United States Women’s Rights Timeline
Compiled January 2013
Here follow some important dates and many interesting facts regarding women and women’s rights in America since the first women’s rights convention held in 1848.
~ During the 2008 U.S. presidential campaign, Hillary Clinton thanked the women who held the convention at Seneca Falls in 1848 and began the women’s rights movement. She described the dramatic advances that women have made in the past. “My mother was born before women could vote. My daughter got to vote for her mother for president.” ~
1848 - The world's first women's rights convention is held in Seneca Falls, New York, July 19-20. Lead by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott - “A Declaration of Sentiments and Resolutions” - A document declaring women and men to be equal! The document is debated and signed by 68 women and 32 men, setting the agenda for the women's rights movement that followed.
1849 Elizabeth Smith Miller appears on the streets of Seneca Falls, NY, in "Turkish trousers," soon to be known as "bloomers."
1849 Amelia Jenks Bloomer publishes and edits Lily, the first prominent women's rights newspaper.
1850 Quaker physicians establish the Female Medical College of Pennsylvania, PA to give women a chance to learn medicine. The first women graduated under police guard.
1855 Lucy Stone becomes first woman on record to keep her own name after marriage, setting a trend among women who are consequently known as "Lucy Stoners."
1855 The University of Iowa becomes the first state school to admit women.
1859 The birth rate continues its downward spiral as reliable condoms become available. By the late 1900s, women will raise an average of only two or three children.
1860 Of 2,225,086 Black women, 1,971,135 are held in slavery. In San Francisco, about 85% of Chinese women are essentially enslaved as prostitutes.
1866 The 14th Amendment is passed by Congress then ratified by the states in 1868. The first time "citizens" and "voters" are defined as "male" in the Constitution.
1866 The American Equal Rights Association is founded, the first organization in the US to advocate women's suffrage.
1868 The National Labor Union supports equal pay for equal work.
1868 Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan Anthony begin publishing The Revolution, an important women's movement periodical.
1869 Iowa is the first state to admit a woman, Arabella Mansfield, to the Iowa bar.
1870 For the first time in the history of jurisprudence, women serve on juries in the Wyoming Territory.
1870 The 15th Amendment receives final ratification. By its text, women are not specifically excluded from the vote. During the next two years, approximately 150 women will attempt to vote in almost a dozen different jurisdictions from Delaware to California.
1872 Through the efforts of lawyer Belva Lockwood, Congress passes a law to give women federal employees equal pay for equal work.
1872 Charlotte E. Ray, Howard University law school graduate, becomes first African-American woman admitted to the U.S. bar.
1873 Congress passes the Comstock Law, defining contraceptive information as "obscene material."
1877 Helen Magill is the first woman to receive a Ph.D. at a U.S. school, a doctorate in Greek from Boston University.
1878 The Susan B. Anthony Amendment, to grant women the vote, is first introduced in the US Congress.
1884 Belva Lockwood, presidential candidate of the National Equal Rights Party, is the first woman to receive votes in a presidential election (approx. 4,000 in six states).
1887 For the first and only time in this century, the US Senate votes on woman suffrage. It loses, 34 to 16. Twenty-five Senators do not bother to participate.
1899 National Consumers League is formed with Florence Kelley as its president. The League organizes women to use their power as consumers to push for better working conditions and protective laws for women workers.
1903 - Women’s Trade Union League is formed to eliminate sweatshops and organize labor unions. This was the key institution in forming women’s working conditions in the early 20th century. The heyday of the League came between 1907 and 1922 under the presidency of Margaret Dreier Robins. During that period, the WTUL led the drive to organize women workers into unions, secured protective legislation and educated the public on the problems and needs of working women.
1907 - Harriot Stanton Blatch, (daughter of Elizabeth Stanton) founded the Equality League of Self- Supporting Women. In 1910 - renamed Women’s Political Union. Working class women were recruited into the suffrage movement - 20,000 plus members.
1910 - Women’s Political Union held the first suffrage parade in New York led by H.S Blatch. Eventually over 300 shops sign union contracts.
