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Mrs. Rosalynn Carter, at the White House.
133 of the member states of the United Nations have declared a decade
for women. Equality, development , peace- these are the goals for the coming years.
They underscore the belief that women's destiny is the same as all humanity's.
The struggle calls for a basic commitment to human rights, and American
women know that by strengthening their ties with women from all around the
world they can be a great force for change.
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The tradition of human rights has deep roots in this country. In 1840 Lucretia
Mott and Elizabeth Cady Stanton went to the world anti-slavery convention in
London. Even though Lucretia Mott was a delegate,
they would not seat her on the floor so that she could debate the issues of the
day. They said that was not the proper place for women. These women were
internationalists but they went home pledged to do something about women's
rights. For these women, right through to the early part of the 20th century, votes
for women became a critical issue. It became an all-out struggle both at the
state and federal levels. Women were ridiculed, arrested, but finally the vote
is won! This was just the beginning very soon throughout the world women
realized that the vote alone was not enough to guarantee them full and equal
participation in society. A lifelong struggle had begun. Today it has still
not been resolved.
With the growing awareness of discrimination against women,
the United Nations set up in 1946 a commission to study the role and
status of women. Dr. Davidson Nicol ,Under Secretary General of the UN. As far as
women's rights are concerned, the status on the Commission of Women started about
31 years ago. And it did make progress in questions like the political rights of
women, things like property laws,marriage, laws and so on, but it lacked the fire
which came with the seventies and this was due to women themselves in different
national groups who put that pressure which crystallized in the International
Women's Year Conference, and the United States was a one of a
small group which was most active in this. U.S. participation also involved
other initiatives. 1973-the US Congress- passed the Percy Amendment.
This law requires that American foreign aid program has given tension to the
particular and special needs of women in developing countries. Senator Charles H.
Percy. I was astounded for instance, to discover a few years ago, that our
American AID programs at the technical and economic assistance abroad
was actually widening the gap between men and women in developing countries.
For instance in the area of advanced degrees, scholarships and fellowships in
the United States, offered in these countries, 92 percent went to men,only 8
percent to women.
Wilmette Brown, Black Women for Wages for Housework.
The last line of the poem engraved on the Statue of Liberty is "I lift my lamp beside the
Golden Door." That's supposed to symbolize sharing the wealth with immigrants from
all over the world. That has never been true for women.
The unpaid work that women in the Third World have done for generations, for
centuries, is stored here in New York, and in London, and Paris, and other
metropolitan capitals of the world. And women are denied access to that wealth,
just as the unpaid work of women in this country has created the wealth of this
country is denied to us. Because we know that the money the question of money is
very key to all the questions all the problems that we women have. Because
having money is really the possibility of having some choices in our life. To
choose whether we want to have children or not to have children, to choose whether
we want to marry, or not to get married, or not to have to get married only
because we have to depend on men economically. What happens to the older
woman who has not pursued a career but who has instead devoted herself to
others. Mrs. Sally Spielman. I receive a Social Security check. I'm fortunate enough
I live in a house that don't belong to me, it belongs to my sons. They have been
wonderful, these children. I never went to work I raised them, just being a mother,
joining clubs, Girl Scouts, Boy Scouts, taught Sunday school, and stayed close to
home all my life. And I'm very- it has the paying with my good children. I
couldn't live on the government's check. They supplement me, but I'd rather be it
an independent person and not depend on my children. We all are more or less
free souls and we'd like to feel this way in everything we do, because only God
knows how long we live, and we'd like to enjoy the few years we have left. In 1975
a Presidential Executive Order establishes the National Commission on
The Observance of International Women's Year. This commission was directed to
coordinate and promote the interests of women in the United States throughout
every one of its states and territories. And in June of 1975, an
International Woman's Year World Conference, organized by the United
Nations, was held in Mexico City. Patti Hutar, U.S. delegate to the UN
Commission on the Status of Women. Now it was said, before the World Conference
convened, that women from the developing world and from developed countries would
have absolutely nothing in common, and they saw our task as being impossible.
Nothing could have been further from the truth. Because women from all areas of
the world were able to work together and 133 nations unanimously adopted the
World Plan of Action. And one of the most significant actions call for in the
World Plan of Action is the establishment of the United Nations
Decade for Women, that runs from 1976 to 1985.
At the same time voluntary organizations also held an International Women's Year Tribune meeting in Mexico
City. There were 6,000 women there from a hundred countries, even though some of us
think they were all Americans, Americans were in the vast minority there were
rich, there were poor, there were many middle class women, and above all they
had a common bond. They were not satisfied with the way things are.
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A tin miners wife from a tiny mining community way up in the Andes came to
tell us that their struggle as women was a struggle for survival, but nothing
would change until the total economic structure of the country was changed.
If women's situation is to change women themselves will have to change it. After
Mexico, women dispersed, but women and women's organizations and associations
of both men and women continued to discuss the themes of
International Women's Year Betty Reardon, the Chairperson of the
Tribune Panel on Peace and Disarmament. The whole of the International Women's
Year and International Decade has been inspired by the idea of peace. And peace
not just in the sense of eliminating war, but peace in the sense of eliminating
human suffering. The business of dealing with human suffering has really been the
business of women, what women's lives have been about for centuries. And now
more than ever, we need those skills and those concerns in our public life. We
need to have women taking part and forming public policy not just for this
decade, but for our whole future.
Mallika [ ] from Southeast Asia was a
Tribune panelist on social attitudes and tradition organization of society right
now is in the hand of men therefore if women are not concerned about this issue
and get involved in the policy level women will be left out totally for me I
think that if this decade that we declared decade for women and
development, if we still see women outside and men inside of the planning
room, for all these key development sectors like population, energy, food, I
think that the decade has failed.
Margaret Heckler came home to co-sponsor a bill along with Bella Abzug to fiance
and hold the International Women's Year State Meetings and National Conference.
As a Congressional Advisor at the International Women's Year Conference in Mexico City, I saw women
from all over the world coming together. I realized that if women's lives were to
change in America, or anywhere else, it was necessary for women to change
themselves. As a natural adjunct of that conference I wanted to bring the
experience of sharing to the American woman, wherever she is, wherever she finds
herself. And therefore I co-sponsored a bill which authorized an International
Womens Conference nationally to be preceded by a conference in every state.
The point of these conferences, was to attract women from the broad spectrum of
America to share with each other regardless of income, regardless of race,
creed, color, philosophical point of view, and whatever other barrier separates
women. The point of the sharing is to look at each other to compare their
lives, to consider the yardstick of justice, for all in America, and as a
result of these conferences, to guide the Congress and the President in terms of
legislation which could be helpful to women everywhere. Equality development
and peace, the goals of the International Decade of Women can only be accomplished
when there is equality, development, and peace within our own society. We
participate in a historic moment. We are holding state conferences, and will
you'll be electing delegates to a national conference, from every state and
territory of this nation. This is the first time such a thing has happened
with the law and funds supported by the United States Congress. What we do with
these conferences, will make a difference in everybody's lives. We will reach
consensus, and we will continue to have differences but surely, we have for the
first time, the tools with which to make a difference in our lives and the lives
of our children and in the hopes of democracy. For women, yes, but for men and
women in this country and I think having overreaching effects all over the world.
The promise in potential of our future, lies within each one of us the decade of
our destinies begins.
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