To Women, So Much More Than Just a Candidate

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Candidates Push for March 4 Votes

Sens. Barack Obama, (D-Ill.), and Hillary Rodham Clinton, (D-N.Y.), campaign hard ahead of primaries on Tuesday, March 4, in Ohio and Texas, contests that could make or break Clinton's campaign. Meanwhile, Sen. John McCain, (R-Ariz.) and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee also make last-minute pitches to voters in the two states.

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"Ah, come on," he said. "A woman's place is in the kitchen."

The man laughed, and Wagner scowled at him. Too surprised to respond, she checked into her room and fumed alone. At that night's NOW event in Akron, she stood at the lectern and told the story.

"Would he have stopped a black man and said something derogatory like that?" Wagner asked. "No, I don't think so. But somehow sexism is still okay. We all know racism is endemic in this society, but people who would never dare to make a racist comment on purpose say sexist things all the time. We can't assume anymore that our fight is over."

The problem, NOW leaders said, is that too many young women have done exactly that, turning to Obama because they feel no obligation to vote for a historic first for their gender. Signer, a lifelong advocate of women's rights, has a 23-year-old daughter who "fell in love with Obama."

"She just doesn't relate to the fact that the opportunities she's had are because of people like Hillary," Signer said. "She's young, and she doesn't have our sense of urgency."

Iowa, where Obama outpolled Clinton among women by five percentage points, was the first sign of trouble. Since then, he has scored nearly as many double-digit wins among women as she has, primarily because black women have voted for him in overwhelming numbers.

"I really believe the biggest divide in the world is men versus women, but most people don't seem to feel that way," Signer said. "A lot of people identify with race first, and so that can mean Obama. They forget about sexism."

During the NOW tour across Ohio, the makeup of each audience was almost exclusively white, middle-age women, many of whom had joined the organization in the late 1960s or 1970s. NOW's infrastructure has faded in Ohio, where only a handful of cities still maintain active chapters. Nationally, the organization maintains about 500,000 members, a number that has remained fairly steady since NOW was founded in 1966. As the organization's membership ages, leaders have lowered membership fees and started chapters at colleges in an effort to attract younger women.

"The heyday was really when we were fighting for the Equal Rights Amendment, and none of the chapters are as strong as they used to be," said Diane Dodge, NOW president in Ohio. "It's a different time. There's a sense of complacency."

The organization hoped to generate excitement by endorsing Clinton, marking only the second time NOW has publicly backed a presidential candidate. NOW leaders traveled to Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina to campaign. The same formula they employed in Ohio was one they had relied on for months: Bring in successful women from around the country and let them answer voters' questions.

When the Akron event ended, the women helped pack up trays of uneaten snacks and cookies in the lobby. Dodge apologized to the other leaders for the paltry attendance. But she felt confident, she said, that their message would not go unheard for long.

"There are people who say, 'Your battle is over. There's no more sexism anymore,' " she said. "Well, at the very least, maybe the whole experience of this campaign will wake those people up."