1912 Juliette Gordon Low found the first American group of Girl Guides, in Atlanta, Georgia. Later renamed the Girl Scouts of the USA. The organization brings girls into the outdoors, encourages their self-reliance and resourcefulness, and prepares them for varied roles as adult women.
1913 Alice Paul and Lucy Burns organize the Congressional Union. Members picket the White House and engage in other forms of civil disobedience, drawing public attention to the suffrage cause.
1914 Margaret Sanger calls for legalization of contraceptives in her new feminist publication, The Woman Rebel, which the U.S. Post Office banned from the mails.
1915 - Women’s Political Union merged with the Congressional Union that eventually became the National Women’s Party.
1916 Jeannette Rankin of Montana becomes the first woman elected to the US Congress and is elected again in 1940.
1917 During WWI women move into many jobs working in heavy industry in mining, chemical manufacturing, automobile and railway plants. They also ran streetcars, conducted trains, directed traffic, and delivered mail.
1919 Congress submits the 19th amendment to the states for ratification. It takes one year to ratify.
1920 - Constitutional Amendment 19 gave women the vote. The last state to holdout, Tennessee, ratified the amendment and women achieved full suffrage in American
1921 Margaret Sanger organizes the American Birth Control League, which becomes the Federation of Planned Parenthood in 1942.
1923 Supreme Court strikes down a 1918 minimum-wage law for District of Columbia women because, with the vote, women are considered equal to men. This ruling cancels all state minimum wage laws.
1923 The Equal Rights Amendment was first proposed by Alice Paul and the National Woman's Party. It was passed by Congress in 1972 and sent to the states for ratification, which is achieved when a proposed amendment is accepted by three-quarters (38) of the states. By the Congressionally imposed deadline of June 30, 1982, only 35 states had voted yes. In 2013 The Equal Rights Amendment is not yet in the U.S. Constitution. The Equal Rights Amendment regarding women reads -Section 1. Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.
1933 Frances Perkins, the first woman in a presidential cabinet, serves as Secretary of Labor during the entire Roosevelt presidency.
1935 Eleanor Roosevelt starts publishing her syndicated column "My Day" which she continues until her death in 1962.
1936 - “Birth Control” was fully legalized.
1941 A massive government and industry media campaign persuades women to take jobs during the war. Almost 7 million women respond, 2 million as industrial "Rosie the Riveters" and 400,000 join the military.
1945-1953 Eleanor Roosevelt serves as a delegate to the United Nations General Assembly. She also became chair of the U.N. 's Human Rights Commission. As a member of the Human Rights Commission, she helped to write the Universal Declaration of Human Rights—an effort that she considered to be her greatest achievement.
1945 Women industrial workers begin to lose their jobs in large numbers to returning service men, although surveys show 80% want to continue working.
1950’s - American women faced issues surrounding the workplace, reproductive rights and the general elevating of women in society. Women in the 50’s were unfulfilled, bored and with modest birth control had a radical call to feminism to end “women’s slavery!”
1957 The number of women and men voting is approximately equal for the first time.
1960 Birth control pills are approved by the FDA marking a revolution in how women would view childbearing and their roles as mothers.
1961 President Kennedy appoints Eleanor Roosevelt to the advisory committee of the Peace Corps and chair of the Presidential Commission on the Status of Women
1963 Equal Pay Act amending the Fair Labor Standard Act, JFK’s New Frontier Program, aims at abolishing wage disparity based on sex.
1963 Betty Friedan's bestseller, The Feminine Mystique, detailed “the problem that has no name." Five million copies are sold by 1970, laying the groundwork for the modern feminist movement.
1964 Civil Rights Acts - Comprehensive U.S. law intended to end discrimination based on race, color, religion, or national origin. It is generally considered the most important U.S. law on civil rights since Reconstruction. It guarantees equal voting rights.
