Vermont’s House members passed the civil union bill, 79-68, on Tuesday and Gov. Howard Dean plans to sign the bill into law quickly, making Vermont the first state to give civil recognition to gay and lesbian couples.
Once this landmark legislation is signed into law, lesbians and gay men will be granted the most comprehensive system of domestic partner benefits in the nation, qualifying them for the some 300 rights and benefits available to married couples in the state.
The U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments today on whether Nebraska can enact a late-term abortion law, making it a crime with a grave penalty of up to 20 years in prison for doctors who perform such abortions.
The case, Stenberg v. Carhart, is the first abortion case to be argued before the U.S. Supreme Court in eight years. At issue is a vaguely worded law that could outlaw the most commonly performed abortion procedures and offers no exceptions to cases where women’s life and health may be at stake.
“Don’t be fooled. This case is not about late-term abortion or any one procedure – it’s about outlawing abortion,” said Eleanor Smeal, president of the Feminist Majority Foundation.
The 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals unanimously ruled the Nebraska ban unconstitutional because it did not protect women’s health and the wording was so vague that it could potentially outlaw all abortions.
Phil Knight, Chairman of Nike, has rescinded his pledge to his alma mater, the University of Oregon, for $30 million because the university joined the Workers Rights Consortium, which utilizes local human-rights groups as well as worker input to monitor factory conditions where campus clothing is made, rather than the Fair Labor Association, which he supports.
Nike said they object to the Workers Rights Consortium’s makeup and its requirement for random, surprise inspection visits to overseas factories. “We object to Workers Rights Consortium because it does not provide a seat on the table for companies,” said Nike spokeswoman Vada Manager.
Students, who have staged sit-ins and demonstrations on several campuses in the last year to put pressure on their universities to join the Workers Rights Consortium, argue that the Fair Labor Association is dominated by corporate interests and will not be diligent in its monitoring.
President Clinton, along with Janet Reno, gathered law enforcement officials at the White House today to develop strategies to mobilize public support for the current hate crimes bill in order to press Republicans in Congress for a vote.
The Senate unanimously approved hate crimes prevention legislation last year, but the bill has stalled in the House. The bill would add sexual orientation, sex and disability to existing hate crimes covered under federal law, i.e. crimes motivated by race, religion, color or national origin.
The proposed hate crimes legislation would authorize federal prosecutors to pursue a hate-crime case if local authorities did not press charges.
The Peruvian National Police has begun recruiting women for traffic patrol positions in an effort to fight corruption on the streets. The program, lauded by Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori, is based on research that found that on personality tests, women were found to be stricter and more disciplined.
As a result of the program, 90 percent of traffic police in Lima are women, whereas two years ago, women constituted only 10 percent of traffic cops.
Despite these gains, Peruvian feminists are critical because the recruiting of women is on the rank-and-file level. “They have no possibility of promotion and work in perilous conditions,” said Macassi Leon, executive director of Flora Tristan, a Peruvian women’s rights group.
Nationally, women constitute only 8 percent of the national police force.
Emerson College communications professor Robert Hilliard will offer a course this Fall called Hate.com, which will examine how radical, right-wing groups recruit new members via the Internet.
Hate groups range from neo-Nazi alliances and anti-lesbian and gay groups to anti-abortion extremists. A federal jury awarded $170 million last year to a group of abortion providers, doctors, and clinics, arguing that creators of “The Nuremberg Files” Web site had violated federal racketeering laws and the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act.
Hilliard and Boston College professor Michael Keith, co-authored a book entitled “Waves of Rancor: Tuning in the Radical Right.” Hilliard intends for his class to analyze how radical hate groups target young people and how they foster hate.
Currently, more than 300 extremist Web sites exist today.
The editor of the Romanian edition of Playboy magazine was recently reprimanded for publishing an article that actually advocated violence against women.
The article, “How to Beat Your Wife Without Leaving Traces,” not only listed a step-by-step procedure for abusing women but went on to imply that good beatings could make for better sex.
Christie Hefner, Playboy Enterprises Chairman and CEO stated that the Romanian editor had been reprimanded for the article, but the editorial director for international editors refused to comment on whether he had been fired.
Fourteen groups in Romania issued a statement in protest of the article on April 17, calling it “a clear incitement to conjugal violence.”
Gen. Pervez Musharraf, Pakistan’s military ruler, declared today that 2000 is to be the Year of Human Rights in Pakistan. Musharraf made this declaration during the beginning of a two-day convention of local and international human rights activists.
