“Republican Hostile Challenge To Women”: Romney, Santorum, And Gingrich Need A Lesson In Women’s History
Disaffected women are packing up to flee the Republican Party in the wake of the War on Women, The Washington Post reported on its front page. Meanwhile, President Obama’s re-election campaign is sending out a massive signal to energize pro-choice women and welcome them into the Democratic Party, The New York Times said on its Sunday front page.
Good, good. Women are clearly the critical constituency to choose the next president. That’s just what the Republican Party deserves for its hostile challenge to women and girls making their own decisions about their own lives. Sometimes you wonder if Republican candidates know that women actually have the right to vote. Let’s face it, neither Mitt, Rick, nor Newt is exactly a woman’s man. They are out-and-out men’s men.
Has former Gov. Mitt Romney or former Sen. Rick Santorum or former House Speaker Newt Gingrich ever read Virginia Woolf? Do they even know who Margaret Sanger is? What about the spitfire Quaker Alice Paul? She led the women suffrage movement to victory over seven or more years of struggle. This happened in 1920, like 92 years ago, gentlemen. Paul took women’s suffrage public, to the streets and to the White House gates, where the strategy was to remind President Woodrow Wilson what the right thing to do was. Paul and other suffragettes were arrested, abused, and force fed in jail. Nothing would stop them until women won the right to citizenship in our democracy.
Note: women suffrage was not given; it was taken. We women today should study pages from Paul’s book on civil disobedience, especially if the War on Women continues to close in on overturning Roe v. Wade, the cornerstone Supreme Court decision that makes reproductive rights—human rights—legal and private.
Margaret Sanger brought you and me birth control. She made up the useful phrase in the interest of saving women’s lives. As a nurse, she was outraged to see young married immigrants on the Lower East Side dying in childbirth or from botched abortions. The death of Sadie Sachs was the catalyst, she said, a 28-year-old mother who begged a doctor to tell her how to prevent another pregnancy. “Well, it can’t be done,” he answered. “I’ll tell you the only thing to do….Tell Jake to sleep on the roof.”
Months after witnessing that predicament, Sanger answered a call to the Sachs home, where she found Sadie Sachs on her deathbed, surrounded by a scene of her weeping family.
Sanger’s cause came from that personal encounter. “The sun came up and threw its reflection over the house tops. It was the dawn of a new day in my life,” she declared. “I would tell the world what was going on in the lives of these poor women.” In 1916, she opened a women’s health clinic in Brooklyn and founded the organization that became Planned Parenthood, the gleam in the eye of one spirited, determined woman. Like Roe v. Wade, it has been besieged lately, as another front in the War on Women.
Sanger’s life is an incredible mirror of her times, especially the free-thinking, defiant mood of Roaring ’20s. Like her contemporary Paul, she too got arrested and spent time in jail in 1917. Under a court order not to give a public speech, she gagged herself and stood next to the eminent historian and Harvard professor Arthur Schlesinger, Sr. as he read her words. She traveled the world to seek ways of safe birth control. Unfortunately, she subscribed to an intellectual trend called eugenics (before the Nazi era.)
Paul and Sanger would ask, what’s wrong with us, defending what’s already been done? If I were to interview them today, they would be eager to know what progress women have made. And what would I tell them—President Clinton’s Family and Medical Leave Act?
They might say to me that their endeavors went beyond the ballot and women’s health. These were vehicles to empower women to speak with their own voices and to determine their own destinies to make this more truly a democracy.
Virginia Woolf, the brilliant English novelist, essayist, and diarist, created the feminist metaphor of a room of one’s own in a manifesto on furthering women’s liberties in life. She lived in the same age as Sanger and Paul. Such a shame these three never met.
Getting back to Romney, Santorum, and Gingrich, well might we ask how much room there is for women in their Americas.