1964 Title VII of the Civil Rights Act bars employment discrimination by private employers, employment agencies, and unions based on race, sex, and other grounds. To investigate complaints and enforce penalties, it establishes the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), which receives 50,000 complaints of gender discrimination in its first five years. . The act was proposed by Pres. John F. Kennedy in 1963 and strengthened and passed into law under Pres. Lyndon B. Johnson.
1966 In response to EEOC inaction on employment discrimination complaints, twenty-eight women, organized by Betty Friedan, found the National Organization for Women to function as a civil rights organization for women.
1968 The first National Women's Liberation Conference is held in Chicago.
1968 The National Abortion Rights Action League (NARAL) is founded.
1968 Shirley Chisholm (D-NY) is first Black woman elected to the US Congress.
1970 Women could attend elite military institutions like West Point and serve in the Air Force, Marine Corps or Navy.
1970 The Equal Rights Amendment is reintroduced into Congress.
1972 The National Women's Law Center is formed - A non-profit advocacy organization to advance the progress of women, girls, and families with emphasis on employment, education, reproductive rights and health and family issues. The Center has been at the forefront of the major legal and public policy initiatives in this country to improve the lives of women. Educating state, local, and federal policy-makers as well as members of the public about critical women's issues, building and leading coalitions, litigating groundbreaking cases and informing landmark Supreme Court decisions. The Center is a sponsor of human rights, helping to resonate women's voices through the minds of public policy-makers, advocates, and the public alike.
1973 Billie Jean King scores an enormous victory for female athletes when she beats Bobby Riggs in the tennis tournament watched by nearly 48,000,000 people.
1973 The first battered women's shelters open in the US, in Tucson, Arizona and St. Paul, Minnesota.
1973 In Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court establishes a woman's right to abortion, having a legal abortion in the first trimester of pregnancy. This effectively cancelled the anti-abortion laws of 46 states.
1974 Hundreds of colleges are offering women's studies courses. Additionally, 230 women's centers on college campuses provide support services for women students.
1975 The first women's bank opens, in New York City.
1978 For the first time in history, more women than men enter college.
1981 At the request of women's organizations, President Carter proclaims the first "National Women's History Week," incorporating March 8, International Women's Day.
1981 Sandra Day O'Connor is the first woman ever appointed to the US Supreme Court. In 1993, she is joined by Ruth Bader Ginsberg.
1984 Geraldine Ferraro is the first woman vice-presidential candidate of a major political party (Democratic Party).
1986 - Fourteen states declare March as Women’s National Month
1987 Congress declares March, in perpetuity, Women’s National History Month. A special presidential proclamation is issued every year that honors the extraordinary achievements of “American Women”. It celebrates the accomplishments of generations of women throughout history.
1990 The number of Black women in elective office has increased from 131 in 1970 to 1,950 in 1990.
1992 Women are paid 71 cents for every dollar paid to men. The range is from 64 cents for working-class women to 77 cents for professional women with doctorates. Black women earned 65 cents, Latinas 54 cents.
1993 Take Our Daughters to Work Day debuts, designed to build girls self-esteem and open their eyes to a variety of careers.
1996 US women's spectacular success in the Summer Olympics (19 gold medals, 10 silver, 9 bronze) is the result of large numbers of girls and women active in sports since the passage of Title IX.
2001 A century after the presentation of the first Nobel Prizes, only 10 of the prestigious awards in the sciences had been bestowed upon women. But the first decade of the 21st century proved a watershed for women scientists. In 2009 alone three women captured the award. Two Americans, Australian-born American molecular biologist and biochemist Elizabeth H. Blackburn and American molecular biologist Carol Greider for Physiology/ Medicine The discoveries of these and other women and the broad recognition of their contributions to scientific progress marked what many hope will be a promising turning point for women in science.
2005 Hillary Clinton introduces the Paycheck Fairness Act. The Paycheck Fairness Act is legislation twice introduced and twice rejected by the United States Congress to expand the scope of the Equal Pay Act of 1963 and the Fair Labor Standards Act as part of an effort to address male–female income disparity in the United States.
