions. One-fourth of male graduates were working as managers and administrators.
— Women with 4 years of high school were predominantly clerical and service workers. Male high school graduates were found primarily in blue-collar craft and operative occupations but there was also a relatively large number in managerial positions. Women with less than 4 years of high school were concentrated primarily in service occupations while the majority of men were working in craft and operative positions.
— Working women have historically lacked the power to improve their wages or working conditions
because the largest numbers have worked in clerical and service occupations where union organization was
less extensive than among blue-collar workers in manufacturing industries. There were unions for women in
industry before
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— Between 1962 and 1972, the proportion of all union members that were women rose from 18.6 percent to 21.7 percent and the number of women union members rose to 4.5 million. Women accounted for at least half the membership in 25 unions. However, a 1973 study revealed that women union members were very much underrepresented in union leadership and only 7 percent of the positions on union governing boards were held by women. The International Ladies Garment Workers Union, with its membership 80 percent female, has one women on its 23-member international board. The Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America, also 80 percent female, had two women on its 20 member board. Few women help to negotiate contracts. The United Automobile Workers has women in about 14 percent of its top local offices but less than 10 percent of its bargainers are women.
— In 1974, The Coalition of Labor Union Women was formed by members of 58 labor unions to work within the labor movement to promote the interests of women. The goals of this group include encouragement of affirmative action programs and women's participation in their unions at all levels, support for passage of legislation of concern to women workers, and recruitment of nonunion working women.
— Apprenticeship programs have traditionally provided access to relatively high-paying jobs in the skilled trades. Opportunities for women have historically been more limited than for men and women have been trained primarily for traditionally female work, such as cosmetologists and cooks. In 1973, less than 1 percent of the nation's registered apprentices were women.
THE EARNINGS GAP
— Among year-round full time workers, the earnings gap between men and women has increased. In 1955 men's earnings exceeded women's by 56 percent. By 1974 this differential had risen to 75 percent. Only 5 percent of workers earning $15,000 or more were women. An important factor contributing to the widening gap is the continued concentration of large numbers of women in low-skilled, low-paying occupations.
— In both 1970 and 1974, the median income of women college graduates aged 25 and older who worked year round full time was only about 60 percent of the comparable male median income. Women college graduates had incomes that were, on the average, lower than men with only a high school education.
— The working wife contributes between 20 to 40 percent of the family income. The proportion tends to be higher among younger families and in families of minority races.
MINORITY WOMEN
— The labor force participation rate for black women has been higher than that of white women although the rate for white women has been rapidly closing this gap. In 1974, 49 percent of black women were in the civilian labor force compared with 45 percent of white women. The presence of young children in the family affects black women less than white women. In 1975, 51 percent of married black women with children under 6 were in the labor force, compared with 35 percent of white women. In 1976, about 2.2 million minority mothers were in the work force, representing 44 percent of all minority women workers and 58 percent of minority mothers in the population.
— Unemployment rates for Spanish women were higher than the rate for all women in 1974; about 10 percent of Spanish women over 16 in the civilian labor force were unemployed compared with 6 percent of all women in the civilian labor force. Labor force participation rates do vary according to type of Spanish origin. While 40 percent of Mexican women and 50 percent of women of other Spanish origins were in the labor force, only one-third of the Puerto Rican women were in the labor force in 1974.
— A larger proportion of Spanish women were employed in blue collar jobs than were employed women in the overall population. Only 16 percent of all employed women were blue collar workers while about one-third of Spanish women had blue collar jobs in 1974. About 6 percent of Spanish women were in professional occupations in 1974 compared with 16 percent of all women.
— The median income of Spanish women in 1973 was not significantly different from that of all women, $2,800. Women of Mexican origin had a lower median income ($2,300) than women of Puerto Rican origin ($3,600) and women of other Spanish origins ($3,100).
— Between 1950-1974, women have become a larger proportion of those in the labor force, of those looking for jobs, and of those unemployed. Teenage and young adult women comprise a larger share of the unemployed. Of the 6.6 million women with some unemployment in 1973, 19 percent were of minority races and 45 percent were teenagers and young adults.
Additional Sources: B. M. Wertheimer, We Were There; Bureau of Labor Statistics; Bureau of the Census; Women's Bureau.
EQUAL RIGHTS AMENDMENT
Section 1: Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.
Section 2: The Congress shall have the power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.
Section 3: This amendment shall take effect two years after the date of ratification.
—Proposed Amendment XXVII
THE HISTORY OF THE ERA
— Alice Paul, leader of the militant National Woman's Party, composed the Equal Rights Amendment in the 1920's, after ratification of the 19th Amendment (woman suffrage). Convinced that the vote was an inadequate guarantee of political power for women and that many discriminatory practices remained in the law, the National Woman's Party determined to secure equal rights for women through this more comprehensive constitutional amendment.
— The ERA has been introduced in each Congress since 1923. While the National Woman's Party has been singleminded in its dedication to this cause, its major ally in this lengthy struggle has been the National Federation of Business and Professional Women Clubs, founded in 1919. For many years, other women's organizations opposed the ERA because they believed it threatened hard won protective legislation for women and children, so vital in the early industrial era.
— In 1940, the ERA was supported for the first time by a major political party and was included in the Republican platform. Since that time, both major parties have endorsed the ERA at each succeeding convention.
— One house of Congress has on occasion passed the ERA but the House of Representatives and the Senate did not reach agreement on this issue until 1972, forty-nine years following its initial introduction. The House approved the ERA (H. J. Res. 208) on October 12, 1971 and the Senate approved this measure on March 22, 1972. It was Rep. Martha Griffiths, D.-Mich., who finally succeeded in securing the required number of signatures on a discharge petition, which removed the resolution from the House Judiciary Committee and brought it to the floor for debate. Despite strong opposition led by Sen. Sam Ervin, D.-N.C., the ERA was finally approved and submitted to the states for action on its ratification.
— The resolution provided that ratification by the required number of states (three-fourths or 38) must be completed by March 22, 1979, seven years from the date of its approval by the Congress. The ERA, if approved, would become the 27th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Thirty-five states have now ratified the ERA.
— President Gerald Ford created the National Commission on the Observance of International Women's Year by Executive Order on January 9, 1975. This action resulted from worldwide preparations for International Women's Year (1975), which had begun in 1972 in this country. There was also growing pressure from many women's organizations on both public and private sectors to achieve equality, particularly in education, employment, legal status and politics. In his proclamation, Pres. Ford stated that "…Americans must now deal with those inequities that still linger as barriers to the full participation of women in our Nation's life." The first consideration of the Commission was "to promote equality between men and women." At its meeting in April 1975, the Commission, composed of representatives of government, business, education, law, racial and ethnic groups, and voluntary organizations, determined that ratification of the ERA would be its top priority issue.
— The Commission's ERA Committee, led by co-chairs Congresswomen Margaret Heckler and Alan Alda, first sought a ruling from the General Accounting Office to define the acceptable limits of their activities. In the opinion of the Comptroller General of the United States, the Executive Order conferred wide discretion upon the Commission as to how it should actively promote equality between men and women. He noted that the Commission, exercising this discretion, had resolved to favor ratification of the ERA. To carry out this resolution, "the ERA Subcommittee intends to educate interested parties as to the impact of the amendment on sexual inequality in the United States and consult with experts on how to best communicate the facts about ERA." The Comptroller General concluded that "the planned activities are within the scope of the Executive Order, both in letter and spirit."
— Following this 1975 ruling, the Comptroller General affirmed the Commission's advocacy of ERA
on August 10, 1977. He stated that the activities of the IWY Commission did not violate the anti-lobbying
provisions of any Federal statute. In addition, he called attention to Public Law 94-167 which specified
that Commission activities must include "a mix of representatives from local, State, regional, and
national agencies, groups, etc. "which work to advance the rights of women" and of
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—Many prominent organizations concerned with issues of significance to women have coordinated their efforts on behalf of ERA with those of the Commission. Among these groups are the National Federation of Business and Professional Women's Clubs, League of Women Voters, National Women's Political Caucus, National Woman's Party, American Association of University Women, Common Cause, National Organization for Women, and representatives from both church and labor coalitions. Among these organizations are several which have for years failed to support the ERA but have now become aware and convinced of its vital significance to women.
THE OPPOSITION
While the credible sources support the ERA and the need for it is clear, many people have been confused by un founded claims about its presumed effects. The proponents are striving to dispel the misconception and unfounded folklore that continue to obscure the intent and impact of the ERA.
