Where are the women?

S.C. ranks last in percentage of female legislators

The Post and Courier

Call it the "cockiness gap" or maybe even the "Magnolia Curtain."

Women make up more than half of South Carolina's population, but only 15 of the state's 170 legislators are females. That's 8.8 percent, the lowest in the nation.

Why is South Carolina falling behind? And why does it matter?

State legislatures have the most direct impact on people's daily lives, much more than Congress, says Dr. Lynne E. Ford, political science professor at the College of Charleston. And state legislatures traditionally have been a pipeline for women who wanted to seek higher offices, a place to accumulate political experience.

When you don't see women in a state legislature, "You're not likely to see them in other offices either," said Ford, whose research for the past decade has focused on women in politics. "So it's no surprise that South Carolina has never had a female governor, that South Carolina has only in the history of the state sent two women to Congress — only in the House, never in the Senate."

Where are the women?

In the early 1990s, a member of the S.C. House of Representatives rang up Rita Allison, who was then a school board member in Spartanburg County. He told Allison he'd be retiring next year and suggested she run for his seat.

"You know what I did?" Allison said. "I went home to my husband and I said, 'Our representative's going to give up his seat. Why don't you run?' "

Lucky for Allison, her husband declined and instead offered her his support.

She served 10 years in the House, sponsoring bills to promote education, health care, tax reform and economic development, and to curb child abuse and domestic violence.

She stepped down in 2002 to run for lieutenant governor, but will be back in the S.C. House representing District 36 soon, facing no opposition in the general election.

When asked why she initially suggested her husband seek the office, Allison said, "I guess I just didn't see myself serving statewide."

Women often feel they're not ready to run, that they don't know enough, that they need another degree, said Barbara Zia, president of the League of Women Voters of South Carolina.

"If you take a man and a woman with equal experience, the woman will tend to feel that she is less qualified than the man will feel," Zia said. It's what one report on women in politics calls "the cockiness gap."

The Palmetto State's dismal percentage of women in the Legislature is largely due to its history and culture, Zia said.

South Carolina women's hopes were dashed in 1920 when the 19th Amendment, giving women the right to vote, was ratified nationally but not by our state, Zia said. While South Carolina women could vote, it wasn't part of state law until 1969.

Historically, government has been seen as the realm of males, and women haven't been encouraged or recruited to run the way men have, Zia said.

"I think about it as kind of a Magnolia Curtain that surrounded women of South Carolina — that they needed to be protected, and the menfolk, so to speak, were the ones who were out there running public affairs and deciding public policy."

Ford said that the tradition of Southern culture "very carefully ascribes or prescribes a role for women in the home."

Note that's home, not House of Representatives, as Jenny Horne can attest.

As she campaigned for the District 94 House seat for Dorchester and Charleston counties, Horne was asked on a regular basis who would take care of her children.

"People don't ask male candidates how they're going to take care of their two small children when they run for office," Horne said. "They assume there's someone in the picture that's going to take care of the children."

The Summerville attorney addressed people's concerns by explaining that her husband, who already shares equally in the parenting of their 3-year-old and 7-year-old, was very supportive, as was her extended family.

Having won the primary and facing no challengers in the general election, Horne will be sworn into her first public office in November, unless there is some unforeseen write-in campaign.

She'll be joining Rep. Julia Anne Parks, who has served District 12 for Greenwood and McCormick counties for the past 10 years.

Parks sees the time commitment of the Legislature as the biggest deterrent for women.

Last Saturday, Parks participated in a parade, then a fundraiser for a children's home, followed by a neighborhood reunion and finally the annual banquet of an educational ministry.

She considers that a busy Saturday, but said every weekend holds at least one event she must attend.

"You really don't have a personal life because serving in politics, the public demands to see you at one function or another," Parks said. "They don't think about the fact that you have a district that has 32,000 to 33,000 people in it. And that's every legislator."

Our state also has one of the longest legislative sessions, convening three days a week from January through June.

A further look at South Carolina's political culture may help explain why few women seek office.

South Carolina is predominantly a one-party state and has a high incumbency rate, Ford points out. As a result, elections are less competitive. And when elections are less competitive, political parties are not aggressively searching for new candidates.

"And Republicans have traditionally not recruited women as aggressively as the Democratic Party has in other states," Ford said.

Should there be more female legislators?

Ford will tell you that as a democratic republic, it matters what the people's representatives look like.

"There's an argument that if people have similar life experiences to their constituents they're more likely to actually legislate on that basis," she said.

There are issues that are considered public issues now because women have been elected to office, including child care, breast cancer and equal pay, Ford said. "You can't define something as a public problem unless there are people willing to put it on the agenda, and I think women put different issues on the agenda."

Many people believe that women bring different experiences and perspectives to the table.

"Women's experience is different from men's," Zia said. "And that's not to denigrate men's experience. (It's) just that if women make up over half of the population of the state, those interests and experiences and concerns need to be represented."

There's a chance South Carolina's 46-member Senate will have no women in it next year. One of the current female senators is retiring; the other lost her bid for re-election.

Senate President Pro Tem Glenn McConnell said the lack of female senators potentially could cause a lack of awareness.

"I think it's important to have different perspectives in there, and to hear those and to understand them," McConnell said. "It causes you to stop and think about the opinion you've got — did you consider that. And perhaps what we're doing is not as inclusive, or is not going to produce the results that we want. ... It's something I may not have thought about."

What could be done?

A young, Columbia-based nonprofit called the Southeastern Institute for Women in Politics is working to train women to become powerful participants in the political process. That includes offering women classes on campaigning.

Another nonprofit, The Alliance for Women, is on a mission to improve the status of women in South Carolina in several areas, including political participation.

Organizations such as these could greatly increase the state's dreary numbers if they're successful in identifying women with good credentials and training them to run, according to Ford.

Also, both Allison and Parks say it's important for women who have served in the Legislature, like themselves, to reach out to and encourage other qualified women to run.

And women across the state need to support qualified women as they campaign, with encouragement and financial contributions, Zia said. Research shows that female candidates are able to raise as much money as males, but that more of the money is coming from men than women.

Every day, South Carolina women are volunteering in schools, serving on committees or leading in other ways, Horne said.

"We've got to take it to the next level and move up to elected office so that we can bring our talents to serve the people of our communities and our state."

Reach Kristen Hankla at 937-5548 or khankla@postandcourier.com.