2005 There were 7 CEO’s in Fortune 500. As of May 2011, there were 12 CEO’s in Fortune 500 companies.
2009 President Obama signed the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Restoration Act, which allows victims of pay discrimination to file a complaint with the government against their employer within 180 days of their last paycheck. Previously, victims (most often women) were only allowed 180 days from the date of the first unfair paycheck. This Act is named after a former employee of Goodyear who alleged that she was paid 15–40% less than her male counterparts, which was later found to be accurate.
2011 There are an estimated 8.1 million women-owned businesses in the U.S. which account for
29% of all enterprises in the country. Nationally, the number of women-owned businesses has
increased by 50% since 1997. Women-owned businesses generate $1.3 trillion in revenues and
employs 7.7 million people in the U.S.
2012 Almost all income growth in the United States over the past 15-20 years came from women.
2012 Women business owners are philanthropically active: seven in 10 volunteer at least once per month; 31% contribute $5,000 or more to charity annually; 15% give $10,000 or more. Women business owners are more likely than men to serve in leadership positions in their volunteer pursuits. High net worth women business owners and executives are active and generous philanthropists as well. Over half contribute in excess of $25,000 annually to charity; including 19% who give $100,000 or more.
2012 Women in business have drastically changed over the past 20 years. These statistics verbalize the fact that the male-dominated business landscape continues to change every day. More and more females are becoming self-made moguls. Women-owned firms are growing rapidly and greatly contributing to the income growth in the U.S. As the latest prevailing strength in small business ownership, women entrepreneurs are taking over and making the business world a whole lot more feminine.
2012 The 113th Congress will have 20 female senators, the most ever in U.S. history. The House of Representatives will also hold a record number of women this term with 78 Congresswomen elected.
The major factor in women's rights in the USA during the late 20th and early 21st century was the spread of equality in industry and jobs. Many successful women achieved highly successful careers, such as Carly Fiorina as head of HP and Hillary Clinton as a viable candidate during the 2008 Democratic Primary. This culminated in the signing of the Lilly Ledbetter Act in 2009, which further supports the idea of equal pay between men and women.
Here follow some important dates and many interesting facts regarding women and women’s rights in America since the first women’s rights convention held in 1848.
~ During the 2008 U.S. presidential campaign, Hillary Clinton thanked the women who held the convention at Seneca Falls in 1848 and began the women’s rights movement. She described the dramatic advances that women have made in the past. “My mother was born before women could vote. My daughter got to vote for her mother for president.” ~
1848 - The world's first women's rights convention is held in Seneca Falls, New York, July 19-20. Lead by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott - “A Declaration of Sentiments and Resolutions” - A document declaring women and men to be equal! The document is debated and signed by 68 women and 32 men, setting the agenda for the women's rights movement that followed.
1849 Elizabeth Smith Miller appears on the streets of Seneca Falls, NY, in "Turkish trousers," soon to be known as "bloomers."
1849 Amelia Jenks Bloomer publishes and edits Lily, the first prominent women's rights newspaper.
1850 Quaker physicians establish the Female Medical College of Pennsylvania, PA to give women a chance to learn medicine. The first women graduated under police guard.
1855 Lucy Stone becomes first woman on record to keep her own name after marriage, setting a trend among women who are consequently known as "Lucy Stoners."
1855 The University of Iowa becomes the first state school to admit women.
1859 The birth rate continues its downward spiral as reliable condoms become available. By the late 1900s, women will raise an average of only two or three children.
1860 Of 2,225,086 Black women, 1,971,135 are held in slavery. In San Francisco, about 85% of Chinese women are essentially enslaved as prostitutes.
1866 The 14th Amendment is passed by Congress then ratified by the states in 1868. The first time "citizens" and "voters" are defined as "male" in the Constitution.
1866 The American Equal Rights Association is founded, the first organization in the US to advocate women's suffrage.
1868 The National Labor Union supports equal pay for equal work.
1868 Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan Anthony begin publishing The Revolution, an important women's movement periodical.