By: Jamie Stiehm, U. S. News and World Report, March 13, 2012
“A Foiled Power Grab”: Voter ID Laws Face Major Roadblocks
Texas Republicans have been trying for years to pass a law that would require state voters to show identification before hitting the polls—and state Democrats have been equally determined to stop such a measure. The Rs came close in 2009, but the House Democrats, only two seats away from a majority, blew up the legislative session rather than see the measure pass. By 2011, however, fresh from Tea Party victories, the GOP had overwhelming majorities in both Houses. The bill was almost undoubtedly going to pass, and rather than go for a more moderate version of voter ID with non-photo options, the conservatives went for the gold, introducing one of the most stringent versions of a voter ID requirement. The only option left for the Democrats was to set up the grounds for the legal battles sure to come.
Monday, it looks like those efforts paid off. The Department of Justice has blocked the law, meaning that while the measure goes to the United States District Court for the District of Columbia, the Lone Star State won’t be allowed to enforce the measure. Not every state must seek permission before changing election law, a process known as preclearance. The entire reason Texas must preclear changes to its election law stems from the state’s history of civil rights abuses. 50 years after the Voting Rights Act was passed, it seems the feds are right to keep their guard up.
Of the many problems the DOJ outlines in its letter to the state, one major point came up repeatedly during the legislative debate on the subject: the plight of rural voters. Democratic senators hit hard on the problem of access to state drivers’ license offices; in the letter, the DOJ notes 81 of the state’s 254 counties lack operational drivers’ license offices. The DOJ also notes that in rural areas the gap between Hispanics and non-Hispanics who have the necessary ID is “particularly stark in counties without driver’s license offices.” The senators were also vehement in discussing the hardships low-income voters would face both in terms of logistics and in terms of monetary costs. The DOJ finds that someone lacking the necessary documents to get an ID would have to start by obtaining a birth certificate—at minimum $22.
The question, not surprisingly, stems from whether Hispanic voters will be disproportionately affected by the new hurdles. The DOJ is fairly damning here, looking separately at two data sets provided by the state, one from September 2011 and one from January 2012. The state failed to explain discrepancies between the two sets of data, but more importantly, the two sets both show similar trends. Latino residents are significantly less likely to have the identification necessary for voting. Furthermore, the letter notes that the state has done almost nothing to educate voters about the coming change: “The state has indicated that it will implement a new educational program;” the letter reads, “but as of this date, our information indicates that the currently proposed plan will incorporate the new identification requirement into a general voter-education program.”
The state attorney general has already filed a preemptive lawsuit, so the next step is the D.C. Courts. But in the meantime, the law can’t go into effect—a legal win for the minority rights groups and Democrats fighting against the state. It’s not the only victory. As the DOJ issued its letter, a second judge in Wisconsin has blocked the state’s measure to require idenfication. Back in December, the Obama administration nixed a similar proposal from South Carolina.
To me, the partisan quality of the debate stains almost everything. Last week, I wrote about Connecticut’s efforts to increase voter turnout—a rare example in the midst of efforts to make voter more difficult. I’ll say now what I said then. These measures have obvious partisan consequences—and voter ID would help Republicans and hurt Democrats in political races. It’s obvious that concern for power is motivating many of the actors in the debate.
But voting is a holy act in democratic governments. It’s a powerful right, one people have struggled and died to exercise, and only relatively recently have minority communities had the necessary legal protections to get to the ballot box. The fact that the DOJ’s decision may benefit one political party is hardly worth mentioning when one considers that it also benefits basic rights of citizens.
By: Abby Rapoport, The American Prospect, March 12, 2012
Defying “A Throwback To 40 Years Ago”: Americans Still Support The Birth-Control Mandate
To go back to The Washington Post poll for a moment, there is a little good news if the Obama administration is still fretting over its handling of the contraception mandate.
By a margin of 61 percent to 35 percent, Americans believe that health insurers should be required to cover the full cost of birth control for women. This even extends to religious-affiliated employers—like hospitals—which were the focal point of the controversy. According to the poll, 79 percent of those who support the birth-control mandate also support it for religious-affiliated employers.
