As the founder of the CALIFORNIALIST, a political action committee to elect women to California State government, I’m often asked why I dedicate my energies to electing Democratic women. The answer: I was raised by a single mother in the 1960′s. Growing up there weren’t many single moms, let alone women who worked. While my childhood was very stable and happy, I knew that my family looked different because I did not have a dad in the home. I also had a mom who worked. And then there were the little things that happened that just seemed odd at the time, but today would be defined as discriminatory.

My mother was a teacher, but all of my friend’s mothers were stay at home moms. In 1960, women made up 32.3 percent of the U.S. workforce. Women earned 60 cents for every dollar earned by men. Most women had jobs as teachers or nurses because they paid more. In 1960, there were no women bus drivers, welders, firefighters, news anchors, CEOS or Supreme Court Justices. Women college professors, doctors, scientists, or lawyers were rare and 35% of bachelor degrees were awarded to women in mostly women only colleges.

As an example, when my mother bought her first house she had to have my grandfather co-sign the loan documents. The 1960 the U.S. Census reported that 62.1% of Americans owned their own home. However, single professional women had a hard time even getting a mortgage because banks worried that they would get pregnant and couldn’t work. Many retail stores would not issue independent credit cards to married women. Divorced or single women often found it difficult to obtain credit to purchase a house or a car.

In contrast, last week I had lunch with a lovely young woman who I met at a political fundraiser. Her comparison to women of the 60′s could not have been more different. She worked and planned to continue working after having children. It seemed an improbability to even fathom not working. All of her friends worked, many of them earning more than their husbands. None of the challenges that my mother faced were part of the reality of my coffee date. She owned her own home. Her confidence, clarity, and optimism were inspiring. We have come a long way.

Women’s rights and their influence have evolved throughout my lifetime. As a result, today we have 33 women representatives in the California legislature. It’s better than it was in 1960. As the upcoming election unfolds, women’s issues will be discussed and analyzed. As the discussion unfolds, we must learn from my mother’s experience and protect the optimism of the young women. The discussions during the Republican primary cannot be forgotten. Birth control, which was approved during the 1960′s, remains an issue in this election. Back to the 1960′s?

With issues like access to birth control, equal pay for women, and affording higher education on the forefront of the Democratic platform nationally, today’s generation of young women need us to remind them that there is still work to be done. Our college students are graduating into the worst economy in recent memory, which will affect their career opportunities for their entire lives. Although we’ve come along way, our young generation is at risk of moving backwards.

Thank you Mom! My mother’s journey taught me the value of having opportunity and equality. Her courage also taught me that anything is possible. I applaud you for being part of a societal change, although difficult at times, to move society forward. With you as my role model, anything is possible!

CALIFORNIA LIST Plan for the 2012 Primary – Please Renew Your Membership!

Last weekend our household received our primary voter pamphlet reminding us that upcoming the election is upon us. I’ve been in the political business long enough to usually get a sense of what will happen, but this election is an exception. With redistricting and our new top tier voting system, we have no idea how tough of an election our women candidates will face. Unofficially, it looks like we will lose three to five Democratic women in the Assembly.

Although you have not heard from us directly, CALIFORNIALIST has been studying the new districts, meeting the declared candidates, and researching the different races. Our CALIFORNIALIST pipeline remains strong, stronger than we first anticipated, but the unknown factors of this election threaten the number of women we elect.

While this is an unpredictable year, it is also a winnable year, but we all must work together to make sure that we build the pipeline as well as support those women candidates who have been with us. Our plan for the election season is as follows:

*We are going to focus on our online giving. There will be weekly emails featuring a candidate CALIFORNIALIST believes merits your support.

*Additionally, this year we are going to raise money for an independent expenditure. We think that in order to have some political muscle, we need to join the forces of an independent expenditure to let the powers that be know that electing women is important.

*As always, we will also continue to partner with our sister organizations to pool our resources in various campaigns.

Please Join Us by Becoming a CALIFORNIALIST Member Today!