1869 Iowa is the first state to admit a woman, Arabella Mansfield, to the Iowa bar.
1870 For the first time in the history of jurisprudence, women serve on juries in the Wyoming Territory.
1870 The 15th Amendment receives final ratification. By its text, women are not specifically excluded from the vote. During the next two years, approximately 150 women will attempt to vote in almost a dozen different jurisdictions from Delaware to California.
1872 Through the efforts of lawyer Belva Lockwood, Congress passes a law to give women federal employees equal pay for equal work.
1872 Charlotte E. Ray, Howard University law school graduate, becomes first African-American woman admitted to the U.S. bar.
1873 Congress passes the Comstock Law, defining contraceptive information as "obscene material."
1877 Helen Magill is the first woman to receive a Ph.D. at a U.S. school, a doctorate in Greek from Boston University.
1878 The Susan B. Anthony Amendment, to grant women the vote, is first introduced in the US Congress.
1884 Belva Lockwood, presidential candidate of the National Equal Rights Party, is the first woman to receive votes in a presidential election (approx. 4,000 in six states).
1887 For the first and only time in this century, the US Senate votes on woman suffrage. It loses, 34 to 16. Twenty-five Senators do not bother to participate.
1899 National Consumers League is formed with Florence Kelley as its president. The League organizes women to use their power as consumers to push for better working conditions and protective laws for women workers.
1903 - Women’s Trade Union League is formed to eliminate sweatshops and organize labor unions. This was the key institution in forming women’s working conditions in the early 20th century. The heyday of the League came between 1907 and 1922 under the presidency of Margaret Dreier Robins. During that period, the WTUL led the drive to organize women workers into unions, secured protective legislation and educated the public on the problems and needs of working women.
1907 - Harriot Stanton Blatch, (daughter of Elizabeth Stanton) founded the Equality League of Self- Supporting Women. In 1910 - renamed Women’s Political Union. Working class women were recruited into the suffrage movement - 20,000 plus members.
1910 - Women’s Political Union held the first suffrage parade in New York led by H.S Blatch. Eventually over 300 shops sign union contracts.
1912 Juliette Gordon Low found the first American group of Girl Guides, in Atlanta, Georgia. Later renamed the Girl Scouts of the USA. The organization brings girls into the outdoors, encourages their self-reliance and resourcefulness, and prepares them for varied roles as adult women.
1913 Alice Paul and Lucy Burns organize the Congressional Union. Members picket the White House and engage in other forms of civil disobedience, drawing public attention to the suffrage cause.
1914 Margaret Sanger calls for legalization of contraceptives in her new feminist publication, The Woman Rebel, which the U.S. Post Office banned from the mails.
1915 - Women’s Political Union merged with the Congressional Union that eventually became the National Women’s Party.
1916 Jeannette Rankin of Montana becomes the first woman elected to the US Congress and is elected again in 1940.
1917 During WWI women move into many jobs working in heavy industry in mining, chemical manufacturing, automobile and railway plants. They also ran streetcars, conducted trains, directed traffic, and delivered mail.
1919 Congress submits the 19th amendment to the states for ratification. It takes one year to ratify.
1920 - Constitutional Amendment 19 gave women the vote. The last state to holdout, Tennessee, ratified the amendment and women achieved full suffrage in American
1921 Margaret Sanger organizes the American Birth Control League, which becomes the Federation of Planned Parenthood in 1942.
1923 Supreme Court strikes down a 1918 minimum-wage law for District of Columbia women because, with the vote, women are considered equal to men. This ruling cancels all state minimum wage laws.
1923 The Equal Rights Amendment was first proposed by Alice Paul and the National Woman's Party. It was passed by Congress in 1972 and sent to the states for ratification, which is achieved when a proposed amendment is accepted by three-quarters (38) of the states. By the Congressionally imposed deadline of June 30, 1982, only 35 states had voted yes. In 2013 The Equal Rights Amendment is not yet in the U.S. Constitution. The Equal Rights Amendment regarding women reads -Section 1. Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.
1933 Frances Perkins, the first woman in a presidential cabinet, serves as Secretary of Labor during the entire Roosevelt presidency.