The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan reported that in 1999, women were among those who suffered the worst human rights abuses. Women in Pakistan face the threat of so-called honor killings at the hands of relatives. Police often refuse to investigate or the courts dismiss the cases.
Musharraf insisted his administration would not tolerate the sanctioning of these killings. “So-called honor killings…don’t find any place in our religion or our law. Killing in the name of honor is murder and will be treated as such,” said Musharraf. He also called for progressive child labor reform and universal primary education.
Women’s rights leaders and labor leaders joined on Wednesday with Teamster workers, community members and political leaders to demand that Sunbeam stop its assault on women workers in Cleveland.
Eleanor Smeal, president of the Feminist Majority Foundation, and Karen Nussbaum, director of the AFL-CIO’s Working Women’s Department stood with Donice Wamack, Teamster Local 473 shop steward and 6-year Mr. Coffee worker to decry Sunbeam’s decision to close the local Mr. Coffee plant. The close would cause the loss of 300 jobs, 90 percent of which are held by women.
Mr. Coffee administrators praised the coffee workers productivity and efficiency but still decided to move the plant to Mexico where workers will be paid $7 a day instead of $7-8 an hour as at the Cleveland plant.
“The workers have been willing to take extremely modest wages to save these jobs. But instead, Sunbeam is moving to take advantage of exploitative sweatshop wages,” said Smeal. “This is a women’s issue both here and in Mexico. The workers who will be exploited in Mexico will be principally young, desperate women.”
Mr. Coffee by their own admission was making a profit from their Cleveland plant but it was not enough. Some 220 American companies have moved just over the border in Mexico to take advantage of sweatshop wages and conditions. The women’s groups and the unions pledged to continue the fight to save these jobs and to end sweatshops.
Women’s groups in California are joining together in a statewide network aimed at increasing opportunities for working women and female business owners.
The California State Economic Network, part of a national initiative generated at the 1998 Women’s Economic Summit in Washington, DC, is designed to link women business leaders, supporters and public officials to advance women’s national economic progress.
“The idea is to join together behind legislation and programs that benefit women business owners and generally improve the economic status of women,” said Judith Luther Wilder, co-chief executive of Women Incorporated, which is organizing California State Economic Network.
California SEN will hold a forum on April 28 at the Los Angeles City Club to develop an agenda for the over 100 women business owners, executives, legislators and supporters expected to attend.
Anti-abortion extremists in Melbourne, Florida challenged the injunction in Aware Woman v. Madsen and lost, yet again. When the Aware Woman clinic recently relocated, the defendants went to court to vacate the injunction.
Counsel for the plaintiffs explained to the Court that while the portion of the injunction that pertained to the clinic’s physical location was no longer necessary, the remaining portions of the injunction, for example those that prohibited residential picketing, remained necessary. The Court agreed, and issued an order stating the same.
The Feminist Majority Foundation continues to provide the lawyers for the plaintiffs and to manage the case on behalf of the plaintiffs.
With a 19-11 vote, Vermont State Senators passed a civil union bill granting lesbians and gay men the most comprehensive system of domestic partner benefits in the nation, qualifying them for the some 300 rights and benefits available to married couples in the state.
The landmark legislation must clear one final hurdle in the Vermont House of Representatives next week, which approved an almost identical bill in March, before heading to Gov. Howard Dean’s desk for his assured signature.
More than 3,000 international organizations joined forces in Beirut this week in an effort to end violence against women and promote redistribution of the world’s resources.
The Egyptian coordinator, Farida Naccach, invited other Arab countries to promote more job opportunities. “That will help reduce the impact of women’s dependency on others to sustain themselves and will also increase their family’s income,” said Naccach.
Linda Matar, former president of the Lebanese Women’s Council, suggested classifying women’s demands into categories of social, economic and political. “Violence has many aspects. Sexual harassment at work is one and laws which discriminate is another, and it would be good to start identifying them,” said Matar.
The Women’s International March Against Violence and Poverty for the Year 2000 presented its demands on Thursday to United Nations representatives.
Police are cracking down on a massive trade in women and some children in China that extends from remote villages to major cities like Beijing.
According to government records, 6,802 women and 1,662 children were reported abducted or missing in China and police rescued some 7,660 women and 1,814 children in 1999. The majority of the victims are poor, desperate young women from rural areas who are tricked into leaving home and then sold into indentured servitude.