Thank you for your continued support of the CALIFORNIALIST. Together we will continue to make a difference in California by helping elect women in 2012.

In the spirit of Thanksgiving, CALIFORNIALIST would like to thank our partners in our efforts to elect Democratic women in California and all those who are courageous enough to run for office!

In the past ten years, CALIFORNALIST has worked with different women’s organizations throughout California. Thank you to our partners: EMERGE California, NWPC, Democratic Women of Monterey County, NOW, African American Women’s PAC, Santa Barbara Women’s Political Committee, Run Women Run, the Los Angeles Women’s Political Committee, HOPE, NARAL Pro-Choice America, Planned Parenthood, Project 2012, and EMILY’s List. It is through our partnerships that we can reverse the current decline in the number of elected women here in California. Thank you!

CALIFORNIALIST also would like to thank the women whom we supported for serving California. The challenges facing California are enormous and we appreciate your legislative efforts. The accomplishments of our elected women are too numerous to list here, but a few recent examples of our endorsed candidates who have made a difference include:

• In her continuing efforts to protect children from sexual predators online, Assemblymember Cathleen Galgiani introduced Assembly Bill 755 (AB 755), the California’s Electronic Securing and Targeting of Online Predators Act (E-STOP) on April 25, 2011. AB 755 will require convicted sex offenders to register their email addresses and online identifiers and service providers with the California Department of Justice. That information is then made available to social networking sites, such as MySpace and Facebook to assist them in removing sexual predators from their sites.

• State Senator Christine Kehoe, one of the very first candidates we ever supported, authored The Equal Benefits Bill (SB 117) which was signed by Governor Jerry Brown on September 22, 2011. Senator Kehoe’s ongoing commitment to eliminate discrimination in the work place is evident in this legislation barring the State of California from entering into contracts in excess of $100,000 with businesses and other entities that deny equal benefits to the same-sex spouses of their employees.

• Authored by Assemblywoman Betsy Butler and co-authored by State Senator Fran Pavley, The Toxin-Free Infants and Toddlers Act, known as the Bottle Bill, was signed by Governor Jerry Brown on October 4, 2011. Despite intensive lobbying by the American Chemistry Council, AB 1319 will ban sale of products with the toxic chemical Bisphenol-A (BPA) from baby bottles and sippy cups.

2012 ELECTION

Once the new districts were announced, CALIFORNIALIST has been working to identify the new Democratic women candidates for California State government. Who is running in what District or what seat is still under consideration for many candidates. The disturbing trend we see is the lack of women running for the Assembly. We continue to identify candidates across the State. CALIFORNIALIST will provide a list of potential candidates after the December 30 filing deadline with the Secretary of State.

EMILY’S LIST CANDIDATE TRAINING OPPORTUNITY

Since there are not many women running for office, we are partnering with EMILY’s List to train potential women candidates.

EMILY’s List is a national political donor network and political resource for pro-choice, Democratic women candidates. In 2001, following an alarming drop in the number of women holding elected office, EMILY’s List created the Political Opportunity Program (POP) to recruit, train, and support pro-choice, Democratic women ready to wage and win viable campaigns for state and local offices.

The next candidate training in Los Angeles is scheduled for Saturday, November 19, 2011. The training will be held downtown.

Training open to all women; whether currently serving on the school board or in the State Assembly or just beginning to think about running for elective office. We are certain this training will provide pro-choice, Democratic women with the skills and inspiration needed to successfully run for office.

The program, including materials and meals is free, however space is limited! Partial participation is not possible – you must make a commitment to attend the full program in order to be allocated a seat at the training.

You can register for the training by clicking the link below. Registration will be closing soon, so sign-up today.

SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA CANDIDATE TRAINING

CLOSING THOUGHTS

CALIFORNIALIST also thanks our donors. As we move forward into the 2012 election cycle it is important to be appreciative for our past accomplishments. But there is still much work to be done because the number of elected women continues to decline. In a recent CNN poll nearly three-fourths of Americans – 74 percent – say the economy is still in a recession. To close budget shortfalls, often social programs that affect women, families, and children are placed on the chopping block – especially those concerning reproductive rights. This is why CALIFORNIALIST remains vigilant in our efforts to recruit, train, and to elect more women who will work to safeguard women’s rights. Together with you, our supporters, we can make a difference. Thank you!

