Love and Relationships
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Women's Enews Announces 21 Leaders-2003
greatest women explorers whose achievements might otherwise be lost. She writes that "the story of women explorers is as old as time, as old as myth, and as real as memory." Milbry is also working to ensure that discoveries of women explorers and scientists are included in public school history curricula. Kavita Ramdas, president and chief executive officer, Global Fund for Women, a grantmaking foundation supporting women"s human rights organizations around the world. Born and raised in India and educated in the United States, Ramdas has spent her professional life working on issues of poverty, economic development and population. She has brought her international knowledge and understandings to bear as the fund attempts to assist women"s economic independence, increase girls" access to education and stop violence against women. Amy Richards, co-author of "MANIFESTA: Young Women, Feminism, and the Future." Through her ability to strongly articulate the experiences and views of a new generation of feminism--Third Wave feminism--she kindled its growth and broadened its appeal. She is also a co-founder of the Third Wave Foundation, which strives to combat inequities and build lasting financial support for social activism around the country by empowering young women. Elaine Roulet, creator, the Children"s Center program at Bedford Hills Correctional Facility in New York. The center and other programs founded by this member of a Roman Catholic religious order provide mothers in prison opportunities to be with their children, including living with their newborns for up to one year and a seasonal day camp. Elizabeth A. Sackler, public historian and philanthropist. In 2002, the Elizabeth A. Sackler Foundation donated Judy Chicago"s groundbreaking "The Dinner Party" to the Brooklyn Museum of Art. In 2004, newly renovated space on the museum"s fourth floor will permanently house the piece within the Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art. The center will embody the values of gender equality, justice and freedom. Sackler also sponsored a major exhibition of Chicago"s other works at Washington, D.C."s National Museum of Women in the Arts. Henna White, Jewish community liaison for a Brooklyn, N.Y. district attorney where she reaches out to battered women in the close-knit Hassidic enclaves. White also co-founded Mothers to Mothers, which promoted dialogue and understanding between Jewish and African American women in the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn following the 1991 riots there. The leaders all have made a significant impact on the lives of women and girls by alleviating a problem; striving for change; using the law to pursue peace and justice; influencing the unaware; or showing others their human potential and possibility for change. We are pleased to honor them as our 21 Leaders for the 21st Century. Jordan Lite is assistant managing editor of Women"s Enews. Jan. 22, 1973: Supreme Court Issues Decision in Roe v. Wade When Norma McCorvey, a 25-year-old divorced carnival worker with a renegade past discovered she was pregnant, she asked her Dallas doctor for an abortion. He suggested California, where the procedure, with a doctor"s approval, was legal. She couldn"t afford it. A serendipitous series of events early in 1970 led McCorvey to Linda Coffee and Sarah Weddington, recent law school graduates eager to make abortion legal. A history stretching back nearly a century lay behind the belief that control of a woman"s body was the very basis for control of her life. A different but overlapping history asserted individual privacy over governmental jurisdiction. By 1970, a movement of many factions with many different agendas and tactics was demanding reform or repeal of abortion laws. Coffee and Weddington won the first round: District Attorney Henry Wade, the Dallas judges said, had failed to demonstrate that the restrictive abortion law "represented a compelling state interest." The state appealed. On Dec. 13, 1971, Weddington made her first appearance before the U.S. Supreme Court. By then, Norma McCovey, known by the pseudonym "Jane Roe," had given birth to a daughter and surrendered her for adoption. A second round of legal argument took place the following October. On Jan. 22, 1973, two days after Richard Nixon"s presidential inauguration, the court decision striking down most legal restrictions on abortion was announced. Far from ending it, the day marked only the beginning of the movement to guarantee reproductive rights. It also marked the birth of an opposition--formerly dominated by the medical profession, now led by religious crusaders--that would grow in strength and passion in the years to come. Louise Bernikow is the author of nine books, including "The American Women"s Almanac." She takes her women"s history slide show to communities and campuses all over the country.Pages: 1 [2]