Women and Politics

This post was submitted by Jean Qiao, WCF communications fellow

We all knew that President Obama could potentially impact the direction of the nation’s highest court. Clearly, Supreme Court justice nominees can define a Presidency, as we saw with George W. Bush and Justices Roberts and Alito…who would overturn Roe v. Wade in a heartbeat.

Luckily, we’re now seeing the second Supreme Court retirement under President Obama (though his nominee won’t change the Court’s ideological makeup): After weeks of suggesting his departure, this morning Justice Paul Stevens announced today that he will officially retire from the bench at the end of June. Justice Stevens is the longest-serving member of the current Supreme Court and has consistently voted in favor of progressive issues.

Wouldn’t it be nice if Sonia Sotomayor and Ruth Bader Ginsburg had the company of another woman on the bench?

Good news, everyone. In their article about Justice Stevens, the Washington Post listed three people that are potentially on the short-list for nominees, and two of the candidates are women: Solicitor General Elena Kagan and appellate court Judge Diane P. Wood. In addition, Kagan is the first woman ever to hold the post of Solicitor General.

So this means there’s a 75% chance that the next Supreme Court Justice will be a woman? I like those odds, but let’s hope that President Obama will make that a reality. Replacing Justice Stevens with a progressive woman will ensure that our reproductive rights are protected (barely protected…but protected).

In a year where we endured multiple efforts by our socially conservative legislators to restrict our reproductive freedoms and throw women’s health under the bus, some support from the nation’s highest Court would be nice.

Adding another woman to the bench will keep us moving toward balancing out the extreme gender inequality in public office government—because we need more women in ALL branches of government.

Tags: justice paul stevens, sonia sotomayor, Supreme Court, supreme court nomination, women justice