SUSAN CLOKE
Mirror Columnist

Meetings in public parks, speaking from makeshift platforms, using the media to get the word out – sound familiar? In 2011 it’s “Occupy Wall Street.” In 1911 it was “Votes for Women.” Different goals define each historical issue. The one constant is that, to change the status quo, people have to speak out in a major voice.

Ms. Magazine wrote about the California suffragists, “No one could say that suffrage supporters hadn’t tried, or become overconfident and quit too soon. During the year they had overcome rain and mud, then heat and dust on the state’s primitive roads to stage debates or give speeches to even the smallest, most remote audiences. They held giant rallies – one in Los Angeles on Sept. 30, 1911 was so well-attended that hundreds were turned away after 5,000 jammed Temple Auditorium and overflowed into Choral Hall. The suffrage effort had garnered support from labor, prominent citizens, newspapers and even a few politicians, and it had matched anti-suffragists ad for ad in the newspapers. On the day of the special election, supporters began assembling at 4 a.m. to go out and stand as near as the law allowed to each polling place to give out literature to the undecided. Cars flying “Votes for Women” pennants were kept busy all day carrying sympathetic voters–all men, of course–to the polls. They rode past many blocks on which there was almost a solid yellow line of suffrage banners hung from houses, telegraph and telephone poles, and anything else to which they could be nailed or tied.”

Celebrating the extraordinary work and the success of the California suffragists, the fact that California has elected women to every level of government and is represented in the United States Senate by Senator Diane Feinstein and Senator Barbara Boxer, more than 150 people filled the auditorium of the Santa Monica Bay Woman’s Club to honor the work of the past, to acknowledge the gift to us, and to think about our responsibility to the future.

Greeted by club members dressed as suffragists, and eating donuts with “Votes For Women” tags, an idea taken from photos of the 1911 rallies, the audience learned, from speeches by UCLA Professor Ellen DuBois, Librarian Virginia Elwood-Akers, and the Martha Wheelock and Jane Guthrie film, “California Women Win the Vote,” exactly how difficult it was, how much work it took, to pass the 1911 amendment to the California Constitution that made California the sixth state with women’s suffrage.

California was already ahead of the rest of the country on the issue of equality. In 1878 the California Constitution was amended, adding the following, contemporary-sounding language, “A person may not be disqualified from entering or pursuing a business, profession, vocation, or employment because of sex, race, creed, color, or national or ethnic origin.” (Article 1 Section 28); “No person shall be debarred admission to any department of the university on account of race, religion, ethnic heritage, or sex.” (Article 9). California women could go to the university and they could work, but they didn’t have the right to vote.

The 1911 election was a cliffhanger. It took several days for the vote to be tallied and victory to be declared. Initial returns had shown defeat, especially in San Francisco, and newspapers had headlined the defeat. In Los Angeles it passed by a narrow margin. According to Joanne Leavitt, President of the League of Women Voters of Santa Monica, the vote for suffrage in Santa Monica was 414 for and 361 against. The Evening Outlook, which had come out in favor of votes for women, took for itself the right of registering the first female voter in Santa Monica.

The California journalist and suffragist, Alice Park, in telling of the narrow victory, famously said on the day the final vote was tallied and the suffragists were victorious, “…men stopped me on the street to congratulate me. Everybody seemed to approve… No man can be found who voted no. They must have died the same day.”

The history of the Woman’s Clubs is intertwined with the story of suffrage. Originally started to provide women a place to learn and study as well as a place to participate in civic life, they became an essential part of the movement for women’s suffrage in America.

