Gender Vote Rocks a Primary : Anger in Pennsylvania propels a woman candidate for U.S. Senate

Californians know something about aftershocks from earthquakes, and now Pennsylvanians know something about aftershocks too. In that state Tuesday, a surprising primary election result was an unmistakable aftershock of the political quake brought on by Prof. Anita Hill’s allegations of sexual harassment by now Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. The quaking may continue in this political year, if nowhere else but within the boots of the entrenched powers in Congress.

The first big clue to the deep-seated remaining anger among some women voters over what they considered the Senate’s clubby and dismissive attitude toward women and women’s issues came last month in Illinois. Cook County official Carol Moseley Braun’s scored an upset Democratic primary victory over longtime incumbent U.S. Sen. Alan J. Dixon. Now political newcomer Lynn Yeakel is the come-from-behind surprise winner in the Pennsylvania Democratic primary, meaning in November she will face Hill’s primary interrogator during last summer’s dramatic hearings--two-term Republican Sen. Arlen Specter.

Yeakel, a fund-raiser for women’s causes, attacked Specter in one of her TV ads, which showed the senator sharply questioning Hill during Thomas’ confirmation hearings last year. “Did this make you as angry as it made me?” Yeakel asked in the ad. Apparently so.

In running for the U.S. Senate, both Yeakel and Braun are seeking to join a body that is 98% male. In the House, there are only 29 women.

California GOP Sen. John Seymour, who may be facing a woman opponent, said recently that gender shouldn’t matter. In the ideal world, it shouldn’t. No doubt Sen. Specter, a moderate who favors abortion rights, will make the same argument. But the gender gap is not simply a matter of whether women vote for women. A lot of women, particularly older women, don’t necessarily vote for women. The gap that Braun and Yeakel seem to have tapped is more about the difference that many women, and men, see between the lip service of Congress and the reality of Congress--a body that is unrepresentative and too often out of touch.