As indicated above the courts will carry out the intent of the framers in interpreting the ERA, and will look to the views of the chief proponents expressed in the majority report of the Senate Judiciary Committee and in the debate.
The following explanations of the effects of the ERA are based on these sources. Phrases and sentences in quotation marks are quoted from the majority report of the Senate Judiciary Committee.
BASIC PRINCIPLE OF THE ERA
"The general principles on which the ERA rests are simple … Essentially the amendment requires that the Federal government and all State and local governments treat each person, male and female, as an individual.
"… The Amendment applies only to governmental action; it does not affect private action or the purely social relationships between men and women.
EFFECT ON THE FAMILY
The ERA will not alter family structure, which is based on private relationships and custom.
Obligations for family support, which are in fact obligations to pay creditors, will be based on individual circumstances and not on sex. Congress specifically recognized in the legislative history of the ERA that a homemaker's contribution, whether the homemaker be male or female, has economic value, a fact with far-reaching implications for the homemaker.
"It is clear the Amendment would not require both a husband and wife to contribute identical amounts of money to a marriage. The support obligations of each spouse would be defined in functional terms based, for example, on each spouse's earning power, current resources and nonmonetary contributions to the family welfare.
"…where one spouse is the primary wage earner and the other runs the home, the wage earner would have a duty to support the spouse who stays at home in compensation for the performance of her or his duties."
The State of Montana, which has an equal rights amended in its State constitution, amended its support law in 1975 to specifically recognize the value of the homemaker:
Duties of husband and wife as to support. In so far as each is able, the husband and wife shall support each other out of their property and labor. As used in this section, the word "support" includes the nonmonetary support provided by a spouse as homemaker. Section 36-102, Revised Codes of Montana.
ALIMONY AND CHILD SUPPORT AND CUSTODY
The effect of the ERA would be to offer fairer treatment on the basis of individual circumstances rather than sex. Courts will be making judgments based on an individual's background and potential earning capacity. The noncompensated contributions of a spouse will be a prime factor in determining support obligations. Currently, the Uniform Marriage and Divorce Act, which provides a model divorce and support law without distinctions based on sex, has been adopted by a number of States.
Divorced parents will be responsible for support of the children in accordance with their means, which will be an improvement for women over present practice. Mothers are contributing by and large more than half the support of the children even though they earn less.
State courts are interpreting State equal rights amendments in harmony with the legislative history of the Federal amendment in this and other respects. In no case has a court said that support must be 50-50. On the contrary, a Pennsylvania court has recognized the care given the children by the mother as constituting support stating:
This is not, of course, to suggest that a mother who is keeping a house and caring for her children must secure the services of a babysitter and seek employment in order to contribute to the children's financial support; it is obvious that a mother who is caring for her children is providing them valuable support. Green v. Freiheit, Court of Common Pleas, First Judicial District of Pennsylvania, Family Division, October Term 1973, No. 1015 D. R. #260259.
COED BATHROOMS
"This right (of privacy) would likewise permit a separation of the sexes with respect to such places as public toilets, as well as sleeping quarters of public institutions."
No bathrooms have been made coed in States having equal rights amendments. Governor Evans of Washington replied when queried on this subject: "The accusations concerning integration of facilities are so ridiculous, we in Washington have ceased to reply to them. Rights of privacy remain fully protected in this State, and thus our restroom facilities, prison cells, and sleeping quarters of public institutions remain totally segregated." (Letter of Feb. 5, 1976 to Ms. Paula Minklei.)
PROTECTIVE LABOR LAWS
Too often protective labor laws applying to women only discriminate against women in the job market. Under the ERA, labor laws applying to women only which are restrictive such as weight lifting laws or laws prohibiting employment more than 8 hours a day, will be invalid. There are practically no such laws now operative as a result of court decisions under title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and legislative action. Complaints under title VII based on application of protective labor laws were all brought by blue-collar union women, who found the laws discriminatory, and the courts agreed. Laws which are beneficial will be extended to cover both sexes.
MILITARY SERVICE
The ERA will require that women be drafted if men are drafted. There is no draft now and because of the success of the volunteer armed services, there is little likelihood of a draft in the foreseeable future. Also, it must be noted, Congress has always had the power to draft women under its general war powers and probably would in the event of an emergency with or without the ERA. Appropriate exemptions would in such a case be available to men and women.
ERA means that women who choose to enlist will have equal opportunity for enlistment, and hence access to valuable military benefits such as in-service training, GI loans and mortgages, and veterans' preferences for civilian jobs. Unfortunately now women who wish to enlist must meet higher standards than men, and even those who meet the standards may have to wait a considerable period.
As to combat, the ERA does not mean that infantry units will be half women. The military services will have the same right to assign women as they have to assign men and certainly will not assign women to duties they are not capable of performing. There are numerous references to this in the majority report of the Senate Judiciary Committee and in the debate in both Houses of Congress.
The constitutional right of Federal authorities to assign military personnel, as interpreted by the Supreme Court, is so broad that it is probable that women who want to serve in combat units will have to sue in the courts to get admitted to combat units even in small numbers.
AUTHORITY OF STATES TO LEGISLATE
The Federal Government will have no more power to legislate in any areas reserved to the States than it now has. Both proponents and opponents agreed that the Congress has adequate authority now to enact any legislation needed to end legal discrimination.
The only restriction the ERA places on State legislation is to require that it not discriminate on account of sex. The ERA no more transfers authority to enact domestic relations law, for examples to the Federal Government than the 18-year-old suffrage amendment transferred all power to make voting laws to the Federal Government. The States still write the voting laws but they can't have a minimum age higher than 18. The States will still enact domestic relations laws, but they cannot make distinctions based on sex; they can make distinctions based on function, such as homemaking.
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EDUCATION
June 25, 1978 marks the 300th anniversary of the graduation of the first woman in the world to receive a university degree. Elena Cornaro, a young Venetian woman, was awarded a doctorate in philosophy from the University of Padua, Italy in 1678. For most of the intervening period, Elena Cornaro remained a remarkable exception among women.
The development of equal education for women has been inhibited by cultural tradition, religious beliefs, and biological arguments about woman's place in society. Although Plato advocated educating women like men, it was the eighteenth century French philosopher, Jean Jacques Rousseau who expressed the prevailing view of women's education through history. Rousseau wrote, "The whole education of women ought to be relative to men, to please them, to educate them when young, to care for them when grown, to counsel them, and to make life sweet and agreeable to them." The educational system of the United States has consistently reflected societal views of sex differences and has provided more limited opportunities for women. Change has occurred very slowly. Discrimination against women in education remains widespread, even though it has been contrary to national public policy since 1972 when the Education Amendments prohibiting sex discrimination were enacted.
—Women comprise over half of the U.S. population but they appear in only 31 percent of the elementary textbook illustrations. Males are depicted in 150 occupational roles while almost all women illustrated are housewives.
—The message little girls get from school textbooks is subservience and passivity. Boys learn to express independence and creativity.
—In a HEW study it was discovered that 47 percent of boys but only 37 percent of girls reported that their fathers "definitely desired" college for them; for mothers it was 48 percent for boys and 37 percent for girls.
—Minority women, including Hispanic, Native American and black, are at an educational disadvantage when compared to whites and are affected by both sex and race discrimination.
—Although approximately 1/3 of the American population is rural, of which more than 1/2 are women and girls, little attention is being directed to them by either rural educators, advocates for rural development, or women's education advocates and providers.
—A study of college students entering Berkeley in 1973 discovered that only 8 percent of the women had four years of high school mathematics compared to 57 percent of the entering men. As a result 92 percent of the freshman women could major in only five out of the twenty available fields.
—In recent years the percentages have risen: 37 percent of the high school women and 59 percent of the men reported four or more years of high school math in 1974.
—In most universities and colleges, without four years of high school mathematics, it is impossible to enter engineering, computer science, economics, business, mathematics, or most science fields. Females are effectively excluded from many fields before they enter college because they do not have the prerequisites.
—Among persons 25 to 29 years of age in 1950, there were only 66 women who had completed at least four years of college for every 100 men who had done so. The ratio in 1975 was 77 female college graduates for every 100 comparable males. While the proportion completing four or more years of college has risen more rapidly for young women than for young men, a higher proportion of men than women in both 1950 and 1975 had completed this much schooling.
—In 1974 women still constituted a very small proportion of students enrolled in some of the traditional "male" majors. For example, the percentage of engineering majors who were women rose from 2 percent in 1966 to 7 percent in 1974. The comparable figures for agriculture and forestry were 3 percent in 1966 and 14 percent in 1974. Female college students in 1974 remained a large proportion of traditional "female" majors, such as education (73 percent), English or journalism (59 percent), and health or medical professions (64 percent).