The Santa Monica Bay Woman’s Club was formed in 1905 and included Georgina Jones and other prominent Santa Monica women in their roster. Its first president, Elmira Stephens, is listed on the rosters of national committees organized to support suffrage. With help, in the form of a land donation from Santa Monica founder, Arcadia Bandini, the Santa Monica Woman’s Club purchased the 4th Street property and the Club is still in the same, now historic, building. Jessica Hankey, a current Woman’s Club member and officer, sees the Santa Monica Bay Woman’s Club as “a tremendous resource that has survived for over 100 years and is here now for the community.”

In the words of one of the SaMoHi students who attended the celebration, “What can we do at this point to get things moving toward full equality?”

And really, isn’t that the right question for each generation to ask?

As Founder of an organization dedicated to electing Democratic female candidates, I believe that no matter what party, all women should take note of the recent ad running against California Congressional candidate Janice Hahn. It is degrading to women everywhere as well as offensive in so many other ways. But, I can’t stop thinking about the ramifications of this kind of advertising.

The advertisement from Turn Right USA uses offensive language and images that undermine the political process. There should be a certain level of dignity and respect for our political process, but the false sense of anonymity in our electronic age appears to be eroding our basic societal civility. We should heed the old saying that civility costs nothing, yet buys everything.

Some of the comments I read mention how funny this ad is. Are we all just supposed to laugh at this? When we as a society accept this type of character assassination that incorporates pornographic illustrations, we have all but eliminated social decorum. By allowing ourselves to become desensitized to the basics of sexual harassment or targeting women as being ‘less than’ within the electoral process, then we are traveling down a slippery slope.

The advertisement also takes away from what the real issues are – how do we move the State of California and the country forward? The ad is distracting and any possible point about policy or political differences are lost in its sheer provocative format.

The past few months I have been traveling around California hosting discussion groups to talk about electing women to political office. While we have been focusing on whether or not gender matters, the underlying theme for us is that there are fewer female candidates running for political office. I believe the process of getting elected has become so offensive and humiliating it can be a deterrent to eliciting those who want to run for public office.

Our focus group last month on the campus of UC Santa Barbara showed that young women today are politically savvy, but remain optimistic in their world view of the political process. Often in their outlook that equality is a basic right clouds their comprehension of just how far we are as a State and Nation from achieving that goal.

Where this ad and our discussion groups collide is fascinating, considering that the media and messaging ideas were examined by the group at UCSB. What does this breakdown in political civility say about the effect on a young women’s desire to run for office or their ability to see themselves running – especially, as we heard, when the upcoming generation doesn’t see gender as an issue?

Our discussion at UCSB was thought provoking. The former President of Alpha Phi, Ericka Kwiatkowski, did an excellent job organizing a group of 30 students, not all from Alpha Phi, but definitely from the Greek system. We were also joined by Mary Nisbet, the Dean of Letters and Sciences, Santa Barbara Supervisor Janet Wolf, and the Chair of the Women’s Studies Department Eileen Boris, all discussing the importance of electing women. It was like a great divide between the younger and more mature age groups.

One of the older women said, “Yes, I definitely look at gender when I vote for a candidate,” which was seconded by Kimberly Parent, who runs the Women’s Center. The young women looked at her as they were puzzled at the thought of her gender specific response — “Why?” they wondered. For the younger generation have been raised that gender, color, race, or religious preference should not come into play. How a candidate stood on the issues mattered most – until they heard that only 24 percent of legislators serving in our California State Government are women and there is a possibility that there will be no women in the Los Angeles City Council next year between Councilwoman Jan Perry being termed out and Councilwoman Janice Hahn’s decision to run for higher office and her term limit. That was a puzzling statistic for them, but there was no clear call to action for them to get up and rally for change.

The UCSB focus group was eye-opening. During a time when women in Saudi Arabia are fighting for the right to drive and the Supreme Court rejected the Walmart women employee discrimination suit and the promise of future ads like the one against Janice Hahn, this shows that we must remain vigilant to our cause to bring women’s equality in an ever changing world. I don’t have any answers, but our work at CALIFORNIALIST reaffirms the importance of reaching out to as many socio-economic and diverse groups as possible and continuing the discussion. If you’d like to help organize a discussion group in your area to further this important discussion, please contact me at bduval@californialist.org.