Now that the controversy is over, for the most part, it’s obvious that this is good territory for the administration, and they should continue to press their advantage. Already, as The New York Times reports, Republican missteps have created an opening for Obama to improve his standing with moderate and Republican-leaning women. Indeed, as the year goes on, I expect that this view will become a little more prevalent:
“We all agreed that this seemed like a throwback to 40 years ago,” said Ms. Russell, 57, a retired teacher from Iowa City who describes herself as an evangelical Christian and “old school” Republican of the moderate mold. Until the baby shower, just two weeks ago, she had favored Mitt Romney for president.
Not anymore. She said she might vote for President Obama now. “I didn’t realize I had a strong viewpoint on this until these conversations,” Ms. Russell said. As for the Republican presidential candidates, she added: “If they’re going to decide on women’s reproductive issues, I’m not going to vote for any of them. Women’s reproduction is our own business.”
In the same way that Democrats should avoid preemptive celebration, Republicans should proceed with caution. It’s one thing to alienate single women, who lean Democratic anyway. It’s something else entirely to scare suburban white women from the GOP coalition. In a world where that happens, it’s hard to imagine Republican control of anything, much less the White House.
By: Jamelle Bouie, The American Prospect, March 12, 2012
“It’s Always In The Future”: When Do We Get To See Obama’s Radicalism?
Last week I wrote a post mocking conservatives for their relentless search for the next secret videotape that will expose Barack Obama as a dangerous radical, the latest of which was the shocking revelation that as a law student, he supported his professor Derrick Bell’s efforts to diversify the Harvard Law School faculty. Unsurprisingly, conservatives reacted by saying that I just didn’t get it (here‘s a sample). It’s worth saying a bit more about this phenomenon, because we surely haven’t seen the last of it, both in the campaign and in Obama’s second term, should he win one.
The search for the radical associations in Obama’s pre-political history began almost as soon as Obama’s presidential candidacy began in 2007. Some conservatives (and that’s an important qualifier; many conservatives understand that this stuff is nuts) have been positively obsessed with uncovering Obama’s radical associations. They have also insisted that those associations are closer than anyone thinks. So it isn’t enough that Obama once served on a charitable board with former ’60s radical Bill Ayers; some want us to believe that Ayers actually ghostwrote Obama’s books! Obama didn’t just speak at a rally supporting Derrick Bell; he hugged Bell, which just shows how close they were!
And all of this is supposed to lead to something, something about Obama’s presidency. Not even the craziest among the conspirators thinks that Obama is, today, taking orders from Ayers. But they would no doubt assert that he doesn’t have to, because in his youth Obama drank so deeply from their cup of extremist America-hating that he will be doing what the likes of Ayers want anyway.
So here’s my question: When do we get to see Obama’s radicalism?
I’m not talking about Affordable Care Act-type radicalism. I mean the real radicalism. The Weather Underground radicalism. The Black Panther radicalism. The dismantling of capitalism, the closing of the Defense Department, the demotion of white people to second-class citizenship. When is that going to come? Can they give us the litany of Obama policies that represent the realization of the visions of the ’60s radicals who supposedly control his mind across the decades?
Because after all, the point of the supposedly shocking revelation about Obama’s past isn’t to help us understand what has already happened but to give us a preview of what is to come. For instance, some conservatives believe the auto bailout is a key component of Obama’s nefarious socialist plan. But you don’t need to know when Obama spoke with Bill Ayers 15 years ago or what he said about Derrick Bell 20 years ago to understand the auto bailout. You can look at the actual auto bailout. No, the shocking revelation is supposed to warn us about new radicalism, the radicalism to come that can only be appreciated if you grasp the full implications of the people Obama was hanging around with a couple of decades ago.
So what exactly is it that they’re warning America about? When do we get to see this crazy radical Obama? If they’re pressed, there is an answer to this question: In his second term! That’s when the mask will be torn off, and the true Obama revealed. Sure, he might be governing like your average center-left Democrat now, but that’s only because he’s been lulling us into a false sense of security, so he can get re-elected and then begin his true project of remaking America, when Angela Davis gets nominated to the Supreme Court, private property is outlawed, and half the public gets herded onto collective farms. Or something.
