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Article: Twenty percent and climbing. (women legislators)(includes sidebars)
- Article from:
- State Legislatures
- Article date:
- January 1, 1994
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1994 National Conference of State Legislatures. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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More and more women are being elected to the legislatures. That could mean changes not only in priority of the issues but also in the legislative process. Even though their numbers are still far from parity with men, women officeholders at most levels of government have increased with each election.
Since the 1970s, there has been a slow but steady gain in the number of women lawmakers, and the 1992 elections swept hundreds of women into elective office. Gains have been common at the federal level, but recently women forged ahead in state and local government elections.
More than 20 percent of the country's 7,424 state legislators are women, five times as many ...