And New Hampshire is the leader at 228. Heh.
Data released Monday by the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University's Eagleton Institute show a record 2,431 women are general election candidates for state legislative seats on Nov. 7. That's 56 more female candidates than the prior peak in 1992, when 2,375 women ran.
Obviously this seems like a good thing and it probably is. But I am interested to see a couple of things. How many of these women will actually be elected? Also, just because women are running doesn't mean that their agenda is feminist or progressive (or anti-war), so I think that is another variable to keep in mind. Finally, how many of these women represent women of color or working class people? Or are they mostly white middle class women, usually the first to have access to legislative bodies?
Of the women seeking office, 1,563 are Democrats, 859 are Republicans and the remainder are third-party candidates or are running in nonpartisan races.
I guess in these confusing times, this information is only slightly valuable. This is perhaps a good thing from a middle of the road feminist perspective. But for those of us that actively believe that the existing state legislative system fails to be truly representative of the people it is seeking to govern, I am skeptical that this will actually change anything.
I also just did a few searches and it is very difficult to find how many people of color, working class people or women of color are elected into state office.
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With regard to New Hampshire in particular, I would guess that 100% of the women candidates are white as the state is something like 97% white. I know there are only about 9000 African-Americans in the state, and I am guessing there are probably even fewer residents from other minority groups. The politics in NH tend to be conservative/libertarian so I definitely wouldn't assume that women candidates are especially progressive.