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Senator Rosalie Silber Abrams

The first Jewish woman elected to the Maryland State Senate, Rosalie Silber Abrams was an energetic and activist legislator who oversaw the passage of nearly 300 bills during her seventeen-year career in the Maryland General Assembly.

Bette Midler Owns Her Own Voice

October 31, 1989

US Court of Appeals says Bette Midler's voice is distinctive.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg

The demand for justice runs through the entirety of Jewish history and Jewish tradition.

Sonia Pressman Fuentes

I became the staff person who stood for aggressive enforcement of the sex discrimination prohibitions of the Civil Rights Act.

Joyce Antler

Besides they told me, ‘only bad girls get abortions.’

Judy Wilkenfeld, 1943 - 2007

Judy Wilkenfeld brought people together, made everyone with whom she came into contact better, and became a close and trusted friend, confidante, mentor, and role model to so many people with whom she worked.

Beate Sirota Gordon, 1987

Meet Beate Sirota Gordon – Who Knew?

Elizabeth Pleck

Beate Sirota Gordon (1923-2012), feminist and Asian arts impressario, was only 22 years old when she wrote women's rights into Japan’s constitution. In her postwar career as a director of performing arts, first for the Japan Society and then the Asia Society in New York City, she introduced Americans to Asian visual and performing arts, from Japanese wood block prints to Burmese music to Vietnamese puppets.

Topics: Women's Rights, Art, Law
Sheryl Sandberg

I’m Hitting “Like” on Leaning In

Evelyn Becker

The spotlight is on Sheryl Sandberg, COO of Facebook, and her mission to change the balance of power in the United States.  Sandberg’s book Lean In hit the proverbial shelves this week and the media is buzzing.  Is Sandberg the new Gloria Steinem?  Will her message on women and leadership motivate real change? 

Stairway in the Woods

Redefine Success, Submit to Passion

Evelyn Becker

It's January 2013 in Denver, Colorado. Things are going well. My children have settled easily into the school year in second grade and pre-K. Becker Impact started a challenging and particularly meaningful new project. Then, as part of that project, I interviewed a charismatic young lawyer who mentioned what first year associates now earn at New York City law firms. Plus bonus.

Topics: Feminism, Israel, Law
Pro Choice Protester, 2010

The name may change but the belief stays the same

Talia bat Pessi

Not surprisingly, the 40th anniversary of Roe v. Wade kicked up a great deal of dust. In early January, Planned Parenthood announced that it will abandon the term "pro-choice" to describe people who believe abortion should be every woman's right; on January 25th, tens of thousands of  activists gathered on the Mall in Washington, D.C. for the annual Walk for Life. One of our regular guest bloggers, high school student Talia bat Pessi, shares her thoughts on the issue. 

Lit Candles

May Their Memory Be for a Blessing

Evelyn Becker

On the front page of this morning’s Denver Post a picture of Veronique Pozner, mother of Sandy Hook Elementary School victim Noah Pozner, at Noah’s gravesite at B’nai Israel Cemetery in Monroe, Connecticut, assaults me as I sit down to drink my morning coffee. Veronique stands next to her rabbi, and my eyes are drawn to his kippah. And I’d thought, that perhaps, I was going to be able to start this day without crying.

Topics: Children, Motherhood, Law
Phyllis Schlafly

Phyllis Schlafly: Groundbreaker for Women's Rights?

Talia bat Pessi

For today’s young feminists, the name Phyllis Schlafly may be totally unfamiliar; if anything, it triggers a distant memory of a footnote in an AP US History textbook. Those activists who lived and fought during the Second Wave are, however, all too familiar with the uber-conservative activist.

Topics: Feminism, Film, Law
Green Woman

Contemporary Abortion Politics: Good for the Jews?

Carole Joffe

This title is, admittedly, at least partially tongue in cheek.

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, 2004

"Jurist with Attitude" Celebrates 19 Years on Supreme Court

Deborah Fineblum Raub

If you are under the age of 20, there’s never been a time in your life when a Jewish woman hasn’t been sitting on the Supreme Court of the United States.

Marcia Greenberger

Marcia Greenberger is founder and Co-President of the National Women’s Law Center, established in 1972 to advocate for gender equality in education, jobs, economic security, and health. Under her leadership, the NWLC has worked to improve the lives of women, girls and families by backing laws to prohibit pregnancy discrimination in employment and to provide compensation for victims of sexual harassment. It helped pass state and federal tax laws to help millions of families pay for child and dependent care and secured new federal remedies for women seeking child support.

Elena Kagan

Justice Kagan's first year on the bench

Kate Bigam

Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan is inarguably a Jewess with attitude – not to mention clout and intelligence. Justice Kagan, who was sworn into office on August 7, 2010, has just wrapped up her first year as an Associate Justice on the country’s highest court, and what a year it’s been.

Gay, Jewish New Yorkers: Mazel tov to the newlyweds!

Kate Bigam

Maybe you’ve heard: As of last Sunday, same-sex marriage became legal in the state of New York. The law, which passed in June, went into effect over the weekend.

Let’s recap some of the Jewish highlights this new law brought about, shall we? There are quite a few of them!

Top 11 Labor History Landmarks in New York City

Labor History Landmark: No. 7 Jefferson Market Courthouse

Leah Berkenwald

The Top 11 Labor History Landmarks in New York City is a blog series on Jewesses with Attitude created in honor of Women's History Month and the 100th anniversary of the Triangle Waist Factory fire. Learn more about the series here, or check out JWA's online walking tour.

Rosalie Silberman Abella speaks on "Identity, Diversity, and Human Rights" at Harvard

March 1, 2010

In a talk at Harvard University on "Identity, Diversity, and Human Rights," Canada Supreme Court Justice Rosalie Silberman Abella shared her family's Holocaust story and explained how it informs he

Rhonda Copelon, 1944 - 2010

Rhonda Copelon often worked behind the scenes, but her finger prints, or perhaps I should say brain waves, are all over many of the most important breakthroughs in progressive feminist advances both in the United States and globally.

Donna E. Arzt, 1954 - 2008

In her a genetic disposition to the appeal of tikkun olam was evident, in the course of a life devoted to deploying the law in behalf of progressive causes of special concern to the Jewish people.

Ruth Pulda, 1955 - 2008

... It was your run-of-the-mill start of a new era; an era of Ruth as a lawyer, a teacher, a mentor, an activist. But it also marked a time during which Ruth's desire to have a family became uppermost. To really know Ruth is to know that her mantra is: Family First! That applies to her immediate family and her many extended families.

Patricia A. Barr, 1950 - 2003

Pat firmly believed that each action she took -- in the public realm and the private realm -- affected the universe ... Pat was full of love. Not a gushy love, but a solid, matter-of-fact, and deeply felt love.

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