Politics the Feminist Machine

By Jill Smolowe

The ABCs of this election year are a woman candidate's dream. A is for abortion, or more precisely the attack on abortion rights that has enraged pro-choice voters in both major parties. B is for the backlash against the all-white, all-male Senate Judiciary Committee, which rubbed women's emotions raw last October with its insensitive handling of Anita Hill's sexual- harassment charges against Clarence Thomas. C is for change, the latest political buzz word for voters and candidates alike. "Men are running around saying, 'I'll change things,' " says Harriett Woods, president of the National Women's Political Caucus. "When a woman merely stands up, people say, 'She'll change things.' "

Those three factors are fueling an unprecedented surge of activity that could make 1992 a breakthrough year for women in politics. As of last week, among women, 18 Democrats and three Republicans were running for the Senate, 96 Democrats and 47 Republicans were running for the House, and eight -- five Democrats and three Republicans -- were running for Governor. This will be a record-breaking year for women if more than 10 Senate candidates and 70 House candidates secure their party's nomination. Fund raising for female candidates has reached new highs. The National Women's Political Caucus and the Women's Campaign Fund, which finance women candidates from both parties, report that contributions are double what they were at this point in the 1990 election cycle. Emily's List, a seven-year-old political-action committee that supports pro-choice Democratic women, will provide funds for up to 30 candidates, more than twice as many as in 1990. The group's membership has trebled to 9,000 since 1990; 10% of it is male.

Female candidates seem poised to make their largest gains in the House, where they occupy 29 of the 435 seats. Redistricting has created at least 17 open seats, and the number of voluntary retirements is now up to 49. House Speaker Thomas Foley predicts that as many as 100 new members will be elected this year. Because women are viewed by many voters as quintessential political outsiders, they could benefit from the anti-incumbent rage that has erupted over the congressional check-kiting scandal. The demise of the Soviet Union has allowed voters to be less concerned about foreign affairs and defense budgets (read: men's issues) and placed new emphasis on social concerns, such as family-leave policy and day care (read: women's issues).

Public-opinion surveys indicate that when women politicians are compared with their male colleagues, they are perceived to be more honest, caring and moral; more responsive to constituent concerns; and more likely to engage citizens in the political process. Women also score better on the issues that cut close to home, among them welfare, health care and education. When it comes to the electorate's No. 1 concern -- the economy -- voters seem inclined to let women take a whack at the mess. "There's a feeling we should give women a chance," says Douglas Muzzio, a political scientist at New York City's Baruch College. "They can't do much worse than the men." Certainly voters seem very receptive to the idea of women in high office. In a Times- Mirror Center poll, 69% of the respondents (74% of women, 63% of men) felt the U.S. would "be better off if more women served in Congress."

But will all this translate into electoral victories come November? As of 1990, registered female voters outnumbered males 60 million to 53 million. Yet gender voting -- the selection of a candidate mainly on the basis of sex -- has not been a significant factor in elections. But some female activists think that is about to change. Harriett Woods predicts that the lingering image of the all-male Senate panel sitting in judgment of Anita Hill will prompt large numbers of female voters to back women candidates because of their sex. "They're going to go to the voting booth," she says, "and literally try to change the face of American politics." Ruth Mandel, director of the Center for the American Woman and Politics at Rutgers University, predicts that this year may go down in the books as the one "in which women voters joined with women candidates."

So far, there are only sketchy indications that the electorate will divide along gender lines. "There may be a strong desire among women to elect more women to higher office, but I'm not so sure it is a compelling desire," says Mervin Field of the San Francisco-based Field Institute. "In the final analysis for women and men, the chief criteria will be competence and whether a candidate is aligned with the voters' views." Muzzio, who analyzes polls for the Los Angeles Times, agrees. "There is no monolithic women's vote," he says. "Gender is overplayed by pundits."

That theory is being put to its biggest test in California. This year the state will elect two U.S. Senators: one for a full six-year term as a successor to retiring Democrat Alan Cranston; the other to serve the remaining two years in the seat vacated by Republican Pete Wilson when he was elected Governor in 1990. Women are running for both seats on feminist platforms. Former San Francisco Mayor Dianne Feinstein, who narrowly lost the statehouse to Wilson, is a candidate for the two-year seat. She is stamping much of her fund-raising merchandise 2% IS NOT ENOUGH, a reference to the current count of only two women in the 100-member Senate.

Barbara Boxer, a five-term Democratic Congresswoman who is running for the six-year seat, is also playing the gender card. In her race against two male opponents, she relentlessly sounds the refrain that men who are strong on women's issues aren't good enough; only a woman will do. The risk is that such tactics will alienate more voters than they attract. "This whole business has got very shrill," says political analyst Joe Scott of the California Eye, a Los Angeles-based newsletter. "It reaches a point where it is counterproductive and reverse sexism."

The four-way race for New York's Democratic Senate nomination poses a different challenge: Which of two strong female candidates should women support? Both Geraldine Ferraro, Walter Mondale's vice-presidential running mate in 1984, and New York City comptroller Elizabeth Holtzman are veteran politicians who need no introduction to voters. Yet their rivalry has stirred deep divisions among progressive women who seemingly cannot stomach the thought of two women competing for the same office. Holtzman finds the quandary absurd, particularly since she and Ferraro stand far apart on certain issues. Ferraro, for example, backs the death penalty, while Holtzman opposes it. "Women are capable of making a distinction between two women, and have been from time immemorial," she says. Ferraro quite agrees. "Tell those women to start acting like grownups," she says. "The men can always figure out whom to vote for."

Another candidate who has excited interest among women is Carol Moseley Braun, who upset incumbent Al Dixon in the Illinois Democratic Senate primary in March. Feminists seized on her triumph over Dixon, who voted for Thomas' confirmation as a Supreme Court Justice, as evidence that the Hill-Thomas backlash would propel women to power. "That was an improbable victory," says veteran feminist Betty Friedan, "so now it seems like an augury of things to come." But was it? Braun, a strong supporter of abortion rights, owed her victory less to women's anger than to the arrogance and myopia of her rivals. Both Dixon and challenger Al Hofeld, a lawyer, found Braun so insignificant -- perhaps because she was a woman, perhaps because she was black -- that they ignored her. While they knocked each other out, she finished first with 38% of the vote.

But Braun's candidacy may prove a harbinger on an entirely different front: the growing strength of the abortion-rights issue -- particularly when there is a female pro-choice candidate championing the cause. Until now, pro-life voters have been more likely than pro-choice supporters to judge candidates solely on the abortion issue. With Roe in jeopardy, that may be changing. Shortly after Braun's victory, her conservative Republican opponent, Richard Williamson, reversed his long-standing opposition to abortion.

What happens if, come Election Day, women do not make great gains at the polls? Will there be a sense of defeat after such high expectations? There shouldn't be, given the successes of this campaign season. Women's concerns are high on the national agenda. The presence of so many women on the campaign trail has chipped away at the novelty of female candidates; it is now thinkable that someday women candidates will simply be taken for granted. "It's a boost no matter what happens," says Katherine Spillar of the Fund for the Feminist Majority. "Those who don't win will be better positioned to run and win next time." Women candidates are scoring big in 1992 -- and the election is still seven months away.

With reporting by Wendy Cole/New York, Jeanne McDowell/Los Angeles and Elaine Shannon/Washington