—Females received 3.1 percent of the degrees awarded for dentistry in 1974-1975 and 13.1 percent of those for medicine. These figures represent an increase of more than four times the percentage of dental degrees and twice the percentage of medical degrees earned by women a decade earlier. Female law degree recipients increased from 3.1 percent in 1964-1965 to 15.1 percent in 1974-1975.
Changing career aspirations of women are reflected in the increased number of women entering undergraduate, graduate and professional schools. Recent (1975) census data show that the number of women aged 25 to 34 attending college rose more than 100 percent from 1970 to 1975; the total undergraduate enrollment of women increased 45 percent from 1970 to 1975; and that women comprise nearly half of the first-year enrollment in graduate and professional schools. From 1970 to 1975 the number of women receiving the doctorate increased by 59 percent and the number of women receiving first professional degrees increased by 184 percent but even with these increases, women still lag in degree attainment. In 1975 women received only 21 percent of the doctorates and 12.5 percent of the first professional degrees in law, medicine and other professions.
—In 1974, an HEW official described his visits to vocational-technical schools, observing that the average expected wage for trades learned by girls was 47 percent lower than for trades learned by boys. He noted that not only were students channeled into traditionally male or female jobs but also that girls were guided into employment at lower income levels.
—At colleges and universities, there has been little overall progress toward employment opportunity for faculty women in recent years. The total percentage of faculty jobs held by women increased by only one half of 1 percent between 1974-1975 and 1975-1976 (from 23.8 percent to 24.3 percent). Female professors earned $3,096 less, on the average, than males in 1975-1976, compared to 2,820 less in 1974-1975.
—In a study reported in 1977 of 1,037 institutions, it was found that white women held only 14 percent of the key administrative positions and minority women only 2 percent. In addition women were paid about four-fifths as much as men with the same job titles at the same type of institution.
—In 1928, 55 percent of elementary school principals were women while in 1973 only 19.6 percent were women.
—In the field of education, there are extremely small percentages of women in leadership roles. Women comprise 20 percent of the members of state boards of education, 3 percent of junior high principals, 1 percent of the senior high principals, and .1 percent of local school superintendents. More important, the number of women in these positions has declined in the last ten years.
—In the area of education, black women have made major advancements. In recent years, there has been a sharp increase in the number enrolled at the college level. In 1964 slightly more than 100,000 black women under 35 years of age were attending college, compared with 392,000 in 1974. Although college enrollment also expanded among white women during this same period, the growth has not been as great as that for black women.
—In 1975 the proportion of black women 25 to 29 years old who were high school graduates (including those going on to college) reached 70 percent, a substantial increase over the 39 percent who were high school graduates in 1960. An educational gap remained in 1975 between black and white women because 83 percent of the white women of this age group had completed high school.
—In 1974 women of Spanish origin were at a lower educational attainment level than were all women in the nation, but younger women of Spanish origin were closing the gap of educational attainment. About 28 percent of Spanish origin women 45 to 54 years old had completed high school, but about 50 percent of these women 25 to 29 years old had done so.
Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, Public Law 92-318, states that with some exceptions:
No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving federal financial asistance….
TITLE IX QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
QUESTION: Who is covered by Title IX?
ANSWER:
Virtually every college, university, elementary and secondary school and preschool is covered by some portion of the law. Many clubs and other organizations receive Federal funds for educational programs and activities and likewise are covered by Title IX in some manner.
QUESTION: Who is exempt from Title IX's provisions?
ANSWER:
Congress has specifically exempted all military schools and has exempted religious schools to the extent that the provisions of Title IX would be inconsistent with the basic religious tenets of the school.
Not included with regard to admission requirements ONLY are private undergraduate colleges, nonvocational elementary and secondary schools and those public undergraduate schools which have been traditionally and continuously single-sex since their establishment.
However, even institutions whose admissions are exempt from coverage must treat all students without discrimination once they have admitted members of both sexes.
QUESTION: How can schools and colleges interested in a positive approach to Title IX deal with its provisions?
ANSWER:
To encourage each school and college to look at its policies in light of the law, the final regulation now includes a self-evaluation provision. This requires that during the next year the educational institution look at its policies and modify them to comply with the law as expressed by the regulation. This includes remedying the effects of any past discrimination.
QUESTION: Does Title IX cover textbooks?
ANSWER:
No. While the Department recognizes that sex stereotyping in curricula and
educational material is a serious matter, it is of the view that any specific regulatory
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QUESTION: May a vocational school limit enrollment of members of one sex because of limited availability of job opportunities for members of that sex?
ANSWER:
No. Further, a school may not assist a discriminatory employer by referral of student or any other manner.
QUESTION: What are the Title IX requirements for counseling in schools and colleges?
ANSWER:
An institution using testing or other materials for counseling may not use different materials for males and females, nor may it use materials which lead to different treatment of students on the basis of sex.
If there is a class or course of study which has a disproportionate number, of members of one sex, the school is required to assure that the disproportion does not stem from discrimination by counselors or materials.
WOMEN AND SPORTS
More specifically, the "Rules and Regulations" relating to Title IX from the Department of Health, Education and Welfare read as follows:
No person shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, be treated differently from another person or otherwise be discriminated against in any interscholastic, intercollegiate, club or intramural athletics offered by a recipient, and no recipient shall provide any such athletics separately on such basis.
(86.41 Athletics)
The Department of Health, Education and Welfare published the following questions and answers concerning Title IX and Sports in June 1975:
QUESTION: In athletics, what is equal opportunity?
ANSWER:
In determining whether equal opportunities are available, such factors as these will be considered:
—whether the sports selected reflect the interests and abilities of both sexes;
—provision of supplies and equipment;
—game and practice schedules;
—travel and per diem allowances;
—coaching and academic tutoring opportunities and the assignment and pay of the coaches and tutors;
—locker rooms, practice and competitive facilities;
—medical and training services;
—housing and dining facilities and services;
—publicity.
QUESTION: Must an institution provide equal opportunities in each of these categories?
ANSWER:
Yes. However, equal expenditures in each category are not required.
QUESTION: What sports does the term "athletics" encompass?
ANSWER:
It encompasses sports which are a part of interscholastic, intercollegiate, club or intramural programs.
QUESTION: When are separate teams for men and women allowed?
ANSWER:
When selection is based on competitive skill or the activity involved is a contact sport, separate teams may be provided for males and females, or a single team may be provided which is open to both sexes. If separate teams are offered, a recipient institution may not discriminate on the basis of sex in providing equipment or supplies or in any other manner. Moreover, the institution must assure that the sports offered effectively accommodate the interest and abilities of members of both sexes.
QUESTION: If there are sufficient members of women interested in basketball to form a viable women's team, is an institution which fields a men's team required to provide such a team for women?
ANSWER:
One of the factors to be considered by the Director in determining whether equal opportunities are provided is whether the selection of sports and levels of competition effectively accommodate the interests and abilities of members of both sexes. Therefore, if a school offers basketball for men and the only way in which the institution can accommodate the interests and abilities of women is by offering a separate basketball team for women, such a team must be provided.
QUESTION: If there are insufficient women interested in participating on a women's track team, must the institution allow an interested woman to compete for a slot on the men's track team?
ANSWER:
If athletic opportunities have previously been limited for women at that school, it must allow women to compete for the men's team if the sport is a noncontact sport such as track. The school may preclude women from participating on a men's team in a contact sport. A school may preclude men or women from participating on teams for the other sex if athletic opportunities have not been limited in the past for them, regardless of whether the sport is contact or noncontact.
QUESTION: Can a school be exempt from Title IX if if athletic conference forbids men and women on the same noncontact team?
ANSWER:
No. Title IX preempts all State or local laws or other requirements which conflict with Title IX.
QUESTION: How can a school athletics department be covered by Title IX if the department itself receives no direct Federal aid?
ANSWER:
Section 844 of the Education Amendments of 1974 specifically states that: "The Secretary shall prepare and publish … proposed regulations implementing the provision of Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 relating to the prohibition of sex discrimination in Federally-assisted education programs which shall include with respect to intercollegiate athletic activities reasonable provisions considering the nature of particular sports."
In addition, athletics constitutes an integral part of the educational processes of schools and colleges and, thus, are fully subject to the requirements of Title IX, even in absence of Federal funds going directly to the athletic programs.
The courts have consistently considered athletics sponsored by an educational institution to be an integral part of the institution's education program and, therefore, have required institutions to provide equal opportunity.
