Quicktime movie, 2.2 megabytes
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Get angry, get active and get
results could be our slogan for feminist politics in the 1990s.
Our record-breaking crowd of abortion
rights marchers went to the polls to user in the so-called Year
of the Woman in 1992. We sent an unprecedented number of women to Congress,
a third of them women of color. |
Selected Quote
"We were America, we were a multiracial, multi-ethnic pluralistic campaign."
Senator Carol Moseley-Braun
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| Though these new, activist women made up just 10 percent
of Congress, they banded together with progressive men to pass important
new laws we had championed for years -- laws that aim to stop violence
against women, curb anti-abortion terrorism, require family and medical
leave and provide record funding for women's health research.
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Quicktime movie, 1.7 megabytes
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But in 1994, the right wing targeted our friends,
progressives stayed home and -- by this huge
1995 rally -- we were protesting the first 100 days of the new
Newt Congress. Only our vigorous organizing stopped their plans to cut
funding for the new Violence
Against Women Act by nearly 70 percent. Often we found we could not
stop the wrecking ball of the religious, political extremists. Now we can
-- at the polls.
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Quicktime movie, 1.7 megabytes
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At that 1995 Rally for Women's Lives, Rabbi Lynn
Landesberg and AIDS activist Lisa Tiger spoke. |
Selected Quote:
"To those in the leadership of Congress who preach prayer in public
schools, who would with one hand put prayer in the mouths of children and
with the other take food out of those very same mouths, I would say to
those people, you are not religious, you are hypocrites."
Rabbi Lynn Landesberg
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Quicktime movie, 1.8 megabytes
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And Daniel Zingale of the Human Rights
Campaign and Patricia Ireland took on House Speaker Newt Gingrich. |
Selected Quote:
"Newt happens when we don't have the organizing, when we don't have
the candidates, when we don't have the votes we need."
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Quicktime movie, 1.6 megabytes
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Given the rude wake-up call of the 1994 elections, we were out organizing
again early in the 1996 election cycle. The
March to Fight the Right in San Francisco brought together a rainbow
crowd with a clear message. |
Selected Quote:
"We want to show ... we do have the strength to turn the right-wing
extremists around, to put them out of office."
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Quicktime movie, 1.5 megabytes
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Dolores Huerta and the Rev. Jesse Jackson spoke about affirmative
action at the march. |
Selected Quote:
"The attacks on affirmative action are full scale. Affirmative action
is not a black issue, a minority issue. It's a majority issue."
Jesse Jackson
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Quicktime movie, 2.2 megabytes
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Si, se puedes. Yes, we can do it. Through strategies
ranging from marches to TV ads to elections, we've brought about tremendous
gains the past 30 years. It's an ironic measure of our progress that we
face such fierce resistance. Now even more of us need to run for office,
work on campaigns and turn out to vote. So join in our crucial political
efforts. Get active and get results.
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Quicktime movie, 1.8 megabytes
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Credits with Luscious Jackson performing at NOW Rally for
Women's Lives. |
