Election Reflection #2: 18 Million Cracks Continue to Grow

Published November 06, 2008 @ 08:11PM PT

While neither Senator Hillary Clinton nor Gov. Sarah Palin made it to the White House this year, there was still an upward shift in the number of women who were elected to political office.

The NOW New Hampshire newspaper reports that after Tuesday's election, women now make up the majority of the New Hampshire State Senate. The citizen-run online publication hails to the efforts of Sen. Clinton saying, "It looks like those millions of cracks in the glass ceiling are spreading."

Additionally, Women Count PAC reports on the multiple female candidates who ran for Congress and earned victory on November 4^th. In the Senate, victories included Kay Hagan (NC), Sen. Mary Landrieu (LA), and Jeanne Shaheen (NH). In the House, Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (Ariz, 8th District), Rep. Kirsten Gillibrand (NY, 20th District), Suzanne Kosmas (Fla, 24th District), Betsy Markey (Colo, 4th District), and Dina Titus (Nev, 3rd District).

State Sen. Kay Hagan defeated GOP Sen. Elizabeth Dole, 53% to 44%

In some states such as South Carolina, however, the tide seems to have reversed when it comes to maintaining a gender balance among elected officials. As reported by The State newspaper, South Carolina has now earned the dubious title of "the only state with an all-male Senate." Despite the fact that women represent more than half of the state's population, South Carolina continues to rank last among states in terms of women in elected office.

Share this Post

Add a Comment

For your comment to be published, you will need to confirm your email address after submitting your comment.

If you already have an account, click here to log in.

First Name:

Last Name:

Email:

Create Password:

Comment

Check Spelling

Email me when there are new posts to this thread
Comment Policy

Comments on Change.org are meant for further exploration and evaluation of the ideas covered in the posts. To that end, we welcome constructive comments. However, we reserve the right to delete comments that are offensive, abusive, or off-topic; that contain ad hominem attacks; or that are designed to subvert or hijack comment threads rather than contribute to them. Repeat offenders may be permanently removed from the site at our discretion.

Author

Jen Nedeau is a social media consultant, progressive activist, feminist speaker and writer. She currently lives in New York City, where she works full-time as the Director of Digital Strategy at Air America Media. In August 2008, Nedeau was selected to be the Editor of the WomensRights.Change.Org where she facilitates daily discussion about the feminist movement. Additionally, Nedeau volunteers as the Chief Technology Officer for New Leaders Council, a non-profit that offers exclusive training for young leaders. You can follow her on Twitter @HumanFolly or learn more here: www.jennedeau.com.