The first leader to emerge was Esther Peterson, who served as assistant secretary of labor in the administrations of Presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson. Peterson guided Kennedy’s Presidential Commission on the Status of Women to advocate for what became the Equal Pay Act of 1963 — and she did so by bringing together like-minded administrators and staffers, members of Congress, labor unions and women’s groups. The Equal Pay Act was the first federal statute prohibiting employment discrimination based on sex. But it was relatively weak, excluding women working in educational institutions, where most women worked outside the home.
Still, the fact that Congress passed something to address equal pay for women encouraged Peterson and her network of activists to do more. They then pressured Johnson to sign Executive Order 11375 in 1967, an amendment that added “sex” to the protected categories of race, creed, color and national origin in an earlier executive order that banned discrimination by federal contractors and subcontractors. Significantly, the amended EO 11246-11375 placed sex on equal footing with race. And it covered educational institutions, which enabled women to file hundreds of sex discrimination complaints.
Peterson, with her ties to federal administrators and staffers, Congress members and numerous feminists, had become a central leader of equal employment initiatives. In other words, she and her network of advocates helped lay the foundation for Title IX.
So, too, did Catherine East, a civil service employee in the federal government. Over the course of almost 40 years, East worked her way to a strategic position within the Labor Department’s Women’s Bureau, where she gained access to crucial statistics and other information needed to move legislation ahead for women. East worked without fanfare, photocopying statistics, legal briefs and related information to send to lawyers, women’s groups and other interested parties. Recipients recopied the information and sent it to others, who often did the same. East, who was active in women’s organizations, also worked to expand her feminist network by linking advocates together.
Bernice Sandler, the third central figure of this widening network, was a highly qualified aspiring professor turned advocate after she lost out on academic jobs because of her gender. She joined the Women’s Equity Action League (WEAL) that was formed in 1968 to focus on equal opportunities for women in employment and education. When Sandler read about EO 11246-11375, the Executive Order that Peterson had pushed for the year before, she immediately thought of its application to colleges and universities, most of which received federal contracts. She met with the Labor Department’s Vincent Macaluso, who gave her valuable advice on the process of filing complaints. He also arranged for her to meet East, who, he informed Sandler, had a wealth of information.