Bai Jingfu, police assistant director of criminal investigation, blamed increasing gaps between the rich and the poor as well as inadequate law enforcement.
State Senators in Vermont gave preliminary approval yesterday to a bill that would legally recognize relationships between lesbians and gay men. A final vote on the civil unions bill is expected today.
If the bill passes, it would grant lesbians and gay men the most comprehensive system of domestic partner benefits in the nation, qualifying them for the some 300 rights and benefits available to married couples in Vermont including medical decisions and tax breaks.
Women & Philanthropy announced Monday their selection of Katherine Acey for their Leadership for Equity and Diversity award. The LEAD award, developed five years ago, honors those who promote equality for women and girls.
Acey serves as the executive director for the Astraea National Lesbian Action Foundation and was selected for “her leadership and vision in bringing visibility, hope and new resources to women who face discrimination, stigma and even hatred based solely on whom they are.”
Idelisse Malave, Executive Director of the Tides Foundation, will present the award to Acey in Los Angeles on Sunday, April 30.
Women & Philanthropy is a Washington, DC-based organization of grant makers that works with individual and institutional funders, regional associations of grant makers and affinity groups to address the critical needs and talents of women.
Televangelist Jerry Falwell announced Friday that he is launching a voter registration drive to register 10 million voters through churches in an effort to raise enthusiasm among the religious right.
The effort, called “People of Faith 2000,” will embark on a seven-month drive to register new voters through pastors who are to solicit voter support during church gatherings.
Americans United for Separation of Church and State (AUSCS) denounced the effort as a “shady shell game” trying to help Bush in the election. AUSCS filed a complaint with the Internal Revenue Service on the grounds that such activity was an abuse of a church’s tax-exempt status.
The National Golf Course Owners Association (NGCOA) and Golf Digest Woman is sponsoring “Take Your Daughter to the Course Week” April 24 – 30 to encourage young women to get involved in the game of golf.
According to Anne Lyndrup, administrative director of the NGCOA, “There’s an image that golf is a man’s game to be played by men and male children. That just isn’t true. It doesn’t make sense if you have a youth golf program and only 13 percent are girls.”
Lyndrup hopes that early exposure to the golf will help women in business who feel disadvantaged because they must decline invitations to business outings with clients.
The week is designed to coincide with the Ms. Foundation for Women’s annual “Take Your Daughter to Work” day, which takes place the fourth Thursday in April. NGCOA is providing assistance to the some 150 of its 4,000 member courses participating in the “Take Your Daughter to the Course Week.”
Yesterday, Maryland lawmakers approved Governor Parris N. Glendening’s legislation requiring that new handguns be sold with built-in trigger locks. President Clinton and Lieutenant Governor Kathleen Kennedy Townsend were present at the ceremony, and Clinton spoke on the importance of a similar federal law, now stalled in Congress. “‘Every single day Congress waits, we lose 12 children, nearly 90 people overall, to gun violence,’ Clinton said. ‘Congress should follow Maryland’s lead.'”
The Maryland state law, opposed vehemently by the NRA, also calls for mandatory sentences for gun crimes and two hours of safety training for anyone purchasing a handgun. Many other states have similar gun control laws, including Massachusetts, Connecticut, Florida, and California.
In an outrageous decision, the Texas Supreme Court refused a minor’s request for a judicial bypass of the state’s recently enacted parental notification law, arguing that she “did not show she was mature enough and sufficiently well informed to make that decision on her own,” the Associated Press resported. The law took effect on January 1, and required an unmarried girl under age 17 to notify a parent before having an abortion, or to seek a court order allowing her to bypass the regulation. Tuesday’s decision marks the first time the Texas court has ruled against a girl since the law was enacted.
Seven of the nine Justices argued that the girl in this case was not sufficiently informed of particular personal medical risks. However, the girl also testified to a particularly alarming family situation, one that highlights the danger of parental consent laws. She argued that telling her parents “would not be in her best interest because when her older sister got pregnant, the parents threw her out of the house and still don’t speak to her.” Despite this evidence of danger to the girl, the court argued that “her particular physical needs and the possibility of physical danger [from the abortion procedure] outweighed a potential family disruption.” Kae McLaughlin, director of the Texas Abortion Rights Action League, noted, “‘It may induce her to tell a parent, but it also may just leave her to remedies outside of the safe, legal medical practice.'”