QUESTION: Does a school have to provide athletic scholarships for women?
ANSWER:
Specifically, the regulation provides: "To the extent that a recipient awards athletic scholarships or grants-in-aid, it must provide reasonable opportunities for such award for members of each sex in proportion to the number of students of each sex participating in interscholastic or intercollegiate athletics."
TEXTBOOKS AND INSTRUCTIONAL MATERIALS
Sexism in textbooks is one area not covered by Title IX, on the grounds that to proscribe what shall be in textbooks would abrogate the First Amendment guarantee of freedom of speech. However, this does not mean that parents, teachers or others can not pressure publishers and school officials to publish and use new texts free of sexism and point out sexist references in currently used or old materials.
Research indicates that stereotyping does not end in elementary school. A study completed in 1974 by a Citizens Advisory on Sex Inequality in Lexington, Massachusetts schools found stereotyped and biased examples in a widely used algebra text for grades 8-10. Boys work, earn high grades, paint, push mowers; girls spend money and one is on a diet.
High school civics books contain a prevailing message that is for men only, according to a study by Jennifer MacLeod and Sandy Silverman. The eight books they surveyed include 1,104 listings for men, 33 for women. Illustrations are similarly one-sided; in charts, political leaders are shown as male. Senator Margaret Chase-Smith is seen holding a bouquet of roses.
History books repeat this pattern. In more than one dozen of the most popular U.S. history texts examined by Janice Trecker, women are generally invisible —more often ignored than maligned. Authors select and quote from male leaders even in areas where there are articulate and able women leaders, such as abolition, labor and other reform movements. Topics uniquely concerned with women, such as women's suffrage, are given short shrift. Birth control is usually omitted entirely. One text devotes five pages to the story of the six-shooter, five lines to the life of a frontier woman.
WOMEN EMPLOYED IN EDUCATION
The difference in salary between males and females is often attributed to women having had shorter service on faculties and thereby not having been in a position to achieve as many raises. Others strongly argue that even if all factors are equal women faculty members at most institutions are paid less than their male counterparts simply because they are females.
It is sometimes argued that males are promoted and advance further than women because their careers are not interrupted by marriage and/or childbirth. Evidence from recent research however, suggests the contrary. Suzanne Howard concluded in her report for the National Council of Administrative Women in Education that "men advance faster with less experience simply because they are men." She cited numerous studies to support her findings. One revealed that 67% of the male principals had less than six years of elementary classroom experience prior to promotion while 88% of the women who became principals had six or more years of elementary teaching.
The National Coalition for Women and Girls in Education noted that "more charges of
sex discrimination had been filed against institutions of higher learning than against any other industry
in the country." In 1973 alone, one in every forty charges filed were against an institution of higher
education. More than 500 educational institutions have been charged with
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VOCATIONAL EDUCATION
The new Vocational Education Bill extends and revises the Vocational Education Act of 1963, the Higher Education Act of 1965, Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, and certain other federal education programs. Under the law, States will be given Federal grants on the conditions that the State provide matching funds. The act mandates criteria for the distribution of vocational education funds within States and specifies administrative requirements for operating State programs. This act affects all three levels of government — national, State, and local.
Under the legislation, signed into law October 12, 1976, each State must hire full-time staff to help end sex bias and stereotyping in vocational education. Starting October 1977, $50,000 of each State's federal allotment (without matching fund requirement) will be set aside for this purpose. States will have to outline how they will assure both sexes equal access to vocational education in a five-year plan before they can qualify for Federal aid.
Some other actions required under the law:
Expansion of national and State advisory councils to include women familiar with the problems of sex discrimination in job training and employment, and sex stereotyping in vocational education.
Development of curriculum and guidance programs that reflect women's changing role so that career choices can be based on their occupational needs and interests.
The act also specifically mentions services for women, including counseling and entry into non-traditional occupations, as well as programs for former homemakers, and single heads of households.
Additional sources: Bureau of the Census; Project on the Status and Education of Women; WEAL; Office of Women in Higher Education, American Council on Education; Chronicle of Higher Education.
HEALTH
MATERNAL HEALTH.
— Maternal mortality is 3 times higher in the U.S. than in Sweden and Scotland.
— Maternal mortality for non-white women is more than 2 and 1/2 times the rate for white women.
— Caesarean sections are increasing significantly in teaching hospitals.
— According to Doris Haire, President of the American Foundation for Maternal and Child Health, "Few American babies are born today as nature intended them to be." Yet at least 90% of all births are normal and uncomplicated.
— There are some 1300 certified nurse-midwives and approximately 5000 lay midwives in the U.S. today.
— In other developed countries, such as France and Sweden where midwives are an essential part of the childbirth process, the rates of infant mortality and birth trauma are significantly lower than in the U.S.
— Nurse practitioners, nurse and lay midwives, and physician assistants are new categories of health workers dominated by women. These new roles for women in the health sector represent a significant change in that they have real autonomy and authority and provide significant alternatives in the delivery of care. Nurse-practitioners are registered nurses who usually take extra training beyond their RN degree. The difference between the work of a registered nurse and that of a nurse practitioner is that the latter determines a patient's care without the intervention of a physician, unless indicated. She practices nursing, not medicine, usually independently of the physician. There are some 7,000 nurse practitioners in the United States today. Many are employed by hospitals in home care programs and emergency rooms, others work in public health programs. The Federal Medicare program does not reimburse the independent midwife or nurse practitioner for services rendered. A tremendous increase of these independent practitioners would be seen if they could count on reimbursement either under existing programs or a national health insurance program.
PATIENT'S RIGHTS.
— Since 1970 female sterilizations in the U.S. have increased threefold.
— Twenty percent of married black women have been sterilized compared to seven percent of married white women.
— Fourteen percent of Native American women have been sterilized.
— Many sterilizations have been performed without the informed consent of the patient.
— The increase in female sterilizations in the U.S. has been most prevalent in the minority groups as can be seen from the figures presented above. These figures show that minority women are sterilized more than their percentage of the female population would warrant. In Los Angeles, ten Chicana women have filed suit alleging that a hospital coerced or deceived them into sterilization procedures. They claim they received consent forms while in labor, or were told about the sterilization procedure only after the fact.
— The Department of Health, Education and Welfare has drafted guidelines for sterilizations paid for with Federal funds. The guidelines include an informed consent form, an explanation of the permanence and irreversibility of the procedure, the dangers of major surgery, a 72-hour waiting period and the option of last-minute refusal. Many, however, feel that these guidelines are insufficient and the Committee to End Sterilization Abuse (CESA) in New York has drafted more stringent guidelines. There has recently come to light further evidence of HEW's failure to help control sterilization abuse. In a May 1976 draft of a new booklet being prepared by HEW entitled "Your Sterilization Operation: Hysterectomy" the government agency continues to advocate hysterectomy for sterilization despite the enormous risks, the needless surgery, and the simpler, safer tubal ligation as an alternative.
DRUGS AND DEVICES.
— Between 1965 and 1975 the number of American women taking estrogen drugs tripled.
— A California State Department of Health survey found a 50% increase in cancer of the endometrium (lining of the uterus) between 1969 and 1974.
— It has been known since the 1930's that estrogens cause cancer in test animals.
—Diethylstilbestrol (DES) has caused vaginal cancer in the female offspring of women given DES during pregnancy and cancer in the women themselves.
— Prior to the 1970's only 3 cases of vaginal cancer had ever been reported. By 1975 250 cases of this cancer had been reported and many went unreported.
— Despite a Food and Drug Administration ban on the use of DES during pregnancy, approximately 11,000 prescriptions for DES are written each year for prenatal care.
— Approximately 150 million women world-wide have taken the birth-control pill and some 50 million women currently use it.
— Contrary to most powerful drugs, the birth-control pill is given to millions of healthy individuals over a long period of time.
— A definite link has been established between the birth-control pill and greater risk of blood clots, stroke, heart attacks, rise in blood pressure, urinary tract infections, and gall bladder disease.
— Women on the Pill have a 7 to 10 times greater risk of blood clots than those who don't take the drug.
— Women on the Pill have 9 times as many strokes as non-Pill users.
— The Food and Drug Administration has advised women over 40 to use a form of contraception other than the birth-control pill because of its risks.
— The Pill causes the growth of non-cancerous polyps in the lining of the cervix and an increase in the number of cells in the ovaries, uterus, and breasts.
