Can women regain hard-fought rights we've begun losing?

Lorie Lux

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Since women make up half the population in the U.S., it’s time for women and men to unite and again fight for women’s rights. What man would like to see his mother or daughter treated unfairly? Men and women are not only of equal value, but enable life to be good for each sex, for families and for a decent country.”

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Throughout history, men and women have worked together to survive, to raise families and to find happiness, but it’s been a struggle for women to be considered of equal value to men.

The idea of keeping women barefoot and pregnant, an old saying, where they had no rights and men enjoyed power over their lives prevailed for centuries. Women heard that they could not understand complicated concepts, they are the weaker sex and that they were less intelligent than men.

That was before the pill, before contraception was made easier. Over the past 100 years, from 1925 to 2025, American women have worked hard, fought hard and proven these concepts to be untrue. Women fought for and won many major changes in their lives during the last century.

The 1920s saw women get legal recognition with Genevieve Rose Cline becoming the nation’s first female federal judge. Frances Perkins became the first woman appointed to a presidential cabinet, serving as Secretary of Labor under President Franklin D. Roosevelt.  

The 1930s were still reeling from the effects of the Great Depression, where jobs were scarce, but newer fields, such as radio, telephone and film industries attracted women employees. Women also found work in traditional roles such as domestic and clerical work.

Birth control gained first judicial approval for medicinal use in the U.S. after 1936’s Appeals Court ruling in U.S. v. One Package of Japanese Pessaries, and The Fair Labor Standards Act established a minimum wage without regard to sex. The U.S. Supreme Court, in 1937’s West Coast Hotel Co. v. Parrish, found the minimum wage constitutional. Eleanor Roosevelt supported women taking government jobs and working for labor movements.

The 1940s, during World War II, saw more than 5 million women enter the U.S. workforce in roles traditionally held by men, the U.N. established the Commission on the Status of Women, and the Supreme Court case Fay v. New York ruled women were qualified for jury duty.

The 1950s set the stage for future work for women’s rights as women moved toward a second wave of feminism. Feminist literature, such as “The Second Sex” by Simone de Beauvoir was published in the U.S. in 1953. Women participated in the Civil Rights movement.

The 1960s were notable for women’s rights. The FDA approved the birth control pill, and the Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibited employment discrimination based on sex.

In the 1970s, a nationwide Women’s Strike for Equality enabled passage of the Equal Rights Amendment by the Senate, and Title IX of the Higher Education Act was passed. The Supreme Court legalized abortion in l973 in the court case Roe v. Wade.

The 1980s saw Arizona’s Sandra Day O’Connor confirmed as the U.S. Supreme Court’s first female justice, and the court case Kirchberg v. Feenstra overturned state laws designating the husband as “head and master” of property.

The 1990s is considered an important wave of success in feminism, with a record number of women elected to Congress. In l993, the Family and Medical Leave Act — FMLA — was signed into law.

In the 2000s, Condoleezza Rice became the first female national security adviser, Nancy Pelosi became the first female speaker of the house, Sonia Sotomayor was appointed to the Supreme Court and the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Restoration Act was signed. In 2013, the ban on women in military combat positions was lifted.

Despite the election of Kamala Harris as the country’s first female vice president in 2020, women began to lose rights.

The Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022, and institutional support in the fields of science and technology was cut. A Report from Human Rights Watch highlighted the rise in violence and harassment against women, including obstetric violence, and workplace violence and harassment which became more visible.

Women have worked for hundreds of years to establish their right to be an equal person, with the same rights enjoyed by men. We are all different, but both are of equal value. One is not better than, nor should be more important than the other.

Since women make up half the population in the U.S., it’s time for women and men to unite and again fight for women’s rights. What man would like to see his mother or daughter treated unfairly? Men and women are not only of equal value, but enable life to be good for each sex, for families and for a decent country.

Editor’s note: Women’s Watch is a cooperative writing effort of the local chapters of the American Association of University Women, the League of Women Voters and the National Organization for Women. This piece was authored by Lorie Lux. Please submit comments at yourvalley.net/letters or email them to AzOpinions@iniusa.org. We are committed to publishing a wide variety of reader opinions, as long as they meet our Civility Guidelines.