1935 Eleanor Roosevelt starts publishing her syndicated column "My Day" which she continues until her death in 1962.
1936 - “Birth Control” was fully legalized.
1941 A massive government and industry media campaign persuades women to take jobs during the war. Almost 7 million women respond, 2 million as industrial "Rosie the Riveters" and 400,000 join the military.
1945-1953 Eleanor Roosevelt serves as a delegate to the United Nations General Assembly. She also became chair of the U.N. 's Human Rights Commission. As a member of the Human Rights Commission, she helped to write the Universal Declaration of Human Rights—an effort that she considered to be her greatest achievement.
1945 Women industrial workers begin to lose their jobs in large numbers to returning service men, although surveys show 80% want to continue working.
1950’s - American women faced issues surrounding the workplace, reproductive rights and the general elevating of women in society. Women in the 50’s were unfulfilled, bored and with modest birth control had a radical call to feminism to end “women’s slavery!”
1957 The number of women and men voting is approximately equal for the first time.
1960 Birth control pills are approved by the FDA marking a revolution in how women would view childbearing and their roles as mothers.
1961 President Kennedy appoints Eleanor Roosevelt to the advisory committee of the Peace Corps and chair of the Presidential Commission on the Status of Women
1963 Equal Pay Act amending the Fair Labor Standard Act, JFK’s New Frontier Program, aims at abolishing wage disparity based on sex.
1963 Betty Friedan's bestseller, The Feminine Mystique, detailed “the problem that has no name." Five million copies are sold by 1970, laying the groundwork for the modern feminist movement.
1964 Civil Rights Acts - Comprehensive U.S. law intended to end discrimination based on race, color, religion, or national origin. It is generally considered the most important U.S. law on civil rights since Reconstruction. It guarantees equal voting rights.
1964 Title VII of the Civil Rights Act bars employment discrimination by private employers, employment agencies, and unions based on race, sex, and other grounds. To investigate complaints and enforce penalties, it establishes the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), which receives 50,000 complaints of gender discrimination in its first five years. . The act was proposed by Pres. John F. Kennedy in 1963 and strengthened and passed into law under Pres. Lyndon B. Johnson.
1966 In response to EEOC inaction on employment discrimination complaints, twenty-eight women, organized by Betty Friedan, found the National Organization for Women to function as a civil rights organization for women.
1968 The first National Women's Liberation Conference is held in Chicago.
1968 The National Abortion Rights Action League (NARAL) is founded.
1968 Shirley Chisholm (D-NY) is first Black woman elected to the US Congress.
1970 Women could attend elite military institutions like West Point and serve in the Air Force, Marine Corps or Navy.
1970 The Equal Rights Amendment is reintroduced into Congress.
1972 The National Women's Law Center is formed - A non-profit advocacy organization to advance the progress of women, girls, and families with emphasis on employment, education, reproductive rights and health and family issues. The Center has been at the forefront of the major legal and public policy initiatives in this country to improve the lives of women. Educating state, local, and federal policy-makers as well as members of the public about critical women's issues, building and leading coalitions, litigating groundbreaking cases and informing landmark Supreme Court decisions. The Center is a sponsor of human rights, helping to resonate women's voices through the minds of public policy-makers, advocates, and the public alike.
1973 Billie Jean King scores an enormous victory for female athletes when she beats Bobby Riggs in the tennis tournament watched by nearly 48,000,000 people.
1973 The first battered women's shelters open in the US, in Tucson, Arizona and St. Paul, Minnesota.
1973 In Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court establishes a woman's right to abortion, having a legal abortion in the first trimester of pregnancy. This effectively cancelled the anti-abortion laws of 46 states.
1974 Hundreds of colleges are offering women's studies courses. Additionally, 230 women's centers on college campuses provide support services for women students.
1975 The first women's bank opens, in New York City.
1978 For the first time in history, more women than men enter college.
1981 At the request of women's organizations, President Carter proclaims the first "National Women's History Week," incorporating March 8, International Women's Day.
