Twenty years ago, women couldn't obtain a loan without their husband co-signing the loan papers.  And that was in America, not some third-world country.  Working in Afghanistan and Rwanda for the past two years, I appreciate even more what women did in this country a short 20 years ago to blaze the path to business success and empowerment of women right here in America.  Last Saturday, October 25, was the 20^th Anniversary of the signing of the Women's Business Ownership Act of 1988.  Access to credit for women business owners, census data important to the world, training support, and official advocacy for our community became reality.  Watching this legislation become law and being involved around the fringes was VERY exciting for me as a new member of the National Association of Women Business Owners (NAWBO).

I joined NAWBO in 1986 because of Virginia Littlejohn. She was my public policy mentor.   She traveled to Oklahoma City in 1986 and recruited me and others to be delegates to the 1986 White House Conference on Small Business.  In August 1986, I made my first trip to Washington, D.C. as a delegate to the Conference and my life changed forever.  I met and worked with other small business owners from across the country who had the same problems in business, the same passion to succeed, and the same desire to change policies we were grappling with on a daily basis. Today,

 MANY of these people are still very close friends and associates.

Gillian Rudd, another mentor and national president of NAWBO in 1987-88, was key to the passage of HR 5050.  I served as National Vice President of Appointments for NAWBO in 1988-89 and watched Gillian and Virginia and others strategize through this legislative process.  NAWBO became a force to be reckoned with.  When the annual State of Small Business Report was released with no mention of the growth of women owned businesses in the report, Gillian and others called a press conference to highlight the fact that women were starting businesses in droves.  There wasn't any data to prove it; however, Gillian knew it was fact. 

After Congressman John LaFalce (D-New York) held hearings identifying major changes needed for women to grow and sustain their businesses, NAWBO assisted in drafting the legislative language and NAWBO activated its membership to pass the symbolic number titled House Resolution HR 5050.    President Ronald Reagan signed it into law on October 25, 1988, as the Women's Business Ownership Act of 1988.

This legislation is the reason we have the National Women's Business Council, the SBA Women's Business Centers, the data needed to prove our success and our areas of improvement, and equitable access to credit.

Personally, I pause at this time to be grateful to Virginia Littlejohn and Gillian Rudd.  When I became national president of NAWBO, Gillian and Virginia were so helpful to me as I also ran for Lt. Governor of Oklahoma during this same time frame.  Shortly after that I watched Gillian as she continued to fight for women business owners and fight cancer which ultimately took her from us!  Without Virginia and Gillian's  influence, I would not have had the opportunity to serve as national president of NAWBO, be the co-founder of Women Impacting Public Policy (WIPP), and now working to empower women in developing countries around the world as the president of the Institute for Economic Empowerment of Women, and serving as a distinguished fellow at the National Center for Policy Analysis.  Small business, regardless of who owns them, remains my passion to this day.

At a time when Joe the Plumber-and Jo the Plumber, too!-are high-profile in politics and the national consciousness, we need to work harder than ever to meet the needs of 21^st century small businesses and their employees.  We need policies like personal and portable benefits, tax fairness, small business health plans and others to keep America competitive and prosperous. 

Leave a Reply