*This analysis of Bryant’s situation was written in 1978 and published in
issued separately from the divorce petition, she contended that Green had
“violated my most precious asset—my conscience”
May 24, 1980). Within three weeks after the divorce decree (August 1980),
the state citrus agency of Florida, which Bryant had represented for eleven
years, decided she was no longer a suitable representative because of her
divorce: “The contract had to expire, because of the divorce and so forth, ”
one agency executive said
Act, which prohibits job discrimination on the basis of marital status.
Even before DeCrow’s sisterly act, however, Bryant had reevaluated her
position on the women’s movement, to which, under Green’s tutelage, she
had been bitterly opposed. “What has happened to me, ” Bryant told the
women who want to pass ERA [Equal Rights Amendment]. That still is
not the answer. But the church doesn’t deal with the problems of women
as it should. There’s been some really bad teachings, and I think that’s
why I’m really concerned for my own children—particularly the girls.
You have to recognize that there has been discrimination against women,
that women have not had the teaching of the fullness and uniqueness of
their abilities. ”
the Panama Canal Treaty. Her roots, and perhaps her heart such
as it is, are in the Old Right, but she remained unknown to any
significant public until she mounted her crusade against the Equal
Rights Amendment. It is likely that her ambition is to use women
as a constituency to effect entry into the upper echelon of right-
wing male leadership. She may yet discover that she is a woman
(as feminists understand the meaning of the word) as her male colleagues refuse to let her escape the ghetto of female issues and enter the big tim e. * At any rate, she seems to be able to manipulate the
fears of women without experiencing them. If this is indeed the
case, this talent would give her an invaluable, cold-blooded detachment as a strategist determined to convert women into antifeminist activists. It is precisely because women have been trained to respect and follow those who use them that Schlafly inspires awe and
* According to many newspaper reports, Phyllis Schlafly wanted Reagan
to appoint her to a position in the Pentagon. This he did not do. In a
debate with Schlafly (Stanford University, January 26, 1982) lawyer
Catharine A. MacKinnon tried to make Schlafly understand that she had
been discriminated against as a woman: “Mrs. Schlafly tells us that being a
woman has not gotten in her way. I propose that any man who had a law
degree and graduate work in political science; had given testimony on a
wide range of important subjects for decades; had done effective and brilliant political, policy and organizational work within the party [the Republican Party]; had published widely, including nine books; and stoppeda major social initiative to amend the constitution just short of victory dead
