Where are the Women in 2012?

2008 was almost too much for people like me who study women in politics.  Can we reminisce for a moment?  Hillary Clinton, former first lady and senator of New York almost won the democratic nomination for president.  Sarah Palin, whose name many of us didn’t even know how to pronunciate at first burst onto the scene as gun-toting mother of five who looked more than a little like Tina Fey. 

I wrote two books, Almost Madam President:  Why Hillary Clinton ‘won in 2008 and Gender and the American Presidency:  Nine Presidential Women and the Barriers They Faced (co-authored with Ted Sheckels and Diana Carlin) blogged and commented to my heart’s content.  It was a very good time.  But now, with no woman on the ticket in 2012, where can we look to gain clues about how women will advance in politics absent a woman on a national ticket?  

Until the election I will identify the significant women of 2012 in upcoming blog posts and consider their impact on the election. 

Who are they?  The wives of the candidates?  Secretary of State Clinton? Governors?  Senators? Candy Crowley, the debate moderator?  What about the women political pundits?  Can they be a voice for women?  You’ll have to read my blog to see what I uncover.

I’ve been thinking that the progress for women gained in  2008  (and before) must not be lost even in an election cycle barren of women candidates.

Don’t tell me that the only woman representing a candidate is the one in the box for sale at Toys R Us!

Stay tuned!

Ellen McCormack Was an Anti-abortion Democrat Who Ran for President in 1976 and 1980

 

And I never heard of her until I read her obituary in The New York Times on March 30th.

Not that I am keeping track of the name of each woman ever to make a bid (I have read that more than 100 have done so), but she was quite successful and then seemingly slipped out of the public eye. 

This seems to be especially true for women candidates.  They not only receive less press when they run, they are quickly forgotten when they stop running.  That’s why every new book, chapter, article or blog that is written about women presidential candidates in the United States is worth reading.  Jo Freeman noted Ellen McCormack on her Web site.

Maybe we need a study about the “invisible” women presidential candidates like  McCormack, an antiabortion activist who drew attention to her cause and created controversy over campaign finance rules.  McCormack became the first female presidential candidate to qualify for Secret Service protection and federal campaign subsidies.

Before she made her presidential bid she had never held a political office.  She felt passionate about speaking out against a woman’s right to an abortion, cemented with the landmark Supreme Court decision Roe v. Wade decision.  She is the only Democratic presidential candidate to advocate for a constitutional ban on abortion. 

Her grassroots campaign garnered over 200,000 votes in 18 primaries.   At the convention her name was placed into nomination along with Governor Jerry Brown,   Jimmy Carter and Rep. Morris K. Udall. 

She is survived by four children, including a son just down the way in Yardley, PA.  Tempting research project.

                Maybe we should be keeping a list of each and every woman who made a bid for the presidency. 

 

Women candidates as FORCES

This Thursday, March 11th the Women’s Campaign Forum,   a non-partisan national network dedicated to achieving parity for women in public office will hold a big, fancy fundraiser in New York City known as the “parties of your choice gala.”  This is the 30th year that the event has been held and  the entire reason for the event is spelled out on the cover of the invitation:  getting more women into positions of power within the government.  Also on the invitation are quotes from political powerhouses who give thanks to the Women’s Campaign Forum for helping them to become elected.  Geraldine Ferraro noted “WCF was there for me in my first campaign.”  Senator Barbara Boxer said, “It it hadn’t been for WCF, I wouldn’t have come to Washington.” 

I’ll be at the event as an author,  discussing the research I found in two books about women and the United States presidency.  I’ve been asked to condense my findings in a one-minute “elevator speech” so to speak, so here’s the ‘blog version.’  In two books,  Paving the Way for Madam President  (Lexington Books, 2008) and Almost Madam President:  Why Hillary Clinton ‘won’ in 2008 I have uncovered some successful traits of “must dos” for women presidential candidates.  Since I study speech and I’m not a political scientist, I’ll stick to the stylistic needs of women candidates. 

Dos for women to be FORCES as candidates:

 F  orceful Announcement of  your candidacy.   Declare you want to win.  Do not hesitate, because doing so will cast doubt on not only your candidacy, but your ability to govern once elected.  Women candidates must show they are in and “in to win” (not settle for the vice presidency.)

O   ut-smart everyone by knowing all the issues inside and out.  If you are not sure of something pertaining to the election, do not run until you do.  Women’s lack of knowledge is magnified on the campaign trail. 

R ock your workout and get into the best physical shape of your life.  Campaigning is tough and you must have stamina.

C ut a predictable figure in your clothes.  Develop a clothing style that is easy to wear, simple and is predictable.  Same with your hair:  easy, simple and predictable.

E xhibit rhetorical elasticity:  the public speaking style that moves from a masculine to a feminine style with ease.

S lough off the media criticism.  It will come.

This a list of “must dos” for women candidates.  We will have more women in government when they run their campaigns as the FORCES they are.

Nichola D. Gutgold is an associate professor of communication arts and sciences at Penn State Lehigh Valley.  www.nicholagutgold.com

More women governors will lead to Madam President

Why don’t more women governors become presidential candidates?  Barbara Lee, president of the Barbara Lee Foundation created a guide, titled “Keys to the Governor’s Office” to help women running for governor.  At first, her interest was on women and the presidency, but she notes that “as I understood more about the paths to power, it was clear that electing a woman president would become a reality only after we unraveled voters’ complex reactions to a woman seeking full executive authority.”

Marie Wilson, president of The White House Project also notes the importance of the role of governor to increase women’s participation on the national stage.  “Look at governors from large states,” she told me when contemplating who may win the presidency.  Brenda DeVore Marshall and Molly A. Mayhead, editors of Navigating Boundaries:  The Rhetoric of Women Governors, note, “the increasing importance of the state governor throughout the history of the country, coupled with women’s steadily expanding role in the office, demonstrates that the face of leadership has changed.  It also indicated that examining the women who are governors in America would be a good place to start when identifying women most likely to make successful bids for the presidency.  But that doesn’t seem  the case and it begs the question:  “Why don’t more women governors run for president?”

Currently, there are six women governors.  Jennifer Granholm of Michigan is out because of her Canadian birth.  Still, of the five women governors eligible for the presidency, rarely do we hear of them as contenders.  They include Linda Lingle, Republican of Hawaii, who like Democrat Chris Gregoire have won two terms and enjoy high approval ratings.  M. Jodi Rell, Republican governor of Connecticut has announced her retirement.  Other governors include the newly elected Beverly Perdue, Democrat of North Carolina and Jan Brewer who as secretary of state of Arizona was next in line to succeed Janet Napolitano when she became Secretary of Homeland Security.  Though a small cadre, it begs the question:  why don’t the names of these women don’t come up when presidential politics are discussed? 

Is the rough media treatment of women candidates a deterrent?  Are women who would otherwise plunge into presidential politics thinking twice when they consider the sexist media treatment of Hillary Clinton and Sarah Palin?

Communication scholar Erika Falk, notes in her book Women for President:  Media Bias in Eight Campaigns  that “if women have a negatively skewed  impression of their chances of winning they may be less likely to run, and this may be the most important and worrisome potential outcome of press  coverage of women.”

Governorships are the surest paths to the presidency.   When we elect more women governors and more women governors become presidential candidates then a woman president will be more likely.

 Nichola D. Gutgold is associate professor of communication arts and sciences at Penn State Lehigh Valley and author of Almost Madam President:  Why Hillary Clinton ‘won’ in 2008 (Lexington Books, 2009).