— The intra-uterine devices (IUD) used by millions of American women have never been subject to federally-regulated testing unless they contained a drug or chemical which is released and which is itself a contraceptive, such as the Copper-T and Progestasert. The devices were pre-market tested by the manufacturers who produced them. Under the new Medical Devices Act now in effect those IUD's that have been on the market for many years, such as the Lippes Loop, may continue to be marketed. New IUD's coming on to the market, those with new designs, new composition, etc., have to be pre-cleared. Evidence has to be presented to FDA establishing the effectiveness and safety of the IUD.
— Women use 50% more prescription drugs than men.
— Women use 72% of all anti-depressants, 76.5% of the major analgesics, 70.5% of the minor tranquilizers, and they use the majority of major tranquilizers prescribed.
GYNECOLOGICAL HEALTH
Breast cancer is the most common cancer in women. Almost 90,000 breast cancers are diagnosed each year and each year some 33,000 women die of the disease.
Approximately 95% of breast cancers are found by women themselves, usually by accident.
Some 67,000 new cases of cervical, uterine and ovarian cancers are diagnosed yearly. Of these three, cervical cancer is the most common, killing some 11,000 women each year.
Uterine cancer will be diagnosed in some 27,000 women in 1977. Treatment for uterine cancer is hysterectomy.
According to the National Center for Health Statistics, some 690,000 women had hysterectomies in 1975.
More than 1/2 of all women over the age of 40 are advised to have hysterectomies each year.
Dr. John P. Bunker of Stanford University's Medical School stated that hysterectomy causes "a loss of the uterus by more than half the female population by the age of 65 years."
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Hysterectomy is performed 2 and 1/2 times more often in the U.S. than in England and Wales and 4 times more often than in Sweden.
Hysterectomies for sterilization are 20 times more likely to cause death than a tubal ligation.
According to Dr. Valentina Donahue, an obstetrician-gynecologist, the complications of hysterectomy "include the usual hazards of major surgery — infection, hemorrhage, thromboembolic disease (blood clots) and the risks of anesthesia."
In a New York Times article of September 21, 1975, the director of a large New York City hospital stated that it is "unwritten policy to do hysterectomies for sterilization on poor blacks, Puerto Ricans, and other indigent minorities in charity wards."
Hysterectomy is performed for contraception (sterilization), cramps, vaginal laxness, small noncancerous fibroids, and for headaches and backaches.
Dr. Ralph C. Wright, a gynecologist, has stated," The uterus has but one function: reproduction. After the last planned pregnancy, the uterus becomes a useless, bleeding, symptom-producing, potentially cancer-bearing organ and therefore should be removed."
The rate of invasive cervical cancer among black women is twice that among white women.
Chosen to call this section gynecological health (not reproductive health) because the issues are important to all of us whether or not we bear children. Educating ourselves to care for our health will enable us to make intelligent, informed choices about the care we seek.
Two of the major issues relating to gynecological health are the detection and treatment of cancer, and hysterectomy as a means of birth control.
Cancer is one of the more over-riding threats to women's health. It is a prime issue today, receives much public attention and causes great personal anxiety. Breast cancer kills more women than any other cancer and these sad statistics have not improved in some 30 years. Early detection through breast self examination continues to be our best hope for reducing the mortality statistics. Most women are reluctant to do breast self-examination (BSE) because they are afraid they might find a lump and because they do not know normal breast tissue from abnormal. Breast self-examination cannot be stressed enough. All the experts agree that far fewer women would die from a breast cancer which has fatally spread if they would regularly examine their breasts and be able to distinguish healthy breast tissue from abnormal signs and symptoms.
ALCOHOL AND DRUG ABUSE
Over 1/3 of the nation's 9 million alcoholics are women.
Of 600 halfway houses for alcoholism only 30 are for women.
Only 14 out of 582 treatment grants awarded by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA) are for women's programs.
Out of 1374 NIAAA research grants 4 are specifically for the female alcoholic.
Of 76 NIAAA prevention/education programs none are geared specifically for women.
Only 1 NIAAA treatment program provides a child-care service.
The majority of women drug addicts are white, do not use illegal drugs, and receive their drugs through a doctor's prescription.
Women represent approximately 28% of the total drug treatment population.
According to Alberta Henderson at the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), "the actual percentage of females in the drug abusing population was nearly 50% in a survey conducted in 14 major cities."
Alcohol and drug problems among women have received little attention.
Nevertheless, recent research has shown that the prevalence of these problems in the female population is much greater than had been anticipated. Senator Harrison Williams (Democrat, NJ) and specialists have stated that fully 1/2 of all alcoholics are women.
WOMEN AS HEALTH CARE WORKERS
Women are 80% of the healthworkers in the U.S., including doctors, nurses, technicians, secretaries, house-keeping aides, clerks, and dietitians.
Women are only 3.5% of the dentists, 9.3% of the physicians, 9.1% of the administrators and scientists.
Women are 97.9% of the dental assistants, 97.3% of the registered nurses, 96.4% of the practical nurses.
As health paraprofessionals women represent 63.5% of the therapists, 67.9% of the x-ray technicians, 72% of the clinical laboratory technicians, and 92% of the dietitians. In 1970 their median income was $6,000.
Women hold 96.4% of the health service jobs such as aides, dietary help, housekeepers, ward clerks, and book-keepers. Their median income in 1970 was $4,000.
Despite their large numbers in the health labor force women hold few positions of decision-making power. The majority of health administrators and over 90% of all physicians are men. As reflected in the statistics above, women hold health jobs which tend to reinforce their traditional task-oriented roles of nurturing and service to others. The jobs are also low-paying and offer little chance for upward mobility in the health system.
Dr. Vincente Navarro of Johns Hopkins University has started that "unless the composition of the decision-making bodies in the health sector changes substantially to reflect better the sex and class composition of the producers and consumers of the health sector, no real changes will take place to benefit the majority of women in the health sector."
CHILD CARE.
Arguing whether mothers should be employed away from home has become a pointless exercise. In 1977, mothers are working and they will continue to hold jobs regardless of the action or inaction on child care by State or Federal government. So the crucial issue is not whether child care, but how to achieve good quality child care and how to help working parents find it and afford it.
THE NUMBERS
Once their children are old enough for grade school, the majority of American mothers now enter the labor force. The 28.2 million children of working mothers accounted for 46 percent of all children under age 18. Over 16 million children 3 to 13 years old had working mothers in 1975, but only 1.7 percent were enrolled in group care centers.
— "Most mothers work outside the home because they need the earnings for themselves and their families," Women's Bureau director Alexis M. Herman has said. "And with the dramatic increase in the number of working mothers, especially those with children under 6 years old, lower cost and more readily available child care facilities are critically needed."
— At least 4.6 million children have mothers who are single, separated, divorced or widowed heads of families. In 1975, more than one in every six children under 18 was living in a single-parent family, a percentage that has almost doubled since 1950.
— For the female family head who earns the national average income of $75 a week, or $6,770 a year, the high cost of child care services greatly reduces her choices among available programs.
— The working mother is not solely an urban phenomenon. In 1970, 30 percent of rural non-farm women, and more than 25 per cent of rural farm women with children under six, were in the labor force.
— Today, two out of five mothers of preschoolers are at work or looking for work, a proportion that has doubled in fifteen years and is still growing.
THE TRENDS
Market Opinion Research, in a 1975 study for the International Women's year Commission, found 27 per cent of women who have never worked think they will or might work in the future; 13 per cent of those would need child care. More than four in ten women who previously have been in the labor force think they'll return to work in the future; 17 per cent of the mothers in this group would need child care. Most of the women planning to return to work were under 35, still in prime child-bearing years.
Fewer women are able to afford child care at home since the 1974 Fair Labor Standards Act extended the minimum wage to include domestic workers and housekeepers. It is expected that the demand for Federally subsidized child care will increase as parents with housekeepers try to trim budgets and find it considerably less expensive to use more formal day care programs, centers, and family day care homes.
The "storybook American family" is one of the latter-day casualties of the Industrial Revolution. Inflexible work hours away from a home-centered business or farm, time-consuming commutes, job transfers and relocation away from relative, economic pressures that make two or more incomes necessary to maintain a family's standard of living — all these developments have greatly altered the fondly remembered pattern of family life.
Extended families, where more than two generations of relatives live in the same household, are all but gone. Fifty years ago, half of Massachusetts homes included at least one adult besides the parents; today the figure is four percent.
SAVING THE FAMILY
Ironically, one of the key slogans of the day, "respect for the family," is being translated to mean "leave the family alone."