1981 Sandra Day O'Connor is the first woman ever appointed to the US Supreme Court. In 1993, she is joined by Ruth Bader Ginsberg.
1984 Geraldine Ferraro is the first woman vice-presidential candidate of a major political party (Democratic Party).
1986 - Fourteen states declare March as Women’s National Month
1987 Congress declares March, in perpetuity, Women’s National History Month. A special presidential proclamation is issued every year that honors the extraordinary achievements of “American Women”. It celebrates the accomplishments of generations of women throughout history.
1990 The number of Black women in elective office has increased from 131 in 1970 to 1,950 in 1990.
1992 Women are paid 71 cents for every dollar paid to men. The range is from 64 cents for working-class women to 77 cents for professional women with doctorates. Black women earned 65 cents, Latinas 54 cents.
1993 Take Our Daughters to Work Day debuts, designed to build girls self-esteem and open their eyes to a variety of careers.
1996 US women's spectacular success in the Summer Olympics (19 gold medals, 10 silver, 9 bronze) is the result of large numbers of girls and women active in sports since the passage of Title IX.
2001 A century after the presentation of the first Nobel Prizes, only 10 of the prestigious awards in the sciences had been bestowed upon women. But the first decade of the 21st century proved a watershed for women scientists. In 2009 alone three women captured the award. Two Americans, Australian-born American molecular biologist and biochemist Elizabeth H. Blackburn and American molecular biologist Carol Greider for Physiology/ Medicine The discoveries of these and other women and the broad recognition of their contributions to scientific progress marked what many hope will be a promising turning point for women in science.
2005 Hillary Clinton introduces the Paycheck Fairness Act. The Paycheck Fairness Act is legislation twice introduced and twice rejected by the United States Congress to expand the scope of the Equal Pay Act of 1963 and the Fair Labor Standards Act as part of an effort to address male–female income disparity in the United States.
2005 There were 7 CEO’s in Fortune 500. As of May 2011, there were 12 CEO’s in Fortune 500 companies.
2009 President Obama signed the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Restoration Act, which allows victims of pay discrimination to file a complaint with the government against their employer within 180 days of their last paycheck. Previously, victims (most often women) were only allowed 180 days from the date of the first unfair paycheck. This Act is named after a former employee of Goodyear who alleged that she was paid 15–40% less than her male counterparts, which was later found to be accurate.
2011 There are an estimated 8.1 million women-owned businesses in the U.S. which account for
29% of all enterprises in the country. Nationally, the number of women-owned businesses has
increased by 50% since 1997. Women-owned businesses generate $1.3 trillion in revenues and
employs 7.7 million people in the U.S.
2012 Almost all income growth in the United States over the past 15-20 years came from women.
2012 Women business owners are philanthropically active: seven in 10 volunteer at least once per month; 31% contribute $5,000 or more to charity annually; 15% give $10,000 or more. Women business owners are more likely than men to serve in leadership positions in their volunteer pursuits. High net worth women business owners and executives are active and generous philanthropists as well. Over half contribute in excess of $25,000 annually to charity; including 19% who give $100,000 or more.
2012 Women in business have drastically changed over the past 20 years. These statistics verbalize the fact that the male-dominated business landscape continues to change every day. More and more females are becoming self-made moguls. Women-owned firms are growing rapidly and greatly contributing to the income growth in the U.S. As the latest prevailing strength in small business ownership, women entrepreneurs are taking over and making the business world a whole lot more feminine.
2012 The 113th Congress will have 20 female senators, the most ever in U.S. history. The House of Representatives will also hold a record number of women this term with 78 Congresswomen elected.
The major factor in women's rights in the USA during the late 20th and early 21st century was the spread of equality in industry and jobs. Many successful women achieved highly successful careers, such as Carly Fiorina as head of HP and Hillary Clinton as a viable candidate during the 2008 Democratic Primary. This culminated in the signing of the Lilly Ledbetter Act in 2009, which further supports the idea of equal pay between men and women.