Chapter 9

The 1980s: Porn Wars
and the Constitution

All of us can be activists, without having to make speeches or march. Be involved with issues and concerns (Influence in other words).1

—Margaret Strongitharm

In 1985, CFUW President Margaret Strongitharm summed up the organization’s goal of being a moderate and informed voice in public affairs. By the end of the decade, CFUW put that belief into action by sending delegations to Parliament Hill to meet with Barbara McDougall, minister for the status of women. The 1980s began with the organization hosting a very successful International Federation of University Women (IFUW) conference in Vancouver, only the second time that the gathering had been held in Canada. Having negotiated a ceasefire in their war over fee increases, more members became active on the international front. CFUW also joined many Canadian women in ensuring that their rights were protected in the constitution “patriated” in 1982—and launched an unambivalent attack on pornography.

Some new clubs were established in the 1980s, many of them in the West and in smaller towns and cities,2 and others in new suburban areas such as Markham-Unionville (near Toronto) and Calgary North. CFUW membership was at around 12,500 despite the graduation of 60,000 women each year, prompting President Linda Souter to challenge members to double their numbers. She was not the first, nor the last, president to do this. A special Ad Hoc Committee was created to survey CFUW to determine what members considered the organization’s most important goals. To address membership issues at the policy level, CFUW decided that clubs could accept any woman who supported the goals of CFUW, whether she was a graduate from a post-secondary institution or not. It was hoped this would counter the perception that the organization was elitist. The federation, looking for consistency, also asked clubs to change their names from, for example, the University Women’s Club of Toronto to Canadian Federation of University Women/Toronto, or CFUW Toronto.3 Neither directive was universally followed among the largely autonomous clubs.

At the club and national leadership levels, there was a growing shift away from professional or academic women toward volunteers, as executives were predominantly recruited from that dwindling demographic of women who could afford not to be in the paid labour force. The professional and executive roster was discontinued, although CFUW still sought appointments for women. The federation finally established a permanent head office in Ottawa, various organizational reforms allowed the executive to act more quickly between meetings, and ushered in the era of annual general meetings (AGMs). Councils were established in British Columbia, Saskatchewan, and Alberta. After the Chronicle, which had provided a detailed record of business decisions, was discontinued, the federation launched a shorter, newsier journal and the president’s newsletter to improve communications with clubs.

Eileen Crawford Clark became president in 1979. Born in Scotland, she was a teenage math prodigy who received a government scholarship to take an accelerated degree in mathematics and physics at St. Andrews University; she earned her bachelor of science degree at age nineteen and joined the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force to become a radar technical officer when World War II broke out. In 1945, she came to Toronto as a war bride and her new sisters-in-law introduced her to CFUW. She and her husband later settled in Montréal, where Clark served as CFUW provincial director, Québec (English) from 1970 to 1973 and vice president for Québec from 1973 to 1976. She also chaired the Committee on International Relations from 1968 to 1979, a position soon to become an automatic appointment for past presidents. Clark was also elected fourth VP of IFUW.

Left to right: unidentified person, Eileen Clark, and Laura Sabia.

Clark rented office space at the Université de Montréal and got to work on resolving the simmering fee dispute with IFUW and planning the 1980 IFUW triennial in Vancouver. It was, by all accounts, a tremendous success with 825 delegates attending from forty-four countries. Clark reported at the meeting that the contentious IFUW fee dispute had been resolved in a spirit of goodwill and that CFUW would remain a member in good standing. The friction between the two organizations is explored more fully in Chapter 14, but suffice it to say that the IFUW reduced Canada’s fee based on membership, and streamlined its administration. This paved the way for renewed support for IFUW in Canada, with some Canadian leaders taking on an active role.

In keeping with its longstanding defense of women’s rights, CFUW joined other women’s groups in a campaign to ensure that women were represented in Canadian constitutional discussions.4 International developments in human rights were having an impact in Canada, first with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948 and then with John Diefenbaker’s Canadian Bill of Rights in 1960. The UN Convention on the Elimination of all Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) was adopted by the General Assembly on December 18, 1979, and signed by Canada July 17, 1980. Women’s groups were becoming increasingly aware that they could not rely on the wording of the 1960 Bill of Rights that had proven ineffective in protecting women—the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that it only applied to how a law was administered, not to the content of the law. This meant that reform was possible only through the laborious process of amending legislation piece by piece. When federal-provincial talks in the late 1970s discussed transferring divorce jurisdiction to the provinces, which would have made tracking down support payments even more difficult than it already was, women’s groups protested. The government dropped the idea, but the incident prompted women to study constitutional issues more seriously.

When Pierre Trudeau returned to government in 1980—just after the first Québec referendum on separation—and introduced a plan to “patriate” the constitution and enshrine a Charter of Rights and Freedoms within it, women were ready.5 The first version of the charter tabled by the prime minister relied heavily on the wording of the 1960 Bill of Rights for its equality guarantee. Because the charter entailed a new formal judicial review of laws in terms of basic principles, which had not previously existed, it was critical that it have the strongest possible equality guarantee, one that gave Canadian women confidence that it would further women’s equality agenda. Anglophone women lobbied extensively for improvements to the equality provision and, in January 1981, Minister of Justice Jean Chrétien announced that section 15 of the proposed charter would read, “Every individual is equal before and under the law and has the right to equal protection of the law and equal benefit of the law.”6 This was a good start but it was missing one key ingredient—women wanted a place at the negotiating table.

