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Phyllis Schlafly Teaches Us Some lessons
In a New Yorker article entitled "Firebrand," Elizabeth Kolbert reviews "Phyllis Schlafly and Grassroots Conservatism: A Woman's Crusade" by Donald T. Critchlow. Through her work running for congress, backing Goldwater, defeating the ERA, writing books, speaking to the media, founding the Eagle Forum ("Leading the Pro-Family movement since 1972", now very big on the anti-gay marriage issue) and sitting on the board of Tom Monaghan's conservative Catholic business organization Legatus, Schlafly has earned important experience and victories.One thing she has been good at is forming coalitions:
By (Schlafly's approach), it isn't the coherence of conservative ideology that matters but just the opposite - the movement was so loosely conceived that it could accommodate libertarians and religious fundamentalists, pro-gun lobbyists and pro-lifers.In public she claimed that women, by their deference to men, had special "privileges," and her work to defeat ERA was to retain the special status women had (instead of being "equal," which would take away and lower their status). Whether or not this was a ruse, she played it up to the delight of her constituency. At one Houston rally she said, "First of all, I want to thank my husband, Fred, for letting me come. I always like to say that, because it makes the libs so mad." One of her claims to fame was influencing the choice of Senator Glodwater at the 1964 Republican Convention. Critchlow writes: To help (Barry Goldwater) secure the 1964 nomination she composed a pocket-sized book titled "A Choice Not an Echo." In inimitable Schlafly style, "A Choice Not an Echo" mixed fact, sensational accusations, commonsensical truths, and elaborate conspiracy theories into a compelling but evidently bogus narrative... Schlafly published the book at her own expense in April, 1964, and began mailing it out, gratis, to friends and fellow anti-Communist activists. Soon the orders started pouring in. Within a month, the book had supposedly sold more than half a million copies, and, within six months, more than three million... To a remarkable extent, "A Choice Not an Echo" fulfilled Schlafly's goal. Ninety-three per cent of the delegates to the 1964 Republican Convention reported having read it, and twenty-six per cent said that they had been influenced by it.When it came to the ERA, Schlafly has said, "I knew from the start that I had found enough seriously wrong with E.R.A. to stop it, or at least stall it, for an awfully long time." Her tactics, and the outcome, foreshadow the Bush Administration's use of the religious right for political purposes. Kolbert writes: Soon the movement began to grow, according to Critchlow, mainly by involving young women--a large proportion of them Evangelical Christians--who had never before been involved in politics... In surveys, a remarkable ninety-eight per cent of E.R.A. opponents claimed church membership, as compared with thirty-one per cent of E.R.A. supporters. Kolbert continues: E.R.A. supporters tried at every opportunity to point out the inconsistency of Schlafly's position. Here was a woman who insisted that a woman's greatest satisfaction lay in caring for her family--in 1973, Schlafly still had four children at home--yet spent most of her time politicking. (In the middle of the STOP ERA campaign, Schlafly stunned everyone, including her husband, by announcing that, on top of everything else, she was going to start law school; she received her law degree a few years later.) But Schlafly's personal life could just as easily be taken as proof of what she was arguing: that women had no need for the E.R.A.Kolbert sums up the article this way: While Ann Coulter and Laura Ingraham were still playing tea party, (Schlafly) recognized that deliberation was no match for diatribe, and logic no equal to contempt. She was, in this way, a woman ahead of her time.For me, one of the most interesting quotes in the article was from one of Schlafly's opponents was from Karen DeCrow, former president of NOW: "I think what Phyllis is doing is absolutely dreadful. But I can't think of anyone more together and tough. I mean, everything you raise your daughter to be... She's an extremely liberated woman." Not that she'd admit to it in public... Artist/activist Joel Pelletier tours the US with his painting speaking on issues including the separation of church and state, pluralism and American civil and secular society, and how the Arts can further these discussions and ideals.
Phyllis Schlafly Teaches Us Some lessons | 5 comments (5 topical, 0 hidden)
Phyllis Schlafly Teaches Us Some lessons | 5 comments (5 topical, 0 hidden)
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