FEMINISM In the 1980’s!

The Glass Ceiling:

• In 1989, according toLabor Departmentstatistics, women,African-Americans andHispanics comprised lessthan 1% of the nation’schief executives 

• Discrimination towards women in the work force, but very subtle, so to not violate any obvious laws

Feminist Majority Foundation:

Is dedicated to, "devis[ing] long-term strategies and permanent solutions for the pervasive social, political and economic obstacles women face."

Feminization of Power Campaign: went all over country to seek out electable women and encourage them to run for office (1987)

-“the more women who run, the more women will win”

-National Organization for Women (NOW) president, Eleanor Smeal 

Artificial Insemination:

1988: In the Matter of Baby M ( a battle of parental rights) Debate on whether surrogate motherhood was ethical… Some feminists believed a woman should have the right to do

what she wants with her body… others believed that women deserve their motherly rights, and must be granted them unless they are unfit to mother

Mary Beth Whitehead, biological mother of Baby M, was not granted the rights to her child by New Jersey Supreme Court’s Judge Harvey Sorkow on March 31, 1987 and on February 2, 1988 a New Jersey Supreme Court Justice reversed Sorkow's decision

“The New Jersey Supreme Court decision also prohibited additional surrogacy arrangements in that state unless "the surrogate mother volunteers, without any payment, to act as a surrogate and is given the right to change her mind and to assert her parental rights."”

Sandra Day O’Connor: First woman to serve as

an associate justice on the U.S. Supreme court (1981)

First woman on a state senate, and in 1973 was elected Republican majority leader