~a column by Colleen O’Brien
Oh, poor Iowa, we’re in season again. The conservative politicos were invited in last month by one of our least progressive politicians to speechify a year ahead of time — Iowa caucusus are set right now for February of 2016 — and we get to hear the media talk about us as the Tea Party/evangelistic Iowan mentality who live in the state known for its cornfields and pig farms.
Who would have dreamed? The idea of the Iowan mentality being labeled “Tea Party” surely makes some folks giddy; others, embarrassed, if not kind of sick.
It’s time to remind ourselves of our progressive past:
- 1838: The Supreme Court of the Iowa Territory ruled that a slave from a slave state could not be forced to return to the slave state after the slave reached Iowa soil.
- 1838: Iowa, while still a territory, allowed unmarried women to own property. At that time, women had few rights and in most of the U.S. were considered property themselves.
- 1846: The same year Iowa became a state, it became the second state in the nation to allow married women to own property (as long as it didn’t originally come from her husband).
- 1846: Iowa demonstrated acceptance of religious minorities by allowing safe passage through western Iowa of Mormons fleeing religious persecution in Illinois.
- 1851: Iowa became the second state to legalize interracial marriage — a century before the rest of America.
- 1851: Iowa legislated that the property of married women did not vest in her husband, nor did the husband control his wife’s property.
- 1857: The University of Iowa became the first state university in the nation to open its degree programs to women.
- 1860: The Iowa State Supreme Court ruled that a married woman could acquire real and personal property and hold it in her own right.
- 1867: African American men were granted the right to vote. The Fifteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which did the same thing nationally, wasn’t ratified until 1870.
- 1868: The Iowa State Supreme Court ruled that women could have custody rights.
- 1868: Iowa became the second state to outlaw segregated schools – 90 years before the rest of America. The Iowa State Supreme Court ruled that all children in Iowa must attend the same schools.
- 1869: Iowan Julia C. Addington became the first woman in the United States to be elected to public office – Mitchell County Superintendent even though women weren’t allowed to vote in Iowa at the time. She ran against a man and defeated him. When Addington asked the Iowa Attorney General to issue an opinion on her election, he wrote that her election was legal under the constitution of Iowa. That was the first such ruling from any Attorney General in the country. Even more astounding is that within a decade, 75 percent of the county superintendents in Iowa were women, another first in the nation.
- 1869: Iowa became the first state to allow women to join the bar, thus setting the stage for the first female attorney in the U.S., Arabella Mansfield.
- 1871: Ada E. North became the first woman in the United States to be appointed to a state office – Iowa State Librarian.
- 1873: The Iowa State Supreme Court ruled that African Americans are entitled to equal treatment in public accommodations.
- 1875: Emma Haddock of Iowa City became the first female in the United States to practice law before a federal court.
- 1880: The Iowa constitution was amended to allow African American men to serve in the Iowa General Assembly.
- 1884: The Iowa Civil Rights Act was passed, prohibiting discrimination in public accommodation. It was one of the first civil rights acts in the nation.
- 1885: Iowa once again demonstrated its acceptance of religious minorities as Iowa’s first Muslim immigrants settled in Cedar Rapids.
- 1890: President Harrison appointed Alexander Clark, an African American from Muscatine, to be U.S. minister to Liberia, one of the first African American diplomats for the United States.
- 1894: Iowa became the third state in the nation to give women the right to vote (after Wyoming in 1869 and Colorado in 1893). Women could vote if candidates were not involved (such as bond issues).
- 1917: The US Army held its first officer candidate class for African American men at Fort Des Moines.
- 1919: Iowa became the 10th state to ratify the Nineteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution (women’s right to vote).
- 1934: The first mosque in the United States is built in Cedar Rapids. It is now known as the Mother Mosque of America. Cedar Rapids is also the home of the Muslim National Cemetery, the only exclusively Muslim cemetery in the United States.
- 1949: The Iowa State Supreme Court ruled that Katz Drug Stores in Des Moines discriminated against Edna Griffin (an African American, also known as the Rosa Parks of Iowa). It was the first successful enforcement of the Iowa Civil Rights Act of 1884. The ruling was preceded by a boycott of Katz Drug Store in Des Moines by white and black residents. This boycott occurred seven years before the bus boycott in Montgomery, AL.
- 1953: Iowa was the only state to defeat a McCarthyistic legislative measure to impose a teacher’s loyalty oath.
- 1953: Iowan Abdallah Ingram, a World War II veteran from Cedar Rapids, convinced President Eisenhower that Islam, along with Christianity and Judaism, should be recognized by the U.S. military. He successfully urged President Eisenhower to stamp “I” for “Islamic” on dog tags of American Muslim soldiers .
- 1962: Iowa becomes the fourth state in the nation to use a merit selection process for its judicial system. This system helps keep politics from influencing judges.
- 1970: Iowa became the second state to adopt no-fault divorce.
- 1970: The University of Iowa became one of the first universities in the U.S. to allow a student GLBT group. It was also one of the first universities in the U.S. to add sexual orientation to its non-discrimination policy.
- 1984: Rich Eychaner, a Republican, became the first openly gay man in the U.S. to run for a voting seat in Congress, Iowa’s fourth congressional district (that’s us, folks).
- 2003: On November 14, Iowa State District Court Judge Jeff Neary in Sioux City granted a divorce to a lesbian couple who had a civil union in Vermont. (This was a year before Massachusetts allowed marriage equality.) The case was appealed by conservatives to the Iowa State Supreme Court.
- 2005: On June 17, the Iowa State Supreme Court, in Alons v Iowa District Court, ruled that a same-sex couple legally joined in another state could be divorced under Iowa law.
- 2007: Iowa became the second state to allow full marriage equality for gays and lesbians. One gay couple was married before the judge put a stay on his ruling in Varnum v Brien until the Iowa State Supreme Court could rule on the case.
- 2007: Iowa became the fifth state to protect children from bullying due to sexual orientation AND gender identity.
- 2007: Iowa became the seventh state to ban discrimination due to sexual orientation AND gender identity, making sexual orientation and gender identity protected classes in Iowa.
- 2008: During the Jan. 3 caucuses, Iowa Democrats became the first in the nation to select Barack Obama as their choice for president. Iowa is 93 percent white.
- 2008: On Jan. 18, the Iowa State Supreme Court ruled that second parent adoptions by same-sex couples are legal.
- 2008: On April 3, Iowa became the eighth state to allow Election Day Registration (EDR) or same day voter registration.
- 2009: On April 3, the Iowa State Supreme Court handed down a unanimous decision in Varnum v Brien in favor of full marriage equality for gays and lesbians. Due to the stay on the 2007 district court ruling, this made Iowa officially the third state to allow marriage equality. It was the first state not on one of the coasts to allow marriage equality and the first state to gain marriage equality with a unanimous decision.
- 2010: On Feb. 17, the Iowa Board of Pharmacy became the first state pharmacy board in the nation to recommend the legalization of medical marijuana AND to change the classification of marijuana to a schedule II drug (one with potential for abuse but accepted medical uses) before either legislators or voters took steps to legalize it.
