When Maine Senator Margaret Chase Smith, a Republican, ran for her party’s presidential nomination in 1964, she was sixty-six years old. She had been a member of the House of Representatives for eight years and a United States Senator for sixteen years. But, as the National Women’s History Museum web site notes, the political pundits of her day were more concerned about her age and whether she was going through menopause than whether she had the experience to lead the country. Senator Smith pointed out that getting older was not a factor for men running for office. Ah, but that was the mid sixties before the feminist movement in the seventies, right?
I am fifty-six. I was a child in the 1960s, a teenager in the 1970s and a young adult in the 1980s and so on. I could not get a paper route because girls were not allowed to be paper carriers. I, a Catholic, could not be an altar server because girls were not allowed to be altar servers. I could not play on a little league baseball team because not only could girls not play on boys teams, there were no teams for girls. That has changed. My nieces had paper routes. Girls are altar servers though some in the Catholic Church trying to stop girls from being altar servers. Mo’ne Davis made history when she pitched in the Little League World Series.
I still remember male comedians in the late 1970s perhaps even into the early 1980s telling jokes about what would happen if a woman were elected President of the United States. Women were too emotional, too irrational and too prone to moodiness and mood swings. If a woman became too upset, she might just push that button and shoot off off a nuclear warhead if someone upset her. Perhaps the only woman who might possibly be stable enough would have to be past both menstruation and menopause. Of course then she would be too old! Those type of jokes were never told about men. Ah, but that was over thirty years ago and much has changed since those days. Women have made so many strides and shattered so many glass ceilings. Women have proven they can do their jobs at any stage of their lives, right?
In 1995, just twenty years ago, the words “Someday a woman will be PRESIDENT” were printed on a t-shirt along with a drawing of Margaret, with a happy expression, from the Dennis the Menace comic strip. Those words were enough to get that shirt removed from Walmart because some shoppers found them offensive. I read about the incident in a magazine. I was stunned to think that in the mid 1990s the idea of a woman being President of the United States offended anyone. I immediately went in search of the shirt which I found at another store. I wore that shirt proudly for awhile then put it away and wore other shirts. Ah, but that was the mid 1990s and things are different now, right?
When she was asked what would be different about her Presidency and why it would not just be a continuation of President Obama’s presidency, Hillary Clinton responded by saying that she is a woman and that would certainly be a difference. There were woman who were offended by her remark and women who found her remark off-putting. Perhaps they do not think gender should be used as a basis for answering a question as to how one’s term as President would be different from another’s. Perhaps they believe that we have surely reached a point where defining one’s ability and/or differences based on gender must be obsolete. The reality is that Hillary is absolutely correct. She will bring a different set of life experiences, a different story, based not only on her childhood upbringing, her education and work but shaped also specifically by her gender. That is something uniquely different from the 44 men who have held the office of President of the United States.
When Senator Margaret Chase Smith announced her candicacy for President in 1964, she said “women before me pioneered and smoothed the way for me to be the first woman to be elected to both the House and the Senate.“ If Hillary Clinton becomes the first woman to be elected President of the United States, she will be standing on the shoulders of every woman who fought to shatter those glass ceilings and prove that women are as capable of doing a job as men are. She will be the first and how well she does will help determine if there will be more women Presidents. Unlike her male predecessors, she will be judged not only on how well she does the job but also on her gender. If men do not do well in jobs, then the general opinion tends to be that they were not the right men for the jobs. But with women, their failures can often lead to the conclusion that all women are not right for the jobs.
Moderately liberal, liberally moderate, American flag waving Democrat! Bachelor of Arts in History with concentration in Early American History and Abraham Lincoln
Graduate student pursuing a Master of Arts Degree online in American History at Southern New Hampshire University