Civil Rights Act of 1964 Revisited 'Still have these inequalities': Region played role in national women's rights movement; advocates say much work remains
Mar. 2—JOHNSTOWN, Pa. — When the United States was founded under the American Enlightenment principle that "all men are created equal," women could not vote, hold political office, own property in their own names or serve in the military, nor were they expected to work outside of the home.
Progress has been made in those areas over the past two-plus centuries.
The gradual transformation has been punctuated by milestone events, including the certification of the 19th Amendment in August 1920, granting women the right to vote.
Then, the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which marks its 60th anniversary this year, prohibited discrimination based on sex.
But steps still remain. No woman has ever been president. Kamala Harris became the first female vice president just a little more than three years ago. Issues still exist regarding equal pay, glass ceilings in the business world and bodily autonomy.
"That's so incredible to think it's been 60 years since then and yet we're just now coming upon the first female vice president, and we're now seeing Roe v. Wade being turned over," said Cassidy Polacek, a member of the Johnstown art community, referring to the Supreme Court decision that had guaranteed a right to an abortion until the court overruled it in 2022.
"This is all coming 60 years after something like this has passed where something like this is supposed to protect things like this from happening. It feels like we're going backward in time."
Rachel Allen, from the Unity Coalition of the Southern Alleghenies, pointed to the ever-changing roles of men and women, saying, "I think the widening of gender roles in general has been beneficial to everyone. I see men more involved in child-raising, not just disciplinarians, but in nurturing and other types of emotional support.
"And everybody wins when that happens. You see gender roles not being so narrowly defined in the workplace."
'Progressive mindset'
Women earning the right to vote was one of the most transformational events in the nation's history.
The law was only enacted after suffragist movements, including in Somerset County, fought for the cause over many decades.
In the summer of 1915, people in several communities in Somerset County gathered to see the Justice Bell, a replica of the Liberty Bell that toured the country to draw attention to women's suffrage.
"The tongue of the bell is chained and will not be unloosened until the women secure the ballot, when it will proclaim the glad tidings throughout the State," reported the Meyersdale Republican newspaper.
In the same year, Dr. Anna Howard Shaw, president of the National American Woman Suffrage Association, spoke during the Somerset County Chautauqua Program's "Woman's Suffrage Day."
Then, in 1916, an estimated 700 to 800 people attended a suffragist event at the farm of Alice and Edmund Kiernan.
"That was really fascinating to learn, that something that large in relation to the suffrage movement had happened right here in Somerset County in August of 1916," said Jennifer Hurl, an archivist with the Meyersdale Public Library who has researched the history of the county's suffragist movement.
Hurl credited Alice Kiernan, a state officer with the Pennsylvania Woman Suffrage Association, and Flora Snyder Black, founder of the Pennsylvania Farm Women, for leading the effort in Somerset County.
"They were very progressive women of their time," Hurl said. "I think, being they both lived here in Somerset County and had that progressive mindset, they had some pretty good connections with people. They were just determined to see it through, is the impression I get."
Hurl added: "I think Somerset County came to have such an active movement because it did have a few key figures who just made things happen. Any time you have a movement like that, you need good leaders to at least get the ball rolling and spur it on. Once you have a few good leaders, a lot of people will follow suit."
Modern women's rights concerns often involve health care, including access to abortion.
In 1973, the Supreme Court ruled in the Roe v. Wade case that the Constitution generally protected the right to abortion. The court overturned that decision in June 2022, shifting the decision to make abortion policy back to the states.
"You could put the sound of weeping in the background," Allen said. "That's definitely an interesting turn of events with the Supreme Court reversing Roe v. Wade. ... That should be problematic to everybody regardless of how you feel about abortion. Having full access to health care, I think, should be a national issue."
Abortion has long been one of the most divisive topics in American politics.
"I think some of these issues, if they weren't politicized, there could be a lot more places for common ground — the full access to reproductive health care, having women be able to have a safe experience delivering a baby," Allen said.
"I don't necessarily like how things are so politicized, because it sort of puts us on the other sides of the fence where there could be places to come together and have abortion be less common, like having less restrictions on adoption, giving women more agency in their health care."
Along with addressing major policies, such as with abortion, there are also day-to-day strides that need to be taken, in Polacek's opinion.
"We still have these inequalities that exist, but they're nuanced, they're subtle, they're not in your face, but that's what microaggressions are," Polacek said. "We're learning that with racism. We're learning that with xenophobia.
"But it's so important that we notice in everyday cases like this that aren't as critical and as important as some other civil rights movements that we're talking about, but it's still a matter of learning, and accepting and knowing when it's happening so that we can target it and we can discuss it.
"Because if we don't discuss these issues, that's when you start to become complacent, and complacency is what causes issues."
