Skip to Content

Women in Congress: An Introduction

Shared Experiences of Women in Congress

<a href="/member-profiles/profile.html?intID=123">Florence Kahn</a> of California (facing camera) and <a href="/member-profiles/profile.html?intID=209">Edith Nourse Rogers</a> of Massachusetts in early 1927, using Congress&rsquo;s first cloakroom for women Members. A House Page (far left) delivers a book to Kahn.Florence Kahn of California (facing camera) and Edith Nourse Rogers of Massachusetts in early 1927, using Congress’s first cloakroom for women Members. A House Page (far left) delivers a book to Kahn.Image Courtesy of the Library of Congress

Though each generation of women in Congress had distinctive traits, experiences shared by women Members united them across the decades. One enduring pattern, called the “widow’s mandate,” the “widow’s succession,” or the “matrimonial connection,” has been an important route for women to attain congressional office—especially the women in the first three generations.11 Between 1917 and 1976, 95 women served in the House and the Senate; a third (34) were widows who were elected or appointed to succeed their late husbands. At present, 46 widows (a fifth of the women who have served in Congress) have directly succeeded their husbands. When familial connections are considered (wives who succeeded living husbands or husbands who were nonincumbent candidates, wives appointed by husbands, or daughters of Members), the percentages are even more startling. Up to 1976, 46 percent of all women Members had benefited from a familial connection. By 2005, a familial connection was still prominent in the careers of more than a quarter (27 percent) of all women Members.

Yet, these statistics suggest that the incidence of the widow’s mandate, while still high, has recently declined. Among the third and fourth generations, ever-greater numbers of Congresswomen have drawn on experience in elective office rather than on experience supporting or advising a male family member in political office. Moreover, the influence of the widow’s mandate, real and perceived, has been magnified by several factors. First, an unusually high number of women who received party nominations to run for their husband’s former seat won their general elections. From 1923 through 2005, 38 out of an estimated 46 House widows who were nominated to run for their husband’s seat won their elections.12 That number is far higher than the number of women elected to the House who were neither incumbents nor widows. Through the 1992 election, for example, just 14 percent of these women won their elections.13

A chief commonality among widows in Congress has been the brevity of their service; half of the 46 congressional widows served one term or less. This trend was particularly prevalent among widows from the South (14 served one term or less) who were nominated by their parties to serve as temporary placeholders until a sustainable male successor could be chosen. There have been, of course, notable exceptions; it is these widows who readily adapted to the institution because of extensive experience with their husbands, and subsequently distinguished themselves, who created in the public mind an enduring image of the prototypical widow successor. For instance, the longest-serving woman in congressional history, Edith Nourse Rogers (1925–1960), was a widow, and several other widows exercised considerable influence in Congress for many years, in some cases more than their husbands, for example, Florence Prag Kahn (1925–1937), Frances Bolton (1940–1969), Margaret Chase Smith (1940–1973), and Lindy Boggs of Louisiana (1973–1991). As a group, widows have tended to receive more press attention because of the tragic or unlikely circumstances of their entry into political office, thus reinforcing public perceptions about the power of the widow’s mandate.14

Familial duties and social expectations concerning a woman’s role in the family contributed to another shared experience among women in Congress. Congresswomen from the pioneer generation onward have striven to balance the demands of their private family life, and public perceptions about women’s responsibility to fulfill those demands, with those of their public career. This added responsibility has not been incumbent on their male colleagues. The third and fourth generations of women to enter Congress, especially, were confronted with this challenge, since more of them entered political office with young children.

Motherhood was a two-edged sword, providing Congresswomen with unique burdens as well as with legislative insights. Representative Emily Douglas of Illinois understood well how family responsibilities could affect women’s participation in politics. Douglas was elected to the House in 1944 as the mother of an 11-year-old daughter while her husband, Paul, who later became a U.S. Senator, was overseas in the military. “What everybody needs to make a good race is a good wife,” Congresswoman Douglas observed. “Now that’s where a woman is handicapped. When a man goes into politics and wins his wife is happy and proud to pull up stakes, corral her children, and move to the designated center of government. But a woman’s position is different, in that her husband often has a business, she has her home to maintain, and her children are established in school.”15 Yet, Congresswomen also understood that motherhood and familial duties provided them with a unique perspective on legislation (e.g., personal knowledge of the cost of groceries and household products) that was not always prioritized by Congressmen. “I am sure I became a finer Congresswoman for being a mother,” Chase Woodhouse of Connecticut said. “It gave me a better understanding of people’s problems. Yes, there were conflicts. Yes, I was thought of as a peculiar creature. But the kids were my motivation. . . . They become in the end the reason for striving.”16 Many later Congresswomen echoed Representative Douglas’s and Representative Woodhouse’s sentiments.