Opponents of child care programs maintain that until children are old enough to attend school, the responsibility for supervision rests squarely with the parents, especially mothers. They are suspicious that access to quality child care will threaten the family, that more women will be encouraged to go to work "to entertain themselves," and that the husband's usual "breadwinner role" will be undermined. Charges are made that child care services would brainwash children and take control from their families to give it to "the state."
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To child care advocates, the slogan "respect for the family" represents a demand that public policy support family life as traditional extended family circles once did. They urge work policies that allow workers to combine their jobs with parenting, rather than force them to choose between the two. They seek not only improved child care services of all kinds, but also flexible working hours so parents can share care, paternal (as well as maternal) leave policies permitting time off when children are sick, and early education in parenting skills.
Some child care activists are presently urging a minimum income level for every family with young children so that the mother or father who is a willing caregiver can afford to stay home. Urie Bronfenbrenner, professor in the Departments of Psychology and of Human Development and Family Studies at Cornell University, has reported to Congress that the United States is the only industrialized nation that has not yet established such a guaranteed minimum. He reported further that the United States is also the only industrialized nation without a nationwide program of child care services for children of working mothers.
Other societies view child care less as a "service to parents" and more as a healthy emotional and intellectual experience for the child. But in this country, the Government supports child care chiefly as a tool to move low-income mothers off public assistance and into jobs. Federal money now sponsors about 900,000 of these children.
WHO CARES FOR CHILDREN?
A relative at home. This is the most commonly used form of child care and includes older schoolage siblings and night-shift fathers who must nap and supervise children simultaneously.
A non-related baby sitter or an informal arrangement with a neighbor. This is the second most common form of care.
Center-based programs.
Nursery schools. Preschool children whose parents can afford such care begin attending on a part-day basis, with sitters or family day care homes filling the gap until the work day ends.
Family day care homes. These homes are one of the least researched but most widely used types of care: they provide 78 percent of child care for working parents. They consists of private residences which take in children who are either related or unrelated to the resident. Less than 10 percent of family homes are licensed which is not to say that all unregulated care is undesirable. Unfortunately, a majority of such homes received low ratings in a widely-circulated discriptive study published in 1972, and this reputation may persist despite quite excellent facilities in many communities. This type of care can also be the most subject to parental dissatisfaction, especially when parents are unsure what a care agreement should cover. Such arrangements can be highly unstable: only half last longer than a few months. Public funding for these homes is almost non-existant, and licensing of family day care homes is not mandatory in at least ten states.
Parent cooperatives. Fathers or mothers share duties as caregivers for a specified number of hours, an impractical arrangement when both work during the day.
Day care centers. Centers are used less than any other arrangement and provide care for only about 2 percent of children of working mothers. Many refuse to accept children under age 2. Some centers require attendance on a full-time basis which fails to meet the needs of those working irregular hours or part-time. However, of all the child care arrangements used by mothers interviewed in Windows on Day Care, a 1972 survey, center care was the most popular because of the stable environment and the learning opportunities provided for children. Public day care centers are non-profit and are usually partially supported by public funds or by charitable organizations such as churches. Private proprietary centers are where the majority of existing center care takes place. Such businesses, including franchised chains, base their fees in terms of potential profit. Consequently, it is unusual for such centers to provide service in poor communities or to attract well-trained caregivers by offering competitive salaries or benefits.
"Arrangements unknown." One-fourth of all children of working parents, including some four million children under 14, are grouped in this category. The figure may be an underestimate since few mothers would be willing to admit that they are unable to provide "proper care." Included in this group of children are about 1.8 million 7-13 year olds who care for themselves until a parent returns from work. Five years ago, an estimated 18,000 children under age 6 were in self-care.
Work-based programs. In the late 1960s, a number of Federal agencies and private concerns began to establish child care centers at the workplace. But a trend toward workplace-based day care has failed to develop. One difficulty was that many working parents were already committed to other long-term arrangements by the time center care was available at work.
A small number of employers are assisting working parents by keeping registries of available day care services, granting vouchers to purchase day care, or by contracting with existing day care centers to hold spaces for children of employees.
With few exceptions (e.g. the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America, which operates child care centers for children of employees), labor unions have demonstrated minimal interest in child care problems of members. Until recently, the most obvious reason was the absence of women from union leadership. Consequently, child care has been missing from health and welfare packages in negotiations. Women workers are now urging their unions, with only mixed success, to make child care a priority issue.
WHAT EFFECT DOES CHILD CARE HAVE ON CHILDREN?
Opponents of child care persist in quoting early studies of children on the Israeli kibbutz. These initial findings indicated that children living full-time in centers away from their parents developed into "middling" people low on initiative. Recent evidence challenges such claims.
Findings in at least a half dozen current studies of several hundred preschool children report that day care children suffer no ill effects due to regular intervals of separation from their working parents when good substitute care is provided.
Research in the last ten years has shown that children with working mothers learn to be self-reliant, have fewer self-doubts, and are as well adjusted socially as children whose mothers stay home, full-time.
Kristin A. Moore and Isabel V. Sawhill write that children of working women have been found to be slightly higher in achievement motivation. They point to several earlier studies that have even found a positive relationship between IQ scores and maternal employment.
"A day care center or day care home can be like a good family in its influence on children — providing stable, warm relationships with caretakers and encouraging intellectual, emotional and social development of children or it can, like some family setting, ignore, brutalize… and destroy a child," said the team that wrote Toward National Policy, a 1976 report released by the National Research Council, National Academy of Sciences.
LEGAL RIGHTS OF HOMEMAKERS.
In his Commentaries on the Laws of England (1795), Blackstone defined the legal position of the married woman in terms that provided the model for American family law:
By marriage, the husband and wife are one person in law: that is, the very being or legal existance of the woman is suspended during the marriage, or at least is incorporated and consolidated into that of the husband; under whose wing, protection, and cover, she performs every thing … Upon this principle, of a union of person in husband and wife, depend almost all the legal rights, duties, and disabilities, that either of them acquire by marriage … The husband is bound to provide his wife with necessaries by law, as much as himself; and if she contracts debts for them, he is obliged to pay them; but for anything besides necessaries he is not chargeable.
Throughout the nineteenth century, this basic legal concept was liberalized and married women gained some rights to their property, their wages, and their children. At the same time, it has consistently supported the idea that the legal duty of the husband is to support his wife, in return for which the wife provides domestic services within the home. Judicial interpretations provide definite limitations to the implied economic security of married women.
Courts generally prefer not to interfere with the sanctity of the marital relationship and the husband's duty to support his wife is seldom enforced while the couple lives together. When living under the same roof, the husband may give his wife as little as he wishes to run the home, regardless of his income. A wife may charge necessaries to her husband but merchants may be reluctant to extend credit to a wife if they believe they may have to sue her husband and prove that the purchases were necessaries in order to collect. A 1953 Nebraska case, McGuire v. McGuire, established that "The living standards of a family are a matter of concern to the household, and not for the courts to determine… As long as the home is maintained and the parties are living as husband and wife it may be said that the husband is legally supporting his wife and the purpose of the marriage relation is being carried out." The support obligation is enforceable only at separation or divorce.
The wife's duty to perform work in the home, as defined by law, is regarded as a service owed to her husband and consequently is not interpreted as work or activity which merits economic rewards.
— Thirty-one percent of husband-wife families in 1973 depended upon the earnings of the husband. These wives were legally and economically dependent upon their husbands.
— Homemaking wives who become disabled get no benefits, even though their services to their families must be replaced, often at considerable expense. The family of a homemaker wife who dies receives no benefits.
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— Wives who work outside the home, but have left the work force for more than five years — perhaps to care for children — often get no return from their Social Security contributions. The reason: they have earned smaller benefits than they are entitled to as their husband's dependent.
— Women who have fulfilled their roles as homemakers may find themselves in their middle years "displaced" through divorce, widowhood, or other loss of family income. They are ineligible for AFDC if their children are over 18 years of age. They are ineligible for unemployment insurance because they have been engaged in unpaid labor in the home. They are often ineligible for Social Security and health plan benefits because they are too young. These women confront employment discrimination because they are women, are older, and have had no recent paid work experience. Consequently they are subject to one of the highest unemployment rates of any sector of the work force.
— Between 1950 and 1975, the percentage of women ages 35-64 who were divorced increased from 2.9 to 6.6 and of women age 65 and older from 0.7 to 2.6. During their period, the percentage of women who were widowed decreased slightly.
— The economic protection of dependent wives and children, always minimal, is being further eroded by the increase of no-fault divorce. Under this system, any leverage to secure adequate division of property, alimony, and child support is seriously weakened. Of the 46 states having some form of no-fault divorce, only nine recognize the "contribution of the homemaker" as a factor to be considered in economic arrangements at divorce.