To people who have a grip on reality, the things Barack Obama will do in a second term aren’t particularly mysterious. We don’t know exactly what will happen, of course, but we’ve got a pretty good idea. He’ll try to solidify the ACA, his signature legislative accomplishment. He may try to achieve tax reform, which could involve slightly higher rates for the wealthy, although he’ll need Republican cooperation to do it. He’ll try to extricate us from Afghanistan, and he doesn’t seem too keen on starting a war with Iran. And so on. Conservatives will dislike most of what he does, and liberals will like most (but not all) of it. In short, though the details aren’t easy to predict, in its broad strokes a second Obama term will probably be a lot like the first Obama term. You’d have to be pretty crazy to believe otherwise.
By: Paul Waldman, The American Prospect, March 12, 2012
“Waiting For Mr. Roberts”: Is There A Constitutional Right To Contraception?
Is there a constitutional right to privacy underpinning the right to contraception? Suddenly, in this political climate, you can’t be sure, no matter what the U.S. Supreme Court said in 1965.
The high court ruled 7-2 in Griswold vs. Connecticut the state law forbidding the use of contraceptives was unconstitutional, in part because of due process, but mainly because it violated “the right of marital privacy.”
But the court of nearly 40 years ago that produced Griswold, the Warren Court, was one of the country’s most liberal, far more liberal than the current court and its consistent 5-4 conservative majority.
And Griswold’s finding of a right of privacy hiding in the “penumbra” of the Bill of Rights has been mocked over the years by conservatives. There is no absolute certainty that if the issue were brought before the Supreme Court today that Griswold would survive — though there is no certainty that it wouldn’t.
As recently as 2010, Justice Antonin Scalia, a conservative paladin speaking to an audience at UC Hastings College of the Law, dismissed the Griswold ruling as a “total absurdity.”
What exactly did the Griswold ruling say?
The late Justice William O. Douglas wrote the prevailing opinion. Three other justices joined him, and three more joined the judgment for different reasons.
“The Connecticut statute forbidding use of contraceptives violates the right of marital privacy which is within the penumbra of specific guarantees of the Bill of Rights,” Douglas wrote.
“We do not sit as a super-legislature to determine the wisdom, need, and propriety of laws that touch economic problems, business affairs or social conditions,” he said. “This law, however, operates directly on an intimate relation of husband and wife and their physician’s role in one aspect of that relation.
“The association of people is not mentioned in the Constitution nor in the Bill of Rights. The right to educate a child in a school of the parents’ choice — whether public or private or parochial — is also not mentioned. Nor is the right to study any particular subject or any foreign language. Yet the First Amendment has been construed to include certain of those rights.”
The Connecticut case “concerns a relationship lying within the zone of privacy created by several fundamental constitutional guarantees. And it concerns a law which, in forbidding the use of contraceptives rather than regulating their manufacture or sale, seeks to achieve its goals by means having a maximum destructive impact upon that relationship. Such a law cannot stand in light of the familiar principle, so often applied by this [Supreme] Court, that a ‘governmental purpose to control or prevent activities constitutionally subject to state regulation may not be achieved by means which sweep unnecessarily broadly and thereby invade the area of protected freedoms.’ … Would we allow the police to search the sacred precincts of marital bedrooms for telltale signs of the use of contraceptives? The … very idea is repulsive to the notions of privacy surrounding the marriage relationship.
“We deal with a right of privacy older than the Bill of Rights — older than our political parties, older than our school system,” Douglas said. “Marriage is a coming together for better or for worse, hopefully enduring, and intimate to the degree of being sacred. It is an association that promotes a way of life, not causes; a harmony in living, not political faiths; a bilateral loyalty, not commercial or social projects. Yet it is an association for as noble a purpose as any involved in our prior decisions.”
The late Justice Potter Stewart, joined by Justice Hugo Black, dissented. Stewart said the Connecticut law might be “asinine,” but he could not find anything in the Constitution to forbid it.
