A Seat of One's Own

I recently read A Room of One’s Own, a classic essay by Virginia Woolf based upon a series of lectures Woolf gave to women’s colleges at University of Cambridge. Woolf creates a fictitious sister of William Shakespeare, equal in talent and genius. Unable to go to school or use her gift for poetry, the character kills herself one night, alone and in despair.

Woolf ponders the writing of female novelists, such as Charlotte Brontë. “Would the fact of her sex in any way interfere with the integrity of a woman novelist, that integrity which I take to be the backbone of the writer? In [...] Jane Eyre, it is clear that anger was tampering with the integrity of Charlotte Brontë the novelist.” Woolf says that the old and forgotten women novelists take the tone of “meeting criticism”—a female novelist would say things “by way of aggression, or that by way of conciliation. She was admitting that she was ‘only a woman,’ or protesting that she was ‘as good as a man.’” Woolf also bemoans the fact that there were few female writers that could be used as role models to young aspiring women.

Our society has certainly come a long way since the days of Charlotte Brontë. Even by 1929, when A Room of One’s Own was first published, the tide of women’s rights was already beginning to turn. Women could attend college, have ownership of their own property, and vote. Woolf writes, “When you reflect upon these immense privileges and the length of time during which they have been enjoyed [...] you will agree that the excuse of lack of opportunity, training, encouragement, leisure and money no longer holds good.” After legal rights for women were enacted in the early 20th century, more and more women entered the workforce. The nation’s top universities eventually opened their doors to women, and women have entered the top tiers of business, medicine, law, and journalism. But has this new wave of equality reached the government?

The first woman to serve in the United States Senate was Rebecca Latimer Felton. She was appointed by the governor of Georgia to serve for an entire day in 1922, at the age of 87 (she was also the last former slave owner to be a U.S. senator). Since then, there have been 37 women senators. Over a third of those senators were appointed, seven after their husbands passed away in office. Currently, there are seventeen women serving in the Senate. If you want to go by the theory of descriptive representation (the idea that for someone to represent your interests, he or she must be part of your demographic), it doesn’t seem right that over 50% over the population is represented by only 17% of senators.

After Hillary Clinton was nominated to be the new Secretary of State, the spotlight was on Governor David Patterson of New York to pick a suitable replacement. Some of the most vocal of those demanding he pick another woman were so-called “women’s groups.” I say “women’s groups” skeptically because I don’t believe that these groups really advance an agenda that is positive for women.

“We need more representation of women. We need more women’s voices at the table,” said Kim Gandy, president of the National Organization for Women.

“I think there are a lot of women who can fit that bill, and it’s really important to us that we don’t lose another seat in the U.S. Senate,” said Cathy Lasry, president of the Eleanor Roosevelt Legacy Committee, according to CNN. “I think that we’ve proven that once we are in there, obviously we can govern. ... We just need that extra push and some help in getting in there.”

These two organizations then urged women to call the Governor to tell him that they wanted a female senator.

Women’s “rights” groups such as EMILY’s List and NARAL applauded Patterson after Representative Kirsten Gillibrand was chosen as Clinton’s replacement. They didn’t “lose” another seat in the senate as once feared.

The comments from women’s groups remind me quite poignantly of Woolf’s criticisms of the earlier female writers. When they plead with the governor to pick a woman for the senate seat, there are undertones of “don’t pick the best person for the job, pick the best woman for the job.” When they say that women are capable of governing, they just need an extra “push” to get there, it sounds like “we can be just as good as men, but only if we have a little bit of help.”

As a conservative, I was pleased with Governor Patterson’s pick for Columbia’s new senator. He surely could have chosen a more liberal senator in a state like New York, yet he selected a person with a strong record of supporting gun-owners rights and opposing the expansion of government in the Troubled Assets Relief Program bank bailout bill. Did he pick the best person for the job or the best woman for the job? That’s hard to quantify. But when framed by the women’s groups, one might think there was a distinction between those two descriptions. Isn’t that a little bit, well, sexist?

Lauren Salz is a Barnard College sophomore. She is the executive director of the College Republicans and the Communications Coordinator of the Columbia Political Union. Check Your Premises runs alternate Wednesdays. Opinion@columbiaspectator.com