American Women on the Move

This is the inside story of the National Women's Conference held in Houston in 1977. Although the federally funded meeting was featured on the cover of Time magazine twice, participant Gloria Steinem now describes it as "the most important event nobody knows about." In fact, the International Women's Year (IWY) Conference was America's most democratic, representative, and inclusive congress of citizens in our history. Conference delegates had been elected by 150,000 women at open meetings in every state and territory where they discussed the range of barriers to women's full equality, debated solutions, and proposed remedies. Anti-feminists also had their say. Despite heated disagreements over issues such as the ERA, abortion, lesbian rights, child care, and other hot topics of the day, the Houston delegates united to approve a National Plan of Action to achieve full equality for all women.