— As the number of divorced women has increased, the number of female-headed families has also risen. Such families numbered over 7.2 million in 1975 — 13 percent of all families and approximately a 73 percent increase since 1960. Correspondingly, the number of children in female-headed families grew from 4.2 million in 1960 to 6.9 million in 1970 and to 10.5 million in 1975.
— In 1950 families with female heads had a median income which equalled about 56 percent of the median for male-headed families; in 1974 this had dropped to about 47 percent.
— In 1960 there were about 31 female-headed families for every 100 male-headed families below the poverty level, while in 1974 there were 85 female-headed families for every 100 male-headed families. The growth in the number of families with female heads below the poverty level occurred exclusively among families with children under 18 years old. Therefore, the number of children in female-headed families below the poverty level increased by approximately one-third between 1960 and 1974, and in 1974 the majority of children in poverty were in families headed by women.
Additional sources: Bureau of the Census, Bureau of Labor Statistics.
RAPE.
MYTH #1: Rape is an impulsive act of passion.
Fact: 71% of all rapes are planned: the place was arranged, enticement was used, or the victim was deliberately sought and a plan made to coerce her into sexual relations.
MYTH #2: Women cry "rape" as a form of revenge against former male friends.
Fact: Of adult victims (over the age of 18) the vast majority were raped by strangers. Children who are raped are more likely to know their assailant. A Washington, D. C. study on rape which divided the cases by age groups found:
| 1-12 | 78% knew their assailant |
| 13-17 | 82% knew their assailant |
| 18-24 | 37% knew their assailant |
| 25 or older | 28% knew their assailant |
Recent New York police sex squad statistics indicate that only 3.4% of rape complaints are unfounded, a rate comparable to those of other felonies. Furthermore, adult women are usually raped by strangers. When a law enforcement agency receives a complaint of a criminal nature and the investigation that follows discloses that an offense has neither occurred nor was attempted, the complaint is "unfounded". Of the number of "unfounded" rape complaints reported to the New York Police Department only .4% were false in the sense projected by the myth.
MYTH #3: Only women who dress provocatively and are in places where they shouldn't be are raped. In other words, women who are raped are asking for it in one way or another.
Fact: Women of all ages, races and economic backgrounds get raped. Rape Awareness in Miami reports that victims range from 2 months to 85 years old 34% were 15 years and under).
Most rapes are planned; only 16% are explosive acts. Physical force was used in 85% of the cases. The remaining cases involved various degrees of non-physical force such as coercion and intimidation with or without weapons. Rape is a violent crime were brutality is inflicted upon the victim.
In 52% of the cases the victim met the offender in a public place and then was coerced into accompanying the rapist to the place of assault.
MYTH #4: If you are going to be raped you might as well relax and enjoy it.
Fact: Victims' responses to rape reflect that the violence and intense trauma of the event was neither relaxing nor enjoyable. After being raped:
42% reported feeling afraid of men
28% said it affected their sex lives
27% felt less independent or more afraid of being on their own
23% said it damaged their trust in male-female relationships
18% felt worthless or lost self-respect
17% felt hostile toward men
10% sustained physical injuries
7% reported suicidal impulses
5% suffered nightmares
MYTH #5: No woman can be raped against her will.
Fact: Rape is a crime of violence, not sexual passion. Amir finds that in most cases (85.1%) some type of force is used, such as choking, beating, roughness, or use of a weapon.
MYTH #6: Women have rape fantasies which reflect their desire to be raped.
Fact: Rape is an act of violent aggression. As Molly Haskill points out in her article "The 2,000 Year Old Misunderstanding: Rape Fantasy." For a woman to fantasize rape in the correct sense of the term would be to fantasize not love or lust but mutilation and no sane woman and very few insane ones express such a desire, even unconsciously.
INCIDENCE
— The FBI has noted that of all the major offenses, rape "is probably one of the most underreported crimes due primarily to fear and/or embarrassment on the part of the victims." Other studies estimate that the actual number of sexual assaults against women of all ages may range from three and a half to nine times the number actually reported to police or medical facilities.
— In a report by the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments on the treatment of rape victims, forcible rape from the victim's perspective was described as "both a severe personal violation resulting in the loss of control over her sexual and self determination and an extremely frightening life-threatening situation."
— The Department of Justice report on victims of rape described it as "one of the most brutal of all crimes. Rape victims need sustain no physical injury to suffer severe and lasting pain; few crimes are better calculated to leave their victims with lasting psychic wounds.
— The Queen's Bench study, Rape Victimization, noted that 89 percent of the victims interviewed reported that the rape had "altered" their lives in a major way.
— A study by the D. C. Task Force on Rape reported that some medical personnel neglected to perform tests necessary for the collection of evidence for further prosecution, thus lowering the chance of convictions. Many doctors did not want to examine a rape victim, or if they did, falsified medical records for the court, minimizing or neglecting entirely signs of trauma in an attempt to avoid being called to testify. Some doctors are not trained in specialized treatment or in the methods of collecting evidence. Psychological counseling is not always available at a "time when empathy would go a long way toward abating future mental trauma. Frequently victims are not informed about methods of avoiding pregnancy and of the need for follow-up medical tests for venereal disease.
—Two researchers, Cathleen Schurr and Nancy Gager, maintain that one of the greatest gaps in current police methods in the lack of training given to police officers with regard to handling rape victims. As a result, many victims receive insensitive treatment, extensive and unnecessary questioning, and are treated with skepticism, while much needed evidence is lost in the process.
— The Metropolitan Washington study concluded that "unless a victim is able to receive positive support from those close to her or from an agency or service designed to provide this support, she may have greater difficulty coping with both the assault and her normal life for a long time."
— The low prosecution rate can be attributed to the administration of rape laws, according to legal experts. They report that "the victim is subject to peculiar pressures, humiliations, and traumatic, occurrences in the very process of prosecuting the crime. This occurs because the rape jurisprudence, that is, the case law evidence requirements, the instructions, and the operations of the jury itself, is based on a deeply suspicious view of both the nature of women and sexual intercourse."
— The common law definition of rape serves as the basis for most statutory and case law relating
to rape. According to this definition, rape is the unlawful carnal knowledge (penetration however slight)
of the victim by the alleged assailant, without the victim's consent. Other forms of sexual assault, such
as oral and anal contact and use of objects, are not included in this traditional definition. Under common
law, sexual intercourse by a man with his wife, although it may be
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—In most States the prosecution must prove that the victim did not consent. Her past sexual history can be introduced to show consent, as well as to undermine her credibility. While the woman's past sexual history may be considered admissable evidence, the past behavior of the defendant, even if criminal, is often not considered relevant.
—The consent standard is a feature unique to rape prosecution. Rape is the only crime in which the victim has to prove that she did not consent, and did not want—even subconsciously—to be raped.
—Judicial decisions and the verdicts of even the most representative of juries often influenced by Victorian anachronisms, according to one report. These include the suspicion that a "proper" person should have absorbed substantial physical brutality to evidence lack of consent; that prior sexual experience of consent; that prior sexual experience of any kind is reasonable evidence of possible misconduct or "provocation" on the part of an unmarried victim, that "nice girls don't get raped and bad girls shouldn't complain."
—While most States do not require corroborative testimony to bring a case to trial, such evidence is usually needed to get a conviction. Corroboration is any testimony or evidence other than testimony of the victims of the crime. In a rape case; corroborative evidence may include: torn clothing; bruises or injuries; medical evidence and testimony; promptness of complaints to friends, relatives, or police; the presence of semen or blood on clothing of accused and victim; lack of reason to falsify charges; the emotional conditions of the victim; evidence of breaking and entering into the victim's home; conduct of the accused when arrested; and the opportunity for the accused to commit the crime.
—In many cases of sexual assault no corroborative evidence exists. Criminals who intimidate their victims with weapons or threats of harm generally do not leave evidence behind. Women who are embarrassed, scared, or perhaps unaware of the procedure may not report the crime immediately. A lack of this evidence often allows the defendant to plead consent.
—Judges are required by law in some States, and by tradition in others, to instruct the jury that "rape is an accusation easily to be made and hard to be proved, and harder to be defended by the party accused, though never so innocent." Known as the Hale instruction, these words of caution date back to the 17th century jurist Lord Chief Justice Matthew Hale. Modern male authorities also assume that many innocent men have been convicted on the basis of false charges by women in spite of the difficulty of getting convictions.
