By Pia-Luisa Lenz
Women in South Carolina are special: They live in the only state in the nation with an all-male Senate. Despite the candidacies of U.S. Sen. Hillary Clinton and Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, 2008 did not become an extraordinary election year for U.S. women. In South Carolina, for the first time in three decades, no women will serve in the Senate. Women picked up three of 124 seats in the S.C. House; 17 will serve in 2009. But not even one woman will serve in the 46-seat Senate.
For Donna Dewitt, chair of the Southeastern Institute for Women in Politics, the need for women as representatives is based in the fact that “Many times women bring a different perspective to issues. While men may not be as aware of these issues, strong women leaders are instrumental in helping men to understand them.”
Women nationwide made a net gain of one seat in the Senate, bringing the total to 17 women and 83 men, and a net gain of three seats in the House, from 71 to 74 women and 361men of 435 seats, according to the Center for American Women in Politics of the State University of New Jersey.
“The fact that we have no women in the S.C. State Senate tells me that we have regressed a bit in the last 20 years because we have had a woman who was a lieutenant governor, with Nancy Stevenson; we’ve had a woman member of the U.S. House of Representatives, with Liz Patterson; and we have had quite a few women in the State House of Representatives,” says Marcia Beazley. The 66-year-old Columbia resident has always been interested in the progress of women in South Carolina.
However, “2008 was a record, and it managed to get us from 23.7 percent of women serving in state legislatures to 24.2 percent,” says Debbie Walsh, director of the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, N.J.
While women are not represented in the Senate in South Carolina, in New Hampshire women now hold a majority in the state Senate, 13 out of 24 seats. This makes New Hampshire’s Senate the first state legislative body in U.S. history to be majority female.
The S.C. election results beg the question of equity in a state where women represent 51.3 percent of the population, in other words, the majority, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. South Carolina voters have never sent more than three females to the Senate at a time, according to the CAWP.
This time, all three female candidates running for seats in the upper chamber were defeated. Mandy Powers Norrell lost to Republican attorney Mick Mulvaney in York County’s District 16. Margaret Gamble lost to Democratic incumbent Nikki Setzler in Lexington, and Karen Michalik was defeated by Republican incumbent Phil Leventis in Sumter County’s District 35.
“While women continue to actively gain in the role of media and business, statistics indicate a stark contrast between South Carolina and other states in the role women in politics,” says Dewitt.
For her “The lengthy legislative session and lack of availability of political training deter many women from seeking political office in South Carolina, ranking it 50th in the nation in the number of women in elected office.“
Prior to the Election Day loss for women, South Carolina already ranked last among states in terms of women in elected office, according to the Southeastern Institute for Women in Politics.
“Part of the reason we’re not electing as many women to higher positions in South Carolina right now is that we haven’t had very many women–or at least not the right women–running. Running for public office is very expensive, and it’s hard to raise the money to do it, even if you win,” says Beazley.
“If you lose, you can be stuck with quite a lot of debt, and many S.C. women can’t afford that,” says Beazley who has been an active volunteer in campaigns for various local, statewide and national candidates and is an officer in our voting precinct.
In addition, “Many women view politics as a no traditional role for women,“ says Dewitt.
Palin did not win her bid to become the nation’s first female vice president, but many people agree she and Clinton – whose 18 million votes nearly carried her to the top of the 2008 Democratic ticket – are integral to a major shift in the way women are perceived in politics.
Though Beazley sees the importance of women in important political offices, she would not vote for a candidate only because of gender. “I have no idea why anyone voted for Palin. I believe that McCain lost some votes because his choice of Palin was an indication of the kind of person he might select to be in other positions of leadership. Very scary.”
Judy Beazley, Marcia Beazley’s sister-in-law, worked in the Obama campaign office in Columbia, S.C. She says, “The idea that Palin could become president was a frightening possibility to many. I think people only voted for her because she was new, she energized the conservative right, and because they wanted McCain to win. Palin gave no evidence of her ability to listen, compromise and work out bipartisan solutions that might not agree with her conservative values.”
For many women in South Carolina, Palin’s candidacy was no reason to vote for her and U.S. Sen. John McCain, the Republican nominee for president. In fact, women strongly preferred President-Elect Barack Obama, 56 percent, to McCain, with 43 percent. Women’s votes were a significant factor in Obama’s victory, with a sizable gender gap evident, according to an analysis of exit poll data by the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University.
“When Obama was nominated as the Democratic candidate, the Republican nominee selected a woman as his vice presidential running mate to try to pick up some of the votes from women who had backed Hillary Clinton,” says Marcia Beazley.
She observes that many Clinton supporters realized, that Palin did not have the same values and interests and experience as Clinton. “In fact, they were at opposite points on most issues. And she was not ready to be in a high level position of leadership.”
But for Dewitt, Palin’s nomination was an important step for women in the United States, “With her nomination, family- and women-related issues were viewed as political issues, in addition to traditional platform issues, indicating a different perspective to campaigning,“ says the chair of the Southeastern Institute for Women in Politics.
Judy Beazley still hopes for a change in the next few years, maybe with the help of Sen. Hillary Clinton, who is expected to be named Obama’s choice as secretary of state. “Clinton’s success makes her an important role model. And also in South Carolina, the potential for an increase in the numbers of women in leadership positions in definitely exists.”
“Women are natural leaders in their homes and workplaces. In the future we have to make recruitment, mentoring and training opportunities available to assist women in transitioning their power to politics,“ says Dewitt.
Pia-Luisa Lenz is an exchange student from Germany at Columbia College. She is majoring in English at Columbia College, a private liberal women’s art college in South Carolina.
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