Organizing for America | Ian Jungbacker's Blog: Women's Weekend of Action: On the Road with Sarah Weddington

Women's Weekend of Action: On the Road with Sarah Weddington

By Ian Jungbacker - Oct 14, 2008 7:14:34 PM ET

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With a smile and wit the size of her native Lone Star state, Sarah Weddington knows how to tell a story - and the trail-blazing lawyer has more than a few to tell.

Weddington was only 26 years old when she took her first contested case all the way to the Supreme Court, a stunning accomplishment that was only obscured by the magnitude of the case she won: Roe v. Wade.

Now she's a law professor at the University of Texas, but has always been active in fighting for women.

"I want to tell you why this election is so important to me," she told a gathering at Beloit College. "It's the Supreme Court." Weddington estimates that the next President will be responsible for two - maybe even three - appointments to the highest court in the country. "And women have come so far in my lifetime - and we have such a long way yet to go - to turn back now."

Recalling her childhood in Texas, Weddington remembered when women's basketball was a half-court game where "traveling was called if you dribbled more than twice" and where women were only allowed three career options: teaching, nursing, and being a secretary.

Not only did Weddington break through barriers in the legal profession, but she also went on to serve in the Texas State Assembly where she mentored a legislative assistant by the name of Anne Richards who famously went on to become the first woman Governor of Texas.

But Weddington and pioneering women like her were able to break through the glass ceilings of the past because the American legal system began to recognize that women deserve to be an equal footing with men - and the only person who is going to appoint Supreme Court Justices that will continue to protect women's rights is going to be Barack Obama.

"Wisconsin is so important this election," Weddington told Beloit, "and I can't wait to be a party back in Texas on Election Night and hear the voice on the TV announce 'And we're going to call Wisconsin for Obama!'"

Check out the photo's from the entire Women's Tour featuring Sarah Weddington and Congresswomen Susan Davis and Betty McCollum:

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