“Since 1879 Connecticut has had on its books a law which forbids the use of contraceptives by anyone,” Stewart wrote. “I think this is an uncommonly silly law. As a practical matter, the law is obviously unenforceable, except in the oblique context of the present case. As a philosophical matter, I believe the use of contraceptives in the relationship of marriage should be left to personal and private choice, based upon each individual’s moral, ethical and religious beliefs. As a matter of social policy, I think professional counsel about methods of birth control should be available to all, so that each individual’s choice can be meaningfully made. But we are not asked in this case to say whether we think this law is unwise, or even asinine. We are asked to hold that it violates the United States Constitution. And that I cannot do.”
Griswold applied to married couples, but has since been expanded by the courts to all adults.
Nearly four decades later, contraception is once again under fire. Essentially, the Obama administration ignored the old adage, “Never poke a bear with a stick.” For bear read the U.S. Catholic bishops, who don’t think contraception is proper practice for the 21st century.
In February, U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius issued an interim rule, mandating health insurance plans for all employers, including religiously affiliated institutions, include coverage for birth control, sterilization and other preventive services. The rule caused outrage among Catholic leaders and top officials of the Republican Party.
Feeling the heat, Obama then announced a rule modification: Women may have access to free preventive care, including contraceptive services. But if a woman’s employer objects to birth control on religious grounds, then the insurance company will be required to offer the woman contraceptive care directly, without a co-pay.
The policy was slammed repeatedly on the campaign trail by Republican presidential contender Rick Santorum, a conservative Catholic who said even the amended rule was an attack on religious freedom.
The issue ensnared Santorum’s purportedly more sophisticated rival Mitt Romney.
When Republican senators unsuccessfully tried to enact a measure that would allow employers to opt out of any healthcare coverage to which they objected on religious or moral grounds, Romney at first told an interviewer he was “not for the bill.” When the reaction set in from conservatives, Romney said what he meant was that he “strongly supported” the Senate measure, but misunderstood the original question.
Conservative radio hammer Rush Limbaugh turned up the heat under the dispute after a young law school student testified before a congressional panel that contraception was a necessary part of women’s preventive healthcare, Limbaugh said she wanted taxpayers to pay for her having sex. He also called her a “slut” and a “prostitute.”
Last month, a group of U.S. states went further. Seven filed suit in Lincoln, Neb., contending the amended administration rule violates the First Amendment’s freedom of religion guarantee. The suit was joined by several Catholic organizations.
John Witte, Jonas Robitscher professor of law, Alonzo L. McDonald distinguished professor and director of the Center for the Study of Law and Religion Center at Emory University in Atlanta, told The Christian Post the courts probably will rule against the administration.
The Religious Freedom Restoration Act was enacted by Congress, and signed by President Bill Clinton, in 1993. The act prohibited government from putting a substantial burden on individual or group freedom of religion unless there is a compelling government interest. If there is such a compelling interest, the act said, government must show it is acting in the least restrictive way.
The U.S. Supreme Court, in a 6-3 decision in 1997, struck down most of the law. But the majority, led by Justice Anthony Kennedy, left in place the restriction on the federal government even though it excluded state actions.
That interpretation was confirmed in a unanimous 2006 Supreme Court decision involving the importation of natural drugs from South America for religious purposes. Though the natural substance was banned by federal law, Chief Justice John Roberts said in the opinion the Supreme Court agreed with the lower courts — the federal government had failed to demonstrate a compelling interest in banning the sacramental use of the drug.
That violated RFRA, Roberts said.
One bright spot for contraception defenders: Kennedy wrote the 6-3 majority opinion that struck down the Texas sodomy law in 2003, and told the government to get out of the bedroom. He often completes the 5-4 conservative majority now holding sway at the high court, but in 2003 he joined and led the court’s liberals, saying, “Liberty protects the person from unwarranted government intrusions into a dwelling or other private places. In our tradition the state is not omnipresent in the home.”
By: Michael Kirkland, UPI, March 11, 2012
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