Setback for Minorities
The Denver Post
November 13, 2005

Thirty years ago, a group Colorado women believed it was important to have women on corporate boards of directors, participating in the decisions that affected our lives and our jobs. We called ourselves the Velvet Hammer Group and took CEO's of major Colorado companies to lunch to discuss the possibility of adding women to their all-white-male boards.

We told these important men that many, if not most, of their customers were women. We reminded them of the large numbers of women employees they had and the minimal number of women managers they'd hired. We urged them to train and promote women at the bottom of their organizations and to appoint exceptional, experienced, competent women as role models at the top. We gave them the names of stellar women with strong business backgrounds, experience running their own businesses, or substantial responsibilities at large companies who would make excellent board members.

Each time, they told us to be patient. They reminded us that "girls" were just getting into the job market (though millions had been there for decades) and that it would take time for women to work their way up the corporate ladder. In 30 years or so, they explained to us, there would be lots of women in senior management, perhaps even corporate board, positions. Why, girls might even take over the world, they chortled.

Well, we're still waiting. Yes, the Velvet Hammer Group did have some small successes. We got the first woman appointed to the board of trustees of the Colorado School of Mines. We persuaded a couple of Denver banks to add women to their boards of directors for the first time. But, when large numbers of lawyers and doctors are women, when women are starting more businesses than men, when women are successful leaders in all walks of life, it's quite astonishing that women fill only 11% of corporate board positions and only a handful of CEO jobs at major companies.

And now, in a major step backwards, only one slot on the United States Supreme Court.

Although President Bush nominated Harriet Miers to fill Justice Sandra Day O'Connor's seat, her own conservative base trashed her so thoroughly that she withdrew. Mr. Bush apparently thought he'd done his duty to the 51% of Americans who are women, so now he could return to the good old boys' network and appoint the Court's eighth white man.

Among the thousands of women judges and tens of thousands of women lawyers, was there no one qualified to sit on the U.S. Supreme Court? This administration has dissed the American Bar Association, which most previous presidents have asked to vet judicial appointees. The next president of the American Bar Association, however, will be a woman, Colorado lawyer Karen Mathis. I'm sure she would be able to suggest to the president many highly qualified women to serve on the Supreme Court. But, he won't ask her.

America is a very diverse nation. For justice to truly prevail, our judicial system needs to reflect the make-up of the people it serves. The U.S. Supreme Court should be the hallmark of diversity and fairness. A rich variety of backgrounds and opinions makes the Court a far better arbiter of the countless disputes it adjudicates.

And, of course, it's not just women who should be represented on our nation's highest court. Hispanics make up a significant percentage of our population. Yet, there has never been a Hispanic Supreme Court justice. This is not a discussion about affirmative action. It is a principle of our democracy-or at least should be-that all segments of our society be represented in the last port of call of our justice system.

President Bush has had two chances to appoint Supreme Court justices, a rare and immensely important task. He chose to ignore this opportunity to make the Court reflect America.

So, as far as the Supreme Court goes, we can no longer say, "We've come a long way, baby." We've just slid back a whole generation.