—In reality rape is not a charge that is frequently falsely made. Recent New York Sex Squad Analysis Unit statistics indicate that only 3.4 percent of rape complaints are unfounded, a rate comparable to those for other felonies. The FBI reports that 15 percent of reported rapes nationwide are unfounded. These statistics do not differentiate between false accusations and unprosecutable rapes, that is, between cases where women actually lied about an alleged attack and those where the police could not establish a case.
BATTERED WOMEN.
Until recently, a man had a legal right to "correct his wife for her misbehavior." It is clear that wife beating still occurs.
While there are no nationwide statistics on wife assault, we do have data from pilot projects. For example, in Kalamazoo county, Michigan, there were 5,600 cases of assault a year in a county with 40,000 families.
In Montgomery county, Maryland, the police intervened in 285 cases of assault in 1974.
Wife assault cases comprised 35% of all of the assault cases reported to the Washtenaw county, Michigan, police departments.
In another study of forty families known to be violent, the researcher found that over one-third of the forty neighboring families also reported spousal assault.
And, spouse assault is a common cause of divorce. A 1966 study of divorce applicants found that 36.8% listed abuse as a complaint. Another study of 150 divorce prone couples found that 17% said that violence occurred in their marriage.
Public opinion condones a degree of spouse assault. The National Commission on the Causes and Prevention of Violence found that 25% of the men and 16% of the women surveyed approved of slapping a spouse under some circumstances.
The law also condones spouse abuse. The typical police practice in situations of domestic violence is to avoid arresting the assailant while emphasizing the physical safety of the police officers. This practice is usually justified by asserting that family disputes cause more police deaths than any other type of crime. However, this assertion is unproven. FBI statistics on police deaths are available only for the broad category of "disturbance" calls. Domestic violence is only one of many components of this category. Thus, there are no nation-wide data on the number of police killed while responding to domestic violence calls. Now, the police do not make the safety of the victims their primary concern. In addition, District Attorneys rarely prosecute those who assault their spouses. Many women don't prosecute for fear of reprisal.
The reluctance of law enforcement agencies to intervene on behalf of the victims of spouse assault has grave consequences. Such violence tends to be chronic, vicious, and often homicidal in intent. The Kansas City police department found that in 85% of the family homicides, the police had been called to intervene at least once; and in 50% of these cases, the police had been called upon at least five times. And, women were the most frequent victims of family assault and homicide.
What alternatives are available to abused women? While the legal remedies available to victims of spouse abuse vary greatly from State to State, the following options are being explored by women concerned about this problem. First, since the police rarely arrest the assailant, a victim may tell the police that she wishes to make a citizen's arrest. However, most people are not aware that they may do so, and the police rarely inform victims of this right.
In some States, efforts to change the law are aimed at broadening police powers of arrest. Washington State law permits the police to arrest a person believed to have committed a misdemeanor. In Florida, a bill was introduced which would permit the police to arrest without a warrant a person who is reasonably believed to have assaulted a spouse (HR3474, 1976). However, it is not clear that the police would exercise their power of arrest, since most training manuals used by local police forces follow the advice of the International Association of Police Chiefs to avoid arrest, restore the peace, and leave.
Another option which has attracted much interest of late is for the victim to seek temporary refuge in a shelter for battered wives. Volunteer groups of women, acting either alone or in conjunction with government and private agencies, have created at least twenty-nine such shelters across the country and many more groups of women are attempting to create additional refuges. These shelters are valuable in that they provide the victim with physical security and supportive counseling services which encourages her to take positive steps to reorganize her life away from her assailant.
The drawback to the reliance upon a shelter is that it disrupts the life of the victim and her children, while leaving her assailant in full possession of the family home. In some cases, the woman might be charged with desertion and she may jeopardize her rights in a subsequent divorce settlement. Therefore, one alternative to leaving the family home would be obtaining an injunction or temporary restraining order which bars the assailant from the family home and from further assaults upon the wife. New York and Massachusetts permit the issuing of such orders, while Maryland and Pennsylvania have proposed similar laws.
A final option is for the victim to sue her assailant to recover damages. The threat to sue might act as a deterrent and an award of damages could provide a woman victim some financial security as she begins a new life without her spouse. At present, only New York has a law permitting a spouse to sue the other spouse for intentional damage to person or property. Four States, Illinois, Louisiana, Hawaii, and Pennsylvania and Maryland Have proposed to correct this condition by removing "interspousal tort immunity".
Courts in eighteen additional States have reinterpreted common law to permit, in some circumstances, such suits by victims of abuse. However, the courts have not followed a uniform standard here. In Minnesota, the court required, "substantial evidence… (of) excessive or … gross abuse. …" The Virginia courts have only applied this right to sue to cases arising from automobile accidents.
However, twenty-three States still follow the common law rule which denies an assault victim the right to sue a spouse. Thus many women are effectively denied recourse for justice unless the legal authorities are willing to file criminal charges against the abusive husband. This rarely happens.
Although counseling services should be available to the couple who jointly want to resolve the problem of abuse and preserve their marriage, abusive behavior is difficult to reform. Professionals working with abused spouses suggest that divorce is often the only real solution. However, for many women — especially those without job skills and experience — divorce may mean a sharp drop in their standard of living. Very few women collect alimony and only about a quarter of the women having child custody regularly collect child support. Thus, if women are to have a real alternative to remaining with an abusive spouse, the laws affecting property settlements at divorce must be reformed.
LEGAL REFORM
The New York State law of 1937 may be a model for other States in removing spousal tort immunity. It states:
Right of action by or against married women, and by husband and wife against each other for torts.
A married woman has a right of action against her husband for his wrongful or tortious acts resulting to her in any personal injury…, or resulting in injury to her property, as if they were unmarried, and she is liable to her husband for her wrongful or tortious acts resulting in any such personal injury to her husband or his property, as if they were married.
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One common objection to the removal of inter-spousal tort immunity is that it might give rise to collusion between husband and wife in order to collect insurance payments. To prevent just such collusion, the New York State legislature enacted a law providing that no policy of insurance could cover liabilities of the insured because of death or injury to his spouse.
Also, the objection that such a legal change would produce a flood of trivial suits has been dismissed by the judges in several States who have permitted suits between spouses.
Finally, the argument that such suits would undermine marriage has been dismissed as ridiculous by several judges who argue that women should not be denied their right of redress.
The State of Massachusetts permits a woman to obtain a vacate order in conjunction with an action for divorce or separate maintenance. If necessary, a victim can obtain the order within twenty-four hours. Violation of the court order is considered a trespass and is enforced by the police. The order is in effect for ninety days and it can be renewed. The essential features of such an injunction are that it can be obtained, if necessary, very quickly and that it has strong enforcement provisions.
WOMEN AND THE MASS MEDIA
As long as newspapers and magazines are controlled by men, every woman upon them must write articles which are reflections of men's ideas. As long as that continues, women's ideas and deepest convictions will never get before the public.
Susan B. Anthony, 1900
BROADCASTING
A 1974 Screen Actors Guild study of prime-time network shows found:
| All roles | Small roles | |
| ABC 75.6% male | 75.3% male | |
| CBS 66% male | 66.7% male | |
| NBC 73% male | 75.1% male | |
Major findings from a 1975-1976 monitoring project conducted by the United Methodist Church included:
Women were under-represented in the world of television. A total of 1,095 characters appeared in the episodes coded; 345 or 32% were female; 748 or 68% were male.
The percentage of women portrayed in leading roles was even less than their distorted 32% representation on television.
Women's categories of problems and relationship roles clustered around family and romance. Those of men clustered around business and acquaintances.
In problem solving, men were portrayed primarily as being resolvers of problems faced by others.
Women were more likely to be portrayed in traditional female occupations (secretary, nurse) having low occupational authority. Women were supervised; men were more likely to be supervisors.
Women generally did not use aggressive or defensive force, but were victims of force.
PUBLIC OR NON-COMMERCIAL BROADCASTING
In 1975, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting released "A Report of the Task Force on Women in Public Broadcasting" which showed that of 28 television programs monitored (18 hours):
—200 characters were male; 36 were females (an 85% to 15% ratio),
—Eleven (of the 28) programs had no female participants;
—Only four black women were seen during the week monitored;
—Only 4% of the shows had female announcers/narrators.
The report concluded, "Women are not stereotyped on public television, they are overlooked."
In adult public radio programs, women fared slightly better:
— 428 of the voices were male, 127 female (a 77% to 23% ratio);
— Ten percent of the shows had female announcers, 10% jointly, 80%