Synopsis
Politics is no longer only a man's game. For the first time in history women are finally significant players in the political game.
Called by some the "Women's Iwo Jima," the photograph on the cover of this book shows then-Congresswoman Barbara Boxer leading the march up the Senate steps that initiated the greatest women's revolution since the 1960s. Pressure from Boxer and other women leaders forced the Anita Hill sexual harassment hearings into being and catapulted women into the forefront of American politics. Strangers in the Senate is the inside story of that phenomenal revolution, told by Senator Barbara Boxer, one of its principal warriors.
Senator Boxer reveals how Anita Hill's allegations tapped into the sexual harassment of American women, including female members of Congress - and how Americans began voting for women in numbers never before equalled. She depicts a momentous change in voters' attitudes - a transformation that more than tripled the number of women in the Senate in the space of a single year.
With characteristic warmth, humor and intelligence, Boxer provides illuminating insights into her life as a woman in politics, letting the reader share in her many struggles and victories. She describes the discouragement she felt on the campaign trail, as people slammed doors in her face, telling her to stay home and raise her children, or underestimated her talents because she was a woman. But she also relates the deep pride she takes in knowing that she can make a difference in issues from sexual harassment to freedom of choice to gun control. Her legislation in her decade-long career as Representative from California, and now Senator, has left an indelible imprint on American society.
In Strangers in the Senate, Boxer writes forthrightly of her personal experiences - of her own painful case of sexual harassment by a college professor, of the friend of her son's who was killed as a result of lax gun-control policies - and, as a mother, of her intense concern for education.
Boxer includes stories of many of her colleagues who were also touched by the issues that they legislate - women such as Pat Schroeder and Barbara Mikulski, whom Boxer counts among her mentors and friends. Their insightful and often humorous testimonies provide a fascinating account of the lives of women in the highest legislative bodies in America.
These are put into historical perspective in an informative chapter on the history of women in government and in Hillary Rodham Clinton's foreword on the political activism of First Ladies.
Women are not better than men, Boxer believes - only different; and their different perspectives are crucial for a relevant democracy.
Strangers in the Senate is an inspiring story which is unfolding every day all across America as more and more women participate in a truly exciting revolution.
Reviews
A personal but choppy overview of Boxer's 1992 fight for the US Senate--and of the races of other women who preceded or joined her there. Probably better subtitled ``So You Want to be a Woman Senator,'' Boxer's short account (written with her daughter's help) hip-hops around from her entrance into politics to brief but admiring profiles of other female senators. These legislators range from Rebecca Felton of Georgia, appointed in 1922 to serve one day of a man's unfinished term, to Maryland's Barbara Mikulski, reelected to a second term in 1992 with the new wave of women senators that included Dianne Feinstein, Carol Moseley-Braun, Patty Murray, and Boxer herself. Reviewing how the Anita Hill-Clarence Thomas confrontation galvanized women's support for women candidates, Boxer describes the march of seven women, including herself, from the House of Representatives to the Senate to ask members of the all-male Judiciary Committee to back off and investigate Hills's charges further. They were refused admittance: ``We don't allow strangers here'' was the explanation. There's a brief look at Boxer's debut in California politics by way of a run for country supervisor; at her Senate campaign (when she considered dropping out, her children convinced her to stay the course by reading her Dr. Seuss); and at issues and goals that she believes women senators should address--from abortion rights and gun control to aid to children from conception (via prenatal care) through adolescence (via school reform and mentoring programs). Some amusing anecdotes and much generous praise for her colleagues--but unfocused and meandering. (Includes a succinct, inspirational foreword by Hillary Rodham Clinton) (Thirty-two pages of b&w photographs--not seen) -- Copyright ©1993, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
The epiphany of Boxer's life, as she proclaims in this mediocre memoir, was her success in persuading the U.S. Senate to air the harassment allegations against Clarence Thomas. When the story broke, she walked a few female U.S. representatives over to the "other body" and copped the photo op that played in the press and again on this book's cover. In Boxer's opinion, the stunt was a historical event, to which she repeatedly refers; otherwise, what emerges is her agenda to raise to one-half the female membership of legislatures. That's a worthy goal, but Boxer is far from equal-minded in her vision of gender equality: "Clearly, I have a bias in favor of female Democratic senators. I admit it." Boxer's name--and personal anecdotes (she outs her own experiences with harassment)--somewhat compensates for this tract's insipidity, which is no better expressed than any press release pablum. In solidly Democratic precincts, libraries might see it move off the shelf. Gilbert Taylor
With her daughter, freshman Senator Boxer (D-Calif.) has written a book that is part campaign biography, part showcase for the growing visibility of women in national politics. One chapter profiles women senators of the past, of which there has been only 14 until 1992 (most of them succeeding their husbands in the position). Today there are more female senators serving at the same time than ever--seven. According to Boxer, women politicians were successful in breaking into this exclusive men's club by emphasizing a domestic agenda: the economy, the environment, healthcare, education, and reproductive choice. She concludes with an appeal for more women to run for office and for all voters to support women with votes and bucks. Somewhat unfocused, Strangers is recommended to California libraries serving a politically engaged public.
- Pamela R. Daubenspeck, War ren-Trumbull Cty. P.L., Warren, Ohio
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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