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The National Organization for Women (NOW) is an American feminist organization founded in 1966. The organization consists of 550 chapters in all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia.〔"(Information about NOW. )" National Organization for Women. Retrieved 2011-01-13.〕 ==Background== NOW was founded in 1966 by 28 women who became founders at the Third National Conference of Commissions on the Status of Women in June (the successor to the Presidential Commission on the Status of Women), and another 21 women and men who became founders at the October 1966 NOW Organizing Conference, for a total of 49 founders. Both conferences were held in Washington, D.C.〔 The 28 women who became founders in June were: Ada Allness, Mary Evelyn Benbow, Gene Boyer, Analoyce Clapp, Kathryn Clarenbach, Catherine Conroy, Caroline Davis, Mary Eastwood, Edith Finlayson, Betty Friedan, Dorothy Haener, Anna Roosevelt Halstead, Lorene Harrington, Mary Lou Hill, Esther Johnson, Nancy Knaak, Min Matheson, Helen Moreland, Pauli Murray, Ruth Murray, Inka O’Hanrahan, Pauline A. Parish, Eve Purvis, Edna Schwartz, Mary-jane Ryan Snyder, Gretchen Squires, Betty Talkington and Caroline Ware.〔 They were inspired by the failure of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission to enforce Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964; at the Third National Conference of State Commissions on the Status of Women they were prohibited from issuing a resolution that recommended the EEOC carry out its legal mandate to end sex discrimination in employment. They thus gathered in Betty Friedan’s hotel room to form a new organization.〔 On a paper napkin Friedan scribbled the acronym "NOW".〔 The 21 people who became founders in October were: Caruthers Berger, Colleen Boland, Inez Casiano, Carl Degler, Elizabeth Drews, Mary Esther Gaulden (later Jagger), Muriel Fox, Ruth Gober, Richard Graham, Anna Arnold Hedgeman, Lucille Kapplinger (later Hazell), Bessie Margolin, Margorie Palmer, Sonia Pressman (later Fuentes), Sister Mary Joel Read, Amy Robinson, Charlotte Roe, Alice Rossi, Claire R. Salmond, Morag Simchak and Clara Wells.〔 The founders were frustrated with the way in which the federal government was not enforcing the new anti-discrimination laws. Even after measures like the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, employers were still discriminating against women in terms of hiring women and unequal pay with men. Women’s rights advocates saw that these legal changes were not being enforced and worried that without a feminist pressure group, a type of “NAACP for women,” women would not be able to combat discrimination. NOW was created in order to mobilize women, give women’s rights advocates the power to put pressure on employers and the government, and to promote full equality of the sexes. It hoped to increase the amount of women attending colleges and graduate schools, employed in professional jobs instead of domestic or secretarial work, and appointed to federal offices. NOW's (Statement of Purpose ), which was adopted at its organizing conference in Washington, D.C., on October 29, 1966, declares among other things that "the time has come to confront, with concrete action, the conditions that now prevent women from enjoying the equality of opportunity and freedom of choice which is their right, as individual Americans, and as human beings."〔(【引用サイトリンク】url=http://wax.lib.harvard.edu/collections/seed.do?seed=1498&primColl=261&lang=eng )〕 NOW was also one of the first women’s organizations to include the concerns of black women in their efforts.〔 Betty Friedan and Pauli Murray wrote NOW's (Statement of Purpose ) in 1966; the original was scribbled on a napkin by Friedan.〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=The National Organization for Women's 1966 Statement of Purpose )〕 Also in 1966, Marguerite Rawalt became a member of NOW, and acted as their first legal counsel. NOW's first Legal Committee consisted of Catherine East, Mary Eastwood, Phineas Indritz, and Caruthers Berger; it was the first to sue on behalf of airline flight attendants claiming sex discrimination.〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Honoring Our Founders and Pioneers - National Organization for Women )〕 There were many influences contributing to the rise of NOW. Such influences included the President's Commission on the Status of Women, Betty Friedan's book ''The Feminine Mystique'', and passage and lack of enforcement of the Civil Right Act of 1964 (prohibiting sexual discrimination). The President's Commission on the Status of Women was established in 1961 by John F. Kennedy, in hopes of providing a solution to female discrimination in education, work force, and Social Security. Kennedy appointed Eleanor Roosevelt as the head of the organization. The goal of action was to compromise those wanting to advance women's rights in the workforce (such as advocates of the Equal Rights Amendment) and those advocating women's domestic importance/role needing to be preserved (such as