[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 145 (1999), Part 3]
[House]
[Pages 4122-4123]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                              RATIFY CEDAW

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentlewoman from California (Ms. Woolsey) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Ms. WOOLSEY. Mr. Speaker, I rise to ask my colleagues, my colleagues 
in the House of Representatives, to take a stand for women. In honor of 
Women's History Month, I am reintroducing a resolution urging the 
Senate to ratify the United Nations Convention on the Elimination of 
All Forms of Discrimination Against Women known as CEDAW, C-E-D-A-W. 
The convention holds governments responsible for first condemning and 
then working to eliminate all forms of discrimination against all 
women. This agreement establishes rights for women not previously 
subjected to international standards including political laws, 
including employment law, including education and health care.
  CEDAW was approved by the United Nations General Assembly 19 years 
ago to codify women's equality, 19 years ago. Since then more than 160 
nations have ratified CEDAW. Also, more than two-thirds of the U.N. 
members have gone on record dedicating themselves to ending state 
sanctioned discrimination against women and girls. The one glaring 
exception is the oldest democracy in the world, the United States.
  Mr. Speaker, since 1994 the President has repeatedly submitted this 
treaty to the Senate where it has languished in the Committee on 
Foreign Relations. The position of the United States as an 
international champion of human rights has been jeopardized by its 
failing to consider and ratify CEDAW. Worse yet, our failure to act 
strips the United States of its ability to sit on an international 
committee established in the treaty to ensure that nations are adhering 
to the treaty's guidelines. This action sends a message loud and clear 
to women in this country and all over the world. The message is that we 
are unwilling to hold ourselves publicly accountable to the same basic 
standards of women's rights that other countries apply to themselves. 
This is despite the fact that since federal and state laws already 
prohibit many forms of discrimination against women, the United States 
could ratify the convention without changing domestic law.

[[Page 4123]]

  The President, the Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright, and 
national and international women's groups have expressed their 
commitment to CEDAW. Let us ratify CEDAW this year and make the 21st 
century the first century in the history of humanity where women do not 
know government sanctioned discrimination.
  I encourage my colleagues to join me on this resolution with 41 other 
original cosponsors and make our desires known loud and clear that we 
want CEDAW, we want it ratified and we want it now.

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