(Lilly Ledbetter) I grew up in one of the poorest counties in Alabama during a time
when we had very little.
My mother felt that I should learn the work ethic as a child.
She had worked all her life.
I had to chop cotton in the spring for my Grandfather, and then you would have to drag
that cotton sack on your shoulders down the road.
Picking that cotton as a child taught me that you give a good days’ work for a good days’
pay.
I’m Lilly Ledbetter, and I’m from Possum Trot, Alabama.
I hired in with Goodyear, February 5, 1979.
I wanted to be a part of the radio plant in Gadsden.
We needed to work because we couldn’t make it just on one salary.
We couldn’t pay for our home and we couldn’t pay the mortgage.
It took two people in the middle-class to manage and earn enough money to sustain a
family of four or more.
I wanted more for my children than I had had.
And that’s why I worked so hard.
There were not any women above me in management at Goodyear in Gadsden.
It had only been me.
And most of the women who had had those positions, they didn’t last.
I go into work one evening, and I look in my mail, and here’s this note.
It has four names, and it was the three men and myself.
We had had the same job.
The lowest paid one, he had less education, less training, was younger, and he was already
making 600 plus more a month than what I was.
Goodyear paid me unfairly for 17 years, and my family needed that money.
It just floored me.
All the way home the next morning, I debated: Do I really want to take a stand?
The easy thing to do was let it go.
But that’s not who I am.
And I told my husband, “I have to file a charge in Birmingham, AL, and I will tell
you up front, if I start, I’ll be in it at least eight years.”
And he said “What time do you want to leave?”
(Newswoman) Lilly Ledbetter.
(Congressman) Lilly Ledbetter.
(Professor) Lilly Ledbetter.
(Newswoman) She worked 19 years at a supervisor at a Goodyear tire plant.
But, at the end of her career, says she discovered she was paid far less than men doing the same
job.
(Lilly Ledbetter) I started getting calls from all over the nation.
This was not a Lilly Ledbetter story.
It was everybody’s story.
(Newswoman) Ledbetter sued, but the US Supreme Court threw out her case, saying she filed
her lawsuit too late.
(Rep. Steny Hoyer) The Supreme Court ruled that even though Miss Ledbetter had suffered
clear discrimination, and the law had been broken, she had missed the time in which raise
the issue.
(Lilly Ledbetter) You can pray that it goes your way, but oftentimes it does not.
We live in a country where we can do something about it.
(Brian Williams) President Obama signed his first bill into law.
(Newswoman) Passing a law that says that the 180 day time period employees have to file
a claim starts ticking every time they get a paycheck.
(Brian Williams) And the woman who inspired it, a grandmother who took her case to the
Supreme Court and lost, finally saw her goal realized today.
(President Obama) It’s the story of women across this country, still earning just 78
cents for every dollar men earn.
(Lilly Ledbetter) Starting with the Ledbetter bill, that was a bold step.
He and Michelle, they came up sort of like I did.
He has two daughters, and he wants things better for them.
(President Obama) Equal pay is by no means just a women’s issue.
It’s a family issue.
(Lilly Ledbetter) And he understands how hard it is on the lower class and the middle class
people to raise themselves up and to pull themselves ahead.
(President Obama) The last thing they can afford is losing part of each month’s paycheck
to simple and plain discrimination.
It’s a question of who we are, and whether we’re truly living up to our fundamental
ideas.
(Lilly Ledbetter) It was just awesome.
I mean, it was just awesome.
When I walked up to the White House the morning the bill was signed, my grandchildren looked
up at me like I was a rock star.
I believe the President keeps his promises.
When you make health care easier for women; when you make education possible for women,
and their families, to advance themselves, women have a fair shot.
We need more bills in Congress.
We need paycheck fairness.
(President Obama) You see, an economy built to last is one where we encourage the talent
and ingenuity of every person in this country.
That means women should earn equal pay for equal work.
(Lilly Ledbetter) And when we get paycheck fairness, that will carry the women’s cause
down the road much farther, and give them more benefits.
My case is over, and it’s gone.
It’s decided.
But I can make a difference for my daughter, my granddaughter, and all the women across
the nation.
I believe history is important, and you should never forget where you’ve come from.
And I think the President should be reelected for the next four years because then he can
finish what he has started.
And that’s why I get up every day, ready to go.
Because there’s more work that needs to be done.