In January 1981, the Canadian Advisory Council on the Status of Women (CACSW) was planning a women’s constitutional conference to be held in February, but it ended up being postponed for a second time, and CACSW president and former Chatelaine editor Doris Anderson accused Lloyd Axworthy, minister responsible for the status of women, of orchestrating the delay. She resigned in protest, taking some of her staff with her.7 It was a newsworthy, dramatic move that mobilized women. They established the Ad Hoc Committee of Canadian Women on the Constitution and organized their own Ottawa conference with no government funding. Ottawa MPs Flora MacDonald, Judy Erola, and Margaret Mitchell booked the Confederation Room in the West Block for the conference and were instrumental in subsequent lobbying of their fellow Members of Parliament. Progressive Conservative (PC) Leader of the Opposition Joe Clark and his wife Maureen McTeer held a reception at Stornoway, their official residence, and CFUW members were among the 1,300 women present at this wildly successful three-day meeting.

After intense debate, the women delegates decided that they would support the entrenchment of women’s right in the charter only if there were significant improvements and they were given input into the wording. The Ad Hoc Committee proceeded to lobby cabinet ministers, Members of Parliament, and female senators. The women demanded that the government accept the resolutions adopted at their conference, send them to the House of Commons for debate, and either amend the charter or abandon it. The new CFUW-FCFDU Journal reminded its readers that if the proposed charter did not grant women equality, then neither would the courts.8 The Ad Hoc Committee members sent letters and telegrams, launched a national phone campaign to update women, and held T-shirt demonstrations in the House of Commons. The media covered it all, of course. It was pure drama. Finally, the government announced in the House on April 23, 1981, that the equality provisions of Section 15 would be bolstered by Section 28, which states “Notwithstanding anything in this charter, the rights and freedoms referred to in it are guaranteed equally to male and female persons.”9

As is true with any major lobbying effort, the women needed to maintain vigilance. In November of that same year, during federal-provincial negotiations, a majority of provincial premiers agreed to the inclusion in the charter of an override clause that would allow provinces to pass special time-limited legislation notwithstanding the guarantees of the charter—in effect enabling them to negate various fundamental rights, including women’s rights. Another intense period of lobbying followed as women fought to protect their hard-won guarantees in the charter. CFUW President Eileen Clark sent telegrams to the prime minister, the minister of justice, and all provincial premiers during the federal-provincial constitutional conference. CFUW clubs, vice presidents, and provincial directors all demanded that women’s equality be protected. In the end, Trudeau and the premiers had to partially back down—they exempted Section 28, which guarantees that the charter must be applied equally to both sexes, but not Section 15, which guarantees all equality rights, from the controversial Section 33 override power that allowed Parliament or provincial legislatures to override certain portions of the charter. Although Québec did not sign on to the patriation package, the constitution and charter apply everywhere in Canada; Québec women, in addition to the protections of the federal charter, are also protected under the 1975 Québec Charter of Rights. The patriation process did little to bring women inside and outside Québec together, and these tensions would only increase during the debates over the 1987 Meech Lake Constitutional Accord discussed below. The feminist movement in Québec was closely allied with Québec nationalism and remained somewhat separate from the anglophone movement, a reality that is reflected in CFUW’s low numbers in Québec.

In summing up the campaign, Eileen Clark noted that, “It seems almost incredible that governments would have been quite happy to ensure rights to male persons, but not for the remaining 52.4 per cent of Canada’s population, had we not protested.” She advised members, “to pay close attention to the Charter, and oppose any possible attempts to enact legislation with notwithstanding clauses that would have discriminatory applications.”10 CFUW’s Legislation Committee report at the 1982 triennial noted that the constitution, with the inclusion of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms was now law. Women all across Canada had succeeded in retaining Section 28 on women’s rights after a strong last-minute campaign.11 CFUW passed two resolutions in 1982 to support the charter. The first called on the organization to be continuously vigilant “concerning any overriding provincial or federal legislation which may seem to contravene the spirit of the Charter as expressed in Section 1, Guarantee of Rights and Freedoms.” The second resolution asked the “Government of Canada and provincial and territorial governments to delete Section 33 (1–5) of the 1982 Constitution Act, which may override the fundamental freedoms, legal rights, and equality rights of the Charter.”12

The constitutional battle, fought and won—not once but twice—has come to rival the Persons Case as a landmark in the struggle for women’s equality in Canada. Through it, women again made a considerable contribution to constitutional reform in Canada, one that history will one day acknowledge.13 CFUW played a role in these constitutional reforms that forced legislatures to change laws to conform to Section 15. These in turn influenced future legal decisions. After 1982, feminist lawyers and constitutional experts, many of the same women who led the constitution campaign, established the Legal Education and Action Fund (LEAF) to support cases important for women’s equality.

In 1987, the Mulroney government launched new efforts to bring Québec into the constitutional fold with the Meech Lake Constitutional Accord that contained a highly contentious “distinct society” clause. While CFUW “applauded the inclusion of the province of Québec in Confederation and the specific recognition given to Aboriginal people and the multi-cultural heritage of Canadians,” it expressed concerns that “the First Ministers had failed to respect the guarantees of equality contained in Section 15 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.”14 In their brief to the government, CFUW also cautioned against provincial rights undermining the universality of health and welfare programs, and renewed their request for the appointment of more women to the senate, the supreme court, and other federal institutions.15

Another shift that took the whole world by storm in this decade was the personal computer that revolutionized the way Canadians worked, played, and lived. CFUW kept its members up to date on these technological changes in various ways, big and small. The federation worked with others on “The Future Is Now,” a women and micro-technology conference held in Ottawa in June 1982. As the organizers commented, “We are in the middle of a revolution, which will probably have more impact than the industrial revolution, and that initially, the greatest impact may well be on women.”16 CFUW conference partners in this endeavour included the Canadian Congress for Learning Opportunities