Eleanor Smeal Quotes

When it comes to getting more women into parliament, politicians have at least started to take active measures. The British Labour Party introduced all-female shortlists in 1997.

In politics, they found there were not enough females in the House of Commons, so they came up with the idea of shortlists having to have women on them.

For me, a better democracy is a democracy where women do not only have the right to vote and to elect but to be elected.

In Tunisia, where women have long enjoyed greater rights than many of their Arab neighbors, women pushed for and won a new electoral code that guarantees women will make up half of a candidates' list for office.

We reasoned that the men would find it difficult to vote against the women in their home states when a woman was sitting with them making laws.

If we take into account that women have had the right to vote only for some 100 years - in some countries even less - and that we have already won seats in governments or presidential offices, I understand that men look at this rise with some anxiety.

I cannot doubt that women will line up, like the men elected, with the groups whose political thinking and convictions are in accord with their own political convictions.

When given the chance, women have proven they will participate in the electoral process.

I am really proud to be a part in whatever way of women becoming active in the political scene. I think it was the first time that people came to terms with the reality of what it meant to have a Senate made up of 98 men and two women.

It is in Saudi Arabia's best interest to allow women to fully participate in its society, and this includes the right to vote and run for office.

The press always causes a certain amount of hesitance for people who are considering entering public life. So simply encouraging women to enter politics, on any level, not just on the state level, is extremely important.

We believed that growth through Local Government, and perhaps through some special machinery for bringing the wishes and influence of women of all classes to bear on Parliament, other than the Parliamentary vote, was the real line of progress.

When women are pessimistic about their political strength and feel hopeless about changing the conditions of their lives, it is almost as if they do not believe that democracy means the country belongs to them. But it's true.

The personal attendance and intervention of women in election proceedings...would be a practical evil not only of the gravest but even of an intolerable character.

If we think that our daughters ought to be in Congress next to our sons, we'd better let our sons know that now, so that they get prepared to have women as colleagues.

The political power of women today is greater than they are using.

I consider every attempt to induce women to think they have a just right to participate in the public duties of government as injurious to their best interests and derogatory to their character.

Many women in politics say they had very few, if any, female role models.

Women are prepared to run for office. They're prepared to show up. Oh yeah, women have big roles to play, and they have stepped up to the plate already.

Women are not only deciding the outcome of elections, they serve as important role models for their daughters and other young women - they hold a key to expanding the way in which women value and experience politics.

So I hope women will consider a life in politics. We need women, you see. We need them.

We're going to have more women run for office. We can shift what's going on in Congress.

As a woman candidate myself, I know how important it was to be encouraged to run, to think outside of the box.

I think the more women we have running for office the better.

Do I want more women elected to Parliament? Absolutely. I devote significant amounts of time to getting more women in that situation.