organized labor groups). The commission was in a way to settle the tension between opposing sides. Betty Friedan wrote ''The Feminine Mystique'' in response to her own experiences. She was a feminist long before her book, by educating herself and deviating from the domestic female paradigm. The book's purpose was to fuel movement to a women's role outside of domestic environment. Acknowledging some satisfaction from raising kids, cooking, rearranging house decor was not enough to suffice the deeper desire for women to achieve an education. In an interview, Friedan specifically notes, "There was no activism in that cause when I wrote ''Feminine Mystique''. But I realized that it was not enough just to write a book. There had to be social change. And I remember somewhere in that period coming off an airplane () some guy was carrying a sign... It said, "The first step in revolution is consciousness." Well, I did the consciousness with The Feminine Mystique. But then there had to be organization and there had to be a movement. And I helped organize NOW, the National Organization for Women and the National Women's Political Caucus and NARAL, the abortion rights () in the next few years.”〔 In 1968 NOW issued a (Bill of Rights ), which they had adopted at their 1967 national conference, advocating the passage of the Equal Rights Amendment, enforcement of the prohibitions against sex discrimination in employment under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, maternity leave rights in employment and in Social Security benefits, tax deduction for home and child care expenses for working parents, child day care centers, equal and non-gender-segregated education, equal job training opportunities and allowances for women in poverty, and the right of women to control their reproductive lives.〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=N.O.W. Bill of Rights, 1968 )〕 The NOW bill of rights was included in the 1970 anthology ''Sisterhood is Powerful: An Anthology of Writings From The Women's Liberation Movement'', edited by Robin Morgan. In 1969 Ivy Bottini, who was openly lesbian, designed the logo for NOW, which is still in use today. The first time lesbian concerns were introduced into NOW also occurred in 1969, when Bottini, who was then president of the New York chapter of NOW, held a public forum titled "Is Lesbianism a Feminist Issue?".〔Love, Barbara J. (Feminists Who Changed America, 1963-1975 )〕 However, NOW president Betty Friedan was against lesbian participation in the movement. In 1969 she referred to growing lesbian visibility as a "lavender menace" and fired openly lesbian newsletter editor Rita Mae Brown, and in 1970 she engineered the expulsion of lesbians, including Ivy Bottini, from NOW's New York chapter.〔Bonnie Zimmerman (Lesbian histories and cultures: an encyclopedia ), Garland Pub., 2000 ISBN 0815319207 p. 134〕〔Vicki Lynn Eaklor (Queer America: a GLBT history of the 20th century ), ABC-CLIO, 2008 ISBN 0313337497 p. 145〕 In reaction, at the 1970 Congress to Unite Women, on the first evening when all four hundred feminists were assembled in the auditorium, twenty women wearing T-shirts that read "Lavender Menace" came to the front of the room and faced the audience.〔Flora Davis (Moving the mountain: the women's movement in America since 1960 ), University of Illinois Press, 1999 ISBN 0-252-06782-7 p. 264〕 One of the women then read their group's paper "The Woman-Identified Woman", which was the first major lesbian feminist statement.〔〔Cheshire Calhoun (Feminism, the Family, and the Politics of the Closet: Lesbian and Gay Displacement ), Oxford University Press, 2003 ISBN 0-19-925766-3 p. 27〕 The group, who later named themselves "Radicalesbians", were among the first to challenge the heterosexism of heterosexual feminists and to describe lesbian experience in positive terms.〔Carolyn Zerbe Enns (Feminist theories and feminist psychotherapies: origins, themes, and diversity ), Routledge, 2004 ISBN 078901808X p. 105〕 In 1971 NOW passed a resolution declaring “that a woman’s right to her own person includes the right to define and express her own sexuality and to choose her own lifestyle," as well as a conference resolution stating that forcing lesbian mothers to stay in marriages or to live a secret existence in an effort to keep their children was unjust.〔(Leading the Fight | National Organization for Women ). NOW. Retrieved on 2014-07-25.〕 That year NOW also committed to offering legal and moral support in a test case involving child custody rights of lesbian mothers.〔 In 1973 the NOW Task Force on Sexuality and Lesbianism was established.〔 Del Martin was the first open lesbian elected to NOW, and Del Martin and Phyllis Lyon were the first lesbian couple to join NOW. Advocacy of the Equal Rights Amendment was also an important issue to NOW. The amendment had three primary objectives, which were: “Section 1. Equality of Rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any state on account of sex. Section 2. The Congress shall have the power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article. Section 3. This amendment shall take effect two years after the date of ratification.”〔(【引用サイトリンク】url=http://www.now.org/issues/economic/eratext.html )〕 Efforts were proven successful when Congress passed the amendment in 1972. However, simply passing the amendment in the two houses of Congress did not mean the work was finished. NOW had to direct the efforts of getting the amendment ratified in at least three-fourths of the states (38 out of the 50 states). In response to opposing states denying the ratification of the amendment, NOW encouraged members to participate in marches and economic boycotts. “Dozens of organizations supported the ERA and the boycott, including the League of Women Voters, the YWCA of the U.S., the Unitarian Universalist Association, the United Auto Workers (UAW), the National Education Association (NEA), and the Democratic National Committee (DNC).”〔 As strong as the support was, it was to no avail to the opposition from various groups. These groups included select religious collectives, business/ insurance interests, and most visibly was the STOP-ERA campaign led by antifeminist Phyllis Schlafly. Schlafly argued on the premise of creating equality in work force or anywhere else would hinder the laws that are instilled for the mere protection of these women. The safety of women was a higher priority than ensuring there is equality in financial and social scenarios. Interestingly enough, the predicament over the Equal Rights Amendment was not a fight between men and women who abhor men, but rather two groups of women advocating different perspectives on the nature of their lives. The rivalry was sparked in speeches, such as that of Schlafly who began her dialogue by thanking her husband for allowing her to participate in such an activity.〔(【引用サイトリンク】url=http://www.ushistory.org/us/57c.asp )〕 Even though efforts did not prove to be enough to have the amendment ratified, the organization remains active in lobbying legislatures and media outlets on feminist issues. In 1972 NOW chose the Schlesinger Library as the archives for its records. Abortion being an individual woman's choice has come into the forefront since the Supreme Court case of ''Roe v. Wade'' in 1973. The decision of the court was that it ultimately was the woman's choice in reproduction. However, according to the National Organization for Women, decisions following the 1973 landmark case had substantially limited this right, which culminated their response to encourage the Freedom of Choice Act. The controversy over the landmark case ruling was initiated in the two cases, ''Gonzales v. Planned Parenthood'' and ''Gonzales v. Carhart''. These two cases consequently banned abortion methods after 12 weeks of pregnancy.〔(【引用サイトリンク】url=http://www.prochoiceamerica.org/what-is-choice/fast-facts/foca.html )〕 ''Gonzalez v. Planned Parenthood'' and ''Gonzalez v. Carhart'' both dealt with the question of whether the 2003 Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act was unconstitutional by violating the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment expressed in the ''Roe v. Wade'' case. This act ultimately meant that the “concept of partial-birth abortion as defined in the Act as any abortion in which the death of the fetus occurs when "the entire fetal head () or () any part of the fetal trunk past the navel is outside the body of the mother” is banned. The Supreme Court ultimately decided 5-4 that it was not unconstitutional and did not hinder a woman's right to an abortion.〔(【引用サイトリンク】url=http://www.oyez.org/cases/2000-2009/2006/2006_05_1382 )〕 National Organization for Women claimed it was a disregard to a basic principle stemming from ''Roe v. Wade'', which was to only have legislative restriction on abortion be justified with the intention of protecting women's health. Hence, the support for the Freedom of Choice Act (FOCA) which primary purpose was to safeguard a woman's access to abortions even if the ''Roe v. Wade'' ruling is further disregarded. As of 2013, there are seven states that have made the Freedom of Choice Act state law. FOCA will consequently supersede any other law prohibiting abortion in those seven states. They are: California, Connecticut, Hawaii, Maryland, Nevada, Wisconsin, Maine, and Washington. In addition, Maryland, Nevada, and Washington were the only three states to adhere via ballet initiative.〔 Succeeding in the enactment of FOCA would ultimately mean fulfilment of three goals for the National Organization for Women. First, asserting a woman's reproductive right. Second, disseminate information to the public audience about threats posed in the two court cases mentioned above. Third, through the dissemination of information to the public, this in return would mobilize efforts to support female rights in multiple areas that will be presented in the future.〔(【引用サイトリンク】url=http://www.now.org/issues/abortion/070430foca.html )〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「National Organization for Women」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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