LETTER: Glass ceiling got first crack in Montana in 1916

The Democratic National Convention is over, and 96 years after women earned the right to vote, a woman is the nominee of a major party for president.

She said, “when there is no ceiling, the sky’s the limit.” Hillary Clinton is referring to the glass ceiling. It would be good for her to go back 100 years, when Montanans elected the first woman to serve in public office in any Western democracy, ever. Jeannette Rankin, Republican, progressive, champion of human rights, and pacifist, won a seat in the House of Representatives in 1916.

Women in Montana could not vote for the president, but they could help elect a woman to Congress. The glass ceiling received a monumental crack. It had taken 140 years for a woman to even be elected to office since the founding of the United States. Now, 100 years later, a woman might become president. Progress has been slow, but it has come. As with any human rights issue, we still have far to go, and we must remain vigilant against those who would send us backward.

But, as poster child for Clinton’s 2016 campaign, Rankin presents two problems. One, she was a Republican, but a Republican when that party represented the progressive movement; she is ancestor to the progressives of today. Second, she was the only person to vote against entering both world wars. Too much of today’s world still believes that war is a viable means of policy and our president must be seen as strong and ready to do what is needed.

Rankin hated war, as any sane person must. But our leader must also work within reality. Still, Rankin’s idealism is powerfully American. Clinton would do well to embrace that. Thank you, voters of Montana! You made history. Perhaps we will again.

—Roy Blokker, Lakeside