With the presidential election looming, the Democratic Party of Wisconsin gathered Wednesday night to honor women in all levels of politics at the 10th annual Eleanor Roosevelt Tribute.
“We are here tonight to celebrate some amazing Democratic women past and present,” said Rep. Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis.
The top honor of the night was the Marlys Matuszak Statewide Impact Award, which was renamed after Matuszak when she passed away last February. Marlys’ husband Ed Matuszak presented the award to former State Rep. Rebecca Young and voiced a few sentiments about her wife and her Democratic activism.
“I only wish that she was still alive today to see in two weeks the most amazing thing that’s ever going to happen in the United States,” Matuszak said.
One of the night’s keynote speakers included the president of the Planned Parenthood association, Cecile Richards, who emphasized the Democratic platform on women’s issues in this election is the strongest one the party has ever had.
Richards said she thinks this platform will bring female voters to the polls.
“They want a president who will stand with Planned Parenthood to defend this truth, and that is that five men in black robes don’t know better than women what is right for women’s health in this country,” Richards said.
In addition to attracting the female vote, U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., said young people are also mobilizing and paying more attention to this election.
Peppered with jokes and anecdotes, Klobuchar’s speech addressed her experience with this election and said she sees the importance of young people in her own 13-year-old daughter, who borrowed all her jewelry and clothes to play dress up with friends as journalist Katie Couric and Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin.
Lawton mentioned having new “creds” after flying to China and seeing “that part of Alaska from which you can see Russia.” Gov. Janet Napolitano, D-Ariz. also joked about Palin’s comment, saying she “can see one of John McCain’s houses” from hers.
Napolitano, who made an appearance earlier in the day at the Campaign for Change headquarters on Monroe Street, spoke about Roosevelt’s accomplishments.
In 1924, Roosevelt served as the chair and lone woman of the Women’s Platform Drafting Committee, said Napolitano, who was part of the same committee this year.
The policy recommendations made by Roosevelt, Napolitano said, were visionary and presage the New Deal but were rejected by the all male committee.
“She was presaging not just some of the ideas of the New Deal but the New New Deal we’re going to inaugurate in January,” Napolitano said.
Napolitano said the challenges the next president will face could be the worst since the time of Franklin Delano Roosevelt.
In accordance with Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama’s campaign, Napolitano recited Eleanor Roosevelt’s famous quote, “the future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.”
