Did Title IX spring up out of nowhere?
Of course not! It was part of a growing awareness of the inequities women faced in society. Today, I’ll share a smattering of the events, laws, books and movements that fueled changing societal attitudes about women.
Here we go!
The Equal Rights Amendment. Alice Paul and Crystal Eastman introduced the ERA as the Lucretia Mott Amendment in 1923. They worked for the gender equality law for the rest of their lives, although as of today, the amendment has not passed.
Equal pay laws. In 1945, Congress introduced the Women’s Equal Pay Act. It didn’t pass, but in 1955, Rep. Edith Green (D-OR) introduced the Equal Pay Act. The law passed in 1963, and Rep. Green went on to help write Title IX.
Civil rights movement. Women played a crucial role in the civil rights movement of the 1950s and ‘60s, especially at the grass roots level. For example, Septima Clark designed programs to teach African American citizens how to read and write. Her idea for “citizen education” became the cornerstone of the movement. From women like Clark and suffragists like Mary Church Terrell, who lived into the mid-1950s, women learned how to mobilize for a cause.
The President’s Commission on the Status of Women. President John F. Kennedy established this commission in 1961 to address discrimination against women in education, the work force, and federal benefits programs like Social Security. Former First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt headed the organization.
The Feminine Mystique. Betty Friedan’s book, published by W.W. Norton in 1963, examined the lives of her Smith College classmates, finding that women weren’t totally fulfilled as wives, mothers and household managers. “There was no activism in that cause when I wrote it,” she said. “But I realized that it was not enough just to write a book. There had to be social change.”*
NOW. The National Organization of Women was founded in 1966 by 28 women, including Friedan and Shirley Chisholm, who became the first Black congresswoman two years later. NOW addresses both gender and racial inequality. Today it has about 500,000 members around the country.
The bra burners. In 1968, a group of women staged a protest at the Miss America beauty pageant in Atlantic City, New Jersey. They threw bras, lipsticks, pots, pans, mops and high heels into a “Freedom Trash Can.” (The can wasn’t actually burning, as police put the kibosh on fires.) The protest drew in women who had been on the fence about feminism. “We were young radicals, just discovering feminism because we were tired of making coffee but not policy,” said organizer Robin Morgan.**
The Women’s Equity Action League. Elizabeth Boyer and members of NOW founded WEAL in 1968 to raise women’s status through legal action and legislative change. WEAL officer Bernice “Bunny” Sandler, the “Godmother of Title IX,” discovered the loophole in Executive Order 11246, signed by President Johnson in 1965, that barred discrimination by federal contractors based on sex. Because almost all colleges and universities had federal contracts, she thought the order could apply to them. It was the foundation for Title IX.
Our Bodies, Ourselves. This 1970 book, self published by a group of women in Boston, celebrated women’s bodies, health and sexuality. It encouraged women to view themselves as independent, whole persons rather than as passive partners for men. By 1972, publisher Simon & Schuster came calling, and today the book has sold more than 4 million copies.
Ms. magazine. Journalist and activist Gloria Steinem started Ms. magazine in 1971 as an insert in New York magazine. It quickly eclipsed the day’s women’s magazines, which focused on fashion, food, husband hunting and child raising. By 1972, it was a stand-alone magazine. BTW, civil rights activist Sheila Michaels invented the “Ms” title in 1961, when she wanted to complete forms without including a marital status. “There was no place for me [as a single woman]. I didn’t belong to my father and I didn’t want to belong to a husband,” she said.***
So there you have it… a brief course in the birth of the women’s movement!
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* Ben Wattenberg. Interview of Betty Friedan for The First Measured Century. (weekly PBS program). https://www.pbs.org/fmc/interviews/friedan.htm
** “100 Women: The truth behind the ‘bra-burning’ feminists,” BBC News (September 7, 2018). https://www.bbc.com/news/world-45303069 Morgan later said she regretted targeting the contestants. “After all, they were mostly working-class women trying to get a free scholarship.”
*** Eve Kay,“Call Me Ms.” The Guardian (June 29, 2007).
NOTE: Image shows Septima Clark (left) and a Miss America protester (right).