Rep. Chu began political life in her San Gabriel neighborhoods, but she’s no typical valley girl! During her more than 20 years as a public servant, Rep. Chu has served on the Garvey School District as a Board member, was a three term Mayor of Monterey Park, was elected to the California State Assembly, and was elected to the Board of Equalization where she served as Chair.

Rep. Chu has fought to protect working families, end discrimination, save healthcare, protect the environment, protect women, protect consumers, improve education and worked to close special interest tax loopholes. Now she has distinguished herself as the first Chinese American woman to ever serve in Congress winning her seat with 62% of the vote in the March special election. With her background, we can all rest assured that Rep. Chu will bring her passion, commitment, and integrity to represent our State in the Nation’s capitol.

Congratulations Rep. Chu, you are a shining example to the power of the pipeline!

So, where are all the women leaders of tomorrow? California is facing a crisis in the feminist fight for equality. Only 33 women currently serve on our state legislature and just 6 women have ever held an Executive Branch office. Each election cycle we lose more women to term limits and the pipeline of new women leaders has slowed to a trickle. There are many reasons, but research shows women are choosing not to run because of the daunting hurdles facing our female candidates. Raising huge amounts of money to run a viable race, making personal sacrifices, and all too often defending themselves from gender based biases from their opponents.

Unfortunately, the pipeline for future women leaders is dwindling on every level. City councils, supervisory boards, and boards of education are all reporting fewer numbers of women running and winning locally. Watching Rep. Chu being sworn reminded me once again how important it is to elect women at each level of government.

We need more women to run for office. Rep. Chu’s election to serve California in Washington, D.C. confirms the power of the pipeline! Rep. Judy Chu probably never thought she would be working in the House chamber when she first ran for the Garvey School District Board. Today she will cast her first votes as a member of Congress — I encourage women to follow Rep. Chu’s example because when you start small, you can accomplish big things. Congratulations again to Congresswoman Judy Chu!

Those of us who work tirelessly to advance this cause realize that we are still far from equality, especially in the workplace. During his announcement the President said, “The purpose of this Council is to ensure that American women and girls are treated fairly in all matters of public policy.” I say, it’s about time!California is known for leading the way when it comes to governmental policy, and women’s issues have long been an important focus for the Golden State – especially when it comes to electing women. From Esto Broughton, who was a suffragette and one of the first women elected to our state legislature, to Nancy Pelosi, the first woman Speaker of the House – California women often lead the charge for equality. In fact, many of our cities have already established resources for women and girls dating back to 1974, through the creation of Commissions on the Status of Women. Up and down the state, from San Diego to San Francisco, the commissions are dedicated to serving as a source and a networking channel on issues that impact women and girls throughout the state. In Los Angeles alone, the Association of California Commissions for Women supported the introduction 13 pieces of legislation on behalf of women in California in the 2007/2008 legislative session. And in most cases, those bills were drafted and sponsored by women legislators.

CALIFORNIA LIST understands that elected women are most likely to advocate issues that matter to women in our state – that’s why we know electing women is important. Many of our endorsed candidates who were elected to serve in the legislature are avid voices for equal pay for woman, elder care, and women’s health issues. Assemblywoman Julia Brownley stood firm against human trafficking with AB 2810; Assemblywoman Cathleen Galgiani fought against the exploitation of minors with AB 426 and former Senator Sheila Kuehl drafted SB1489 to establish workplace protections to domestic violence and sexual assault victims. CALIFORNIA LIST supported these women early in their campaigns because electing women matters!

We’ve come a long way, but there is still much to be done. Today, only 33 of our legislators in California are women and that number continues to drop each election cycle. In 2010, we will lose six women due to term limits – we must reverse this decline if we are truly to fulfill the promise of democracy for all people.

A serious focus from Washington on fairness and equality for women will help. Legislation is moving through the House of Representatives to create a Commission on Women and Girls. Please sign this letter to the California delegation urging them to support it.