Spiritual Voice
Younger women are looking for a place where their values are heard and respected but feel alienated from politics and organized religion. “We believe in the ideals of politics, feminism, and religion, but they have all done a lot we don’t agree with,” a 20-something woman said in a recent forum.

Younger women want a spiritual home, a place where they can find support and comfort when they feel unheard in public life. As one told me, “Young women are seeking out new places where they are spiritually fed.”

Where are those places? Younger women recognize that neither organized religion nor the feminist movement offers that perfect place, at least not yet. Most faith communities have a long way to go before they grant women the same respect and authority as men. And religious women often feel unwelcome in feminist organizations because many feminists are, often rightly, critical of organized religion because of its sexism, both past and present. For their part, many secular feminist leaders are perplexed that religious women who also profess to be feminists continue to worship or work in those congregations or institutions. As a consequence, many feminist groups devote little energy to supporting the fight for women’s voice and authority in organized religion.

Young, progressive women who are active in both religious groups and the feminist movement argue that a way to claim their voice is to create networks and alliances between the two worlds. We need one another’s support, they say, as we are all battling sexism and patriarchy. Younger women are also open to the role of spirituality in sustaining feminist activism. They are a generation removed from the most blatant sexism that pervaded both political and religious institutions, and they see the strength that could come from mobilizing women together. A young community activist motivated by her spiritual values claimed that younger religious women are interested in pursuing such common-goal alliances because “we are committed to healing and wholeness.”

Involved Voice
Despite the great potential that young women bring to the struggle for political and religious change, many remain unengaged, seeing few openings for leadership or even for being heard at all. Younger women often step away from public life because they feel dismissed or patronized. But as one young activist told me, in order to make change, younger women must first “claim our own voices and possibilities, rather than letting others define us.” She, like many, is a source of inspiration for us all. None of us can change the world unless we get involved in our communities, in politics, and in public life.
To make a difference, we must be voters, activists, and leaders.

Amy Caiazza is the study director for Democracy and Society Programs at the Institute for Women’s Policy Research. She has a doctorate in political science and has written several books about women’s involvement in politics, religious institutions, and the women’s movement.

Our nation has slowly expanded the right to vote over our history, and it has not always been a smooth process. When our 13 original states first won independence from England, only property-owning white men over 21 who were members of certain religious denominations could vote. By 1790, all states dropped the religious qualification. It was another 65 years before the last state dropped its economic barriers to voting in 1855, so that (broadly speaking) all white men over 21 could vote. After the Civil War, the 15th Amendment extended the vote to all men over 21 born or naturalized in the United States, regardless of race.

The fight still goes on to guarantee that the poor and members of minority racial, religious, and language groups are not denied their right to vote. The landmark Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Voting Rights Act of 1965 struck down poll taxes and other roadblocks to voting, but there are always those who seek to go around the law. For example, some states require voters to show a government-issued photo ID, such as a driver's license. Voters' rights advocates attest that this particularly discourages the urban poor, who are less likely to have a driver's license. See www.votingrights.org for more.

What about women? The 19th Amendment to the Constitution that guaranteed women over 21 the vote was finally ratified on August 26, 1920. Such advocates for women’s civil rights as Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Jane Addams, one of the founders of modern social work, and Carrie Chapman Catt, League of Women Voters founder, had carried on the fight for women’s right to vote in the United States since 1848.

And what about young people? In World War II, single men 18 and over were eligible to be drafted into the armed services. During that war, a congressman from West Virginia introduced an amendment to lower the voting age to 18, arguing that people old enough to fight and die for their country should be able to vote. (He had to keep trying, too: Jennings Randolph introduced bills to lower the voting age 11 times). Finally, on July 1, 1971, when the nation was at war again, President Richard M. Nixon signed the 26th Amendment into law. Young adults could vote.

In the spring of 1972, I turned 18 and exercised my right to vote in the first election after the 26th Amendment was passed. I went to the polling place with my mother; I’ll always remember the look of pride on her face as I stepped up to the table and said, “I’d like to vote, please.”

Audrey Novak Riley lives and votes in River Forest, Illinois.

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