“I think we should get rid of them all. Just start over. Get rid of them all. Then go back to the Constitution. The original Constitution. Just start over and stick with the original Constitution.”

I could feel Susan B. Anthony turning over in her grave. She had given 75-100 speeches a year for over 45 years about women suffrage  and died in 1906, at 86,  without a hint of the likelihood of women getting the vote, which did not come until 1920.  She struggled   constantly in a representative democracy, which scorned and mocked her.

March is Women’s History Month and March 8th, International Women’s Day. Pick up a book or visit a website about the history of our sex; a history not seriously pursued until 1978 and the second wave of feminism.  Instill in your children the desire to write the story of Susan B. Anthony, long lacking a decent and definitive biography, or the thousand of other common women who struggled and died for our freedom.

The freedom to eat lunch with our friends and be ill informed.

Also, call your state Representative and Senator and ask them what ideas they have for improving the lives of Iowa women.  Ask them if they believe in the wage gap, or why is it that the Iowa poor are predominately women and children.  Ask them about the history of comparable worth legislation in Iowa, or paid sick leave as a legislative right, or, well you get the message.

As American women, we are incredibly privileged as compared to women in the rest of the world, but we have, at least, an obligation to learn how that came about. It was despite the original Constitution, not because of it.