A New Kind of Democracy? Political and Cultural Developments in the 1960s 427Rubin’s experiences might not have been widespread, but they were not
rare either. So women knew something had to be done, and became more
involved politically. The next year, women’s issues got an unexpected boost
when congress passed the 1964 Civil Rights Act. Southern congressmen, try-
ing to kill the bill, put an amendment in Title VII that would prohibit “sex”
as well as “race” discrimination, assuming that Congress would vote against it
because of the inclusion of women as a protected group. But the bill passed
and women had gained, or so they thought, federal protection for equal pay,
hiring, and promotions. The government, however, did not seriously examine
cases of sex discrimination, thus prompting female political figures to
denounce federal inaction and leading many women in October 1966 to form
the National Organization for Women [NOW]. NOW was a political organi-
zation aiming to bring women into a “truly equal partnership with men...
[to] mobilize the political power of all women and men intent on our goals.”
In its first victory, NOW pressured Johnson to include women in government
affirmative action programs that were originally designed for African-
Americans. By the mid-1960s, then, the “founding mothers” of the Women’s
Movement had put their issues onto the national agenda. Millions of others
would pick up the struggle, often more militantly, in the coming years.
FIGuRE 8-11 Betty Friedan, 1964