Although 2018 has been called another “Year of the Woman,” increases in women’s representation that year were party-specific. Historically, women’s organizations fought to expand women’s representation in both parties; however, the fruit of these efforts is currently concentrated among Democrats. Indeed, women contributed funds in record numbers in 2018, but the majority of women donors supported Democratic women candidates (Haley Reference Haley2018), and liberal women’s political action committees (PACs) played a prominent role in raising those funds.
Women’s PACs, which endorse and raise funds for women candidates, are a contemporary product of the suffrage movement. The suffrage movement was created and led by women to secure women’s right to vote. Women’s groups, from which women’s PACs arose, expanded women’s activism to support the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA), abortion rights, and political representation by women in both parties. This article traces the history of women’s PACs and how their formation was enabled by the successful efforts of the suffrage movement. We show how the demand by women’s groups for women’s political representation evolved from a bipartisan demand to one more closely aligned with liberal women candidates and the Democratic Party as the two parties took diverging stances on the ERA and abortion and built party cultures that varied in their receptiveness to demands for more women in office. We assess the campaign finance activity of women’s PACs and show how liberal women’s PACs, specifically EMILY’s List, have been significantly more successful than conservative women’s PACs in demanding women’s representation and engaging women donors in supporting women candidates. We conclude that this tremendous disparity contributes to the persistent and increasing partisan gap between Democratic and Republican women candidates and officeholders.
In addition to securing the vote for women, the suffrage movement opened up further opportunities for women’s political participation. According to Goss (Reference Goss, McCammon and Banaszak2018, 201), the movement provided “external validation for women’s role in governance and an unprecedented political opportunity for continued wide-scale civic education.” That next step included the formation of new women’s groups and an expansion of issues around which activists organized (Corder and Wolbrecht Reference Corder and Wolbrecht2016; Freeman Reference Freeman2008; McCammon and Banaszak Reference McCammon and Banaszak2018). Led by suffragists Carrie Chapman Catt and Susan B. Anthony, members of the National American Woman Suffrage Association disbanded and formed the League of Women Voters to “encourage social reform and work on vital issues of concern to members and the public” (League of Women Voters 2019). Another group of suffragists, led by Alice Paul from the National Women’s Party, viewed women’s equality as the next logical step in civic activism and proposed a constitutional amendment for women’s equal rights—the ERA—in 1923 (Becker Reference Becker1981). In the decades that followed, women’s political participation diversified and focused on bipartisan activism to improve women’s economic and political positions (Orleck Reference Orleck2014). A pro-ERA stance was adopted by three women’s groups—National Organization for Women (NOW), National Women’s Political Caucus (NWPC), and Women’s Campaign Fund (WCF)—which emerged in the 1960s and created the first women’s PACs (Burrell Reference Burrell1994). These groups shared a vision of extending women’s political participation beyond voting and bringing women into positions of authority and leadership. By recruiting, endorsing, and funding candidates through affiliated PACs, NOW, NWPC, and WCF became the first women’s representation policy demanders (WRPDs)—organizations that identify the promotion of women candidates for public office as a primary goal (Crowder-Meyer and Cooperman Reference Crowder-Meyer and Cooperman2018).
THE ORIGINAL (AND BIPARTISAN) WOMEN’S REPRESENTATION POLICY DEMANDERS
The three women’s groups that embraced the ERA demanded more women’s representation from both the Democratic and Republican parties, which often were hostile to the prospect of women candidates (Burrell Reference Burrell1994; Freeman Reference Freeman2000). These groups—NOW, NWPC, and WCF—formed their PACs out of frustration with a party system that was inaccessible to most women who wanted to run for elected office. Although it did not create a PAC until 1978, NOW formed in 1966 with a demand for the parties to support women candidates. When the parties declined to assist them, NOW pledged funding—a contribution of $500—to women who supported the ERA and abortion rights (Cooperman Reference Cooperman2010). The other two women’s groups embraced a similar mission. NWPC formed in 1971 and created its PAC in 1976 to endorse candidates who were “pro-ERA, pro-Roe, and pro-publicly funded child care” (Burrell Reference Burrell1994, 126). WCF formed in 1974 and created its PAC in the same year (its website proclaims it is the “oldest women’s PAC”) to support candidates who were pro-ERA and “pro-freedom of choice on abortion” (Burrell Reference Burrell1994, 123).
Thus, the first group of women’s organizations that formed women’s PACs challenged both major parties to back women candidates who supported the ERA and abortion rights. The parties had not yet taken up opposing positions on these issues. Consequently, these women’s PACs endorsed both Democratic and Republican candidates, most of whom were women. Throughout the 1970s, the Democratic Party increased its support for women’s rights when allied policy demanders, including civil rights activists and organized labor, became more supportive of the women’s movement (Sanbonmatsu Reference Sanbonmatsu2002; Wolbrecht Reference Wolbrecht2000). Concurrently, evangelicals wielded their clout as a key constituency in the Republican Party coalition of policy demanders, asserting socially conservative positions and promoting a party culture favoring traditional gender roles (Sanbonmatsu Reference Sanbonmatsu2002; Wolbrecht Reference Wolbrecht2000). After the Republican Party dropped its support for the ERA and added an anti-abortion plank in its platform ahead of the 1980 election, the activities of women’s PACs evolved to reflect the parties’ policy differences and their diverging willingness to respond to women’s representation policy demands.
Thus, the first group of women’s organizations that formed women’s PACs challenged both major parties to back women candidates who supported the ERA and abortion rights.
EMILY’S LIST AND THE ANTI-EMILYS EMERGE TO DEMAND WOMEN’S REPRESENTATION
In the 1980s, states failed to ratify the ERA, the parties continued to polarize on social issues, and men in both major parties continued to be dramatically overrepresented in office. There was parity between the small number of Democratic and Republican women incumbents in Congress and in the numbers of women candidates from both parties relegated to challenging incumbents in hopeless races (Burrell Reference Burrell1994; Center for American Women and Politics 2018). Because NOW, NWPC, and WCF retained their pro-ERA and pro-choice positions, their demands for women’s representation and support for progressive women candidates now resulted in most of their endorsements going to pro-choice women running as Democrats.
Yet, given the Democratic Party’s continued indifference toward women candidates, progressive women came together to form an additional group—EMILY’s List—founded in 1985 to recruit, endorse, fund, and support pro-choice women Democratic candidates and officeholders (Pimlott Reference Pimlott2010). Like the suffragists before them, the women who founded EMILY’s List took on the role that traditional power brokers refused to play to promote women’s equality—in this case, by doing the work of political parties to reach out to women candidates and support them early in the campaign cycle when support can be most consequential (Cooperman Reference Cooperman2010). Pro-choice Democratic women candidates who proved their electoral viability by meeting independent fundraising goals could earn an EMILY’s List endorsement during their primary campaign. With this came financial support through bundled contributions from individual EMILY’s List members, providing early money to help women candidates win their party’s nomination and move on to the general election. The formula of candidate viability and early financial support with bundled funds proved to be highly successful for EMILY’s List and, in turn, the Democratic Party. EMILY’s List generated a largely female network of campaign donors, bringing women into new forms of political participation and enhancing women’s emergence and success as Democratic candidates for office. This increased the PAC’s clout within the Democratic Party and amplified its voice as a powerful policy demander (Cooperman and Crowder-Meyer Reference Cooperman, Crowder-Meyer, Shames and Och2018). As EMILY’s List grew, NOW, NWPC, and WCF continued endorsing and funding pro-choice women candidates but they could not provide a comparable level of support.Footnote 1
Of course, not all of the demands for more women’s representation came from EMILY’s List or were directed at the Democratic Party. Several women’s PACs formed in response to EMILY’s List with their own demands to the Republican Party for greater women’s representation. The WISH List organized in 1992 and demanded more representation for pro-choice Republican women until 2010, when they disbanded and merged with Republicans for Choice (Cooperman Reference Cooperman2010). Susan B. Anthony List, which explicitly aligns itself with a famous suffragist the group identifies as pro-life, organized in 1993 and demanded more representation by women candidates who oppose abortion.Footnote 2
Although new women’s PACs emerged to call for representation by women officeholders with varied policy positions, the Democratic and Republican parties have not been equally receptive to these demands. The distinct cultures of the Democratic and Republican parties affect the willingness of members in each party’s coalition to support group demands for greater representation of women in political office (Crowder-Meyer and Cooperman Reference Crowder-Meyer and Cooperman2018). The Democratic Party is more receptive to group-based claims (Freeman Reference Freeman1986; Grossmann and Hopkins Reference Grossmann and Hopkins2015) and progressive gender roles (Wolbrecht Reference Wolbrecht2000) and therefore is more likely to hear and act on women’s representation policy demands. In contrast, the Republican Party’s political culture is more hierarchical with leading policy demanders in the party who oppose government action to protect or expand rights to identity groups and who favor upholding traditional gender roles (Crowder-Meyer and Cooperman Reference Crowder-Meyer and Cooperman2018; Freeman Reference Freeman1986). A demand to the Republican Party for more women’s representation, even from socially conservative groups, is less likely to be positively received by that party’s prominent coalition members. Thus, the demand from women’s PACs for more women candidates and officials moved from a bipartisan demand to a demand pressed most successfully by EMILY’s List and toward the Democratic Party.
WOMEN’S PACS AND DEMANDS FOR WOMEN’S REPRESENTATION IN THE CONTEMPORARY ERA
Whereas Republican women’s representation in office has stagnated, Democratic women continue to increase their numbers among candidates and elected officials. This pattern was clearly visible in 2018—arguably the “Year of the Democratic Woman”—when more than 100 Democratic women and only 16 Republican women won US House or Senate seats (Center for American Women and Politics 2018). One basis for this disparity is in the Democratic and Republican party cultures and their embrace (or not) of WRPDs. Progressive women’s PACs—especially EMILY’s List—have become thoroughly integrated into the Democratic Party coalition, whereas conservative women’s PACs remain virtually invisible to elites in the Republican Party (Crowder-Meyer and Cooperman Reference Crowder-Meyer and Cooperman2018).
Progressive women’s PACs—especially EMILY’s List—have become thoroughly integrated into the Democratic Party coalition, whereas conservative women’s PACs remain virtually invisible to elites in the Republican Party (Crowder-Meyer and Cooperman Reference Crowder-Meyer and Cooperman2018).
Today, EMILY’s List is the primary WRPD group to the Democratic Party. It raises millions of dollars in each federal election cycle for women candidates from its vast membership of primarily women donors (Cooperman and Crowder-Meyer Reference Cooperman, Crowder-Meyer, Shames and Och2018)—fulfilling one goal of the suffrage movement by expanding the ways in which women participate in politics. It has helped elect more than 150 pro-choice women Democrats to Congress and more than a thousand women to state and local offices by bundling funds for endorsed candidates and providing resources such as campaign staff in targeted contests. It has trained thousands of women to run for national, state, and local elected office, building a pipeline of progressive women poised to run for other elected positions. It has formed additional PACs to raise and spend funds in nonfederal races and to distribute independent expenditures (EMILY’s List 2019).
EMILY’s List has developed a robust campaign finance network for progressive women that is unmatched by any PAC active in US federal elections. In the process, it has become essential to the Democratic Party and made women’s representation policy demands a broadly accepted goal within that party’s coalition. A recent survey of women’s PAC and party donors reveals wide agreement with this goal among Democrats; even Democratic Party committee donors frequently are motivated to donate by candidate sex and gender issues. In contrast, even Republicans who donate to conservative women’s PACs rarely identify candidate sex as important to their candidate-support decisions (Crowder-Meyer and Cooperman Reference Crowder-Meyer and Cooperman2018). In fact, Democratic women now often outraise Democratic men during primary campaigns (Kitchens and Swers Reference Kitchens and Swers2016), and Democratic women candidates particularly benefit from the priority that Democratic women donors place on funding women candidates (Thomsen and Swers Reference Thomsen and Swers2017).
To date, efforts undertaken by various conservative women’s PACs to duplicate the EMILY’s List playbook have been largely unsuccessful. In addition to Susan B. Anthony List, several women’s PACs—including Value in Electing Women (VIEW) PAC, Maggie’s List, and Winning for Women—have formed to demand representation of conservative women from the Republican Party. Most of these PACs endorse Republican women who support limited government and fiscal conservatism, whereas Susan B. Anthony List endorses and funds pro-life candidates—both men and women. However, as the executive director of Winning for Women noted, Republican women’s representation remains low for reasons that are “equal parts institutional and cultural” (Schuller Reference Schuller2019). Institutionally, conservative women’s PACs raise and distribute funds that combined total a fraction of the amount raised and distributed by EMILY’s List. They have much smaller membership lists from which to bundle funds, do not offer training for prospective candidates, do not often endorse or fund a candidate until after she has won her party’s primary, and do not generally raise and distribute independent expenditures (Cooperman and Crowder-Meyer Reference Cooperman, Crowder-Meyer, Shames and Och2018). Culturally, Republican voters and elites reject group-based demands for women’s representation, preventing women’s PACs from becoming known to or powerful within the Republican Party coalition (Crowder-Meyer and Cooperman Reference Crowder-Meyer and Cooperman2018). Recently, some women Republicans have pushed back against this culture and sought to go around the party, such as Representative Stefanik (R-NY), who resigned as head of recruitment for the National Republican Congressional Committee and founded a PAC to support Republican women early, during nomination contests (Cottle Reference Cottle2018). Thus far, conservative women’s PACs have been unable to provide Republican women candidates sufficient resources and funds to increase their representation; however, some Republican women aim to change this in the future.
Culturally, Republican voters and elites reject group-based demands for women’s representation, preventing women’s PACs from becoming known to or powerful within the Republican Party coalition (Crowder-Meyer and Cooperman Reference Crowder-Meyer and Cooperman2018).
The suffrage movement enfranchised women and expanded opportunities for women’s political participation beyond the vote. It created a space from which women’s groups formed women’s PACs to recruit and fund women candidates and to demand more women’s representation from both the Democratic and Republican parties. However, as our overview of women’s PAC fundraising and other activities demonstrates, these groups have been more successful in demanding political representation for progressive Democratic women than conservative Republican women, which has produced party differences in descriptive and substantive representation and expanded the gender gap in party affiliation (Ondercin Reference Ondercin2017). Although existing party cultures make it likely this pattern will persist, women in both parties continue to use their activism to demand greater representation of women who share their party and ideological positions as candidates and elected officials.