In addition to their familial responsibilities, Congresswomen were challenged by widespread and enduring social expectations about the “natural” or “proper” role for women—as wives, mothers, and caregivers. The power of the traditional conception of a woman’s role is aptly illustrated by the career of Representative Coya Knutson of Minnesota. Elected to Congress in 1954, Knutson emerged as a promising advocate for education reform and agricultural issues. Her career was destroyed in 1958, however, when her abusive and jealous husband falsely accused her of abandoning the family. In 1950s America, that accusation was especially powerful. Most women Members of Congress were not confronted with such direct attacks, but many, especially those who were young or single, faced subtle discrimination on the campaign trail by male political opponents who stressed their roles as fathers and family men. Women faced doubters even within their own ranks. Shortly after Patricia Schroeder’s 1972 election to the House, one of her feminist women colleagues asked how she planned to raise her toddlers and simultaneously advance in her congressional career.

Finally, women in Congress have shared the experience of being a minority, whether they were “insiders” or “outsiders,” whether they were one-term congressional widows or accomplished committee chairs, and whether or not they had familial duties in addition to their professional responsibilities. While the number of women in Congress has varied, women have always been in the minority. Women in Congress have not marched unobstructed toward equality; like all women in American society, Congresswomen have faced barriers and challenges to their overall advancement. As many women Members have observed, Congress has been exceptionally resistant to changes in gender roles taking place in American society. Again, each generation of Congresswomen faced different hurdles. Early women in Congress lacked basic necessities. For instance, it was not until the 1960s that women Members secured nearby bathroom facilities and a lounge near the House Floor; women in the Senate did not have such facilities until the mid-1990s. Congresswomen had limited access to congressional gym and exercise facilities built for men, into the 1990s. Women chipped away at the reluctance of committee chairs and congressional leadership to assign them to key committees, breaking down many of those barriers in the 1950s and 1960s in the House and in the 1980s and 1990s in the Senate. But even as women gained legislative expertise and seniority, their participation in congressional leadership lagged for several decades. Then, with women’s entry into top party positions in the early 21st century, that barrier, too, seemed broken. Women now participate in unprecedented ways at every level of Congress. Nevertheless, history suggests new challenges lie ahead.

Continue Reading »

Footnotes

  1. Irwin Gertzog is a leading analyst of the “matrimonial connection.” See his discussion in Gertzog, Congressional Women: 17–36. See also his early analysis, Irwin Gertzog, “Changing Patterns of Female Recruitment to the U.S. House of Representatives,” Legislative Studies Quarterly IV (no. 3, August 1979): 429–445.
  2. Gertzog, Congressional Women: 34; Office of History and Preservation statistics 1995–2005. See Appendix I: “Marriage/Familial Connections of Women Representatives and Senators in Congress.”
  3. Gertzog, Congressional Women: 20–21.
  4. Perceptions generated by media coverage of a widow Member’s exceptional circumstances or achievements often masked the rather one-sided statistical realities. Most widows of Congressmen never even received their husbands’ party nomination. For instance, in the House from 1916 to April 15, 2005, 422 Representatives died in office. All but Edith Nourse Rogers, Vera Daerr Buchanan, and Patsy T. Mink were male. Many were bachelors or widowers, but about 300 had wives who could have been tapped to replace them. Yet, roughly only one in six of these widows was nominated to succeed her husband. See Gertzog, Congressional Women: 19. Statistics through the 102nd Congress (1991–1993) are Gertzog’s. An additional 18 individuals died in office from the 103rd through the 108th Congresses (1993 to January 1, 2005).
  5. Martha Rhyne, “The Douglas Duo Raps Feminine Refusal to Accept Political Role,” 25 February 1945, Washington Post: S1.
  6. “A Pioneering Feminist Savors Grandmother Role,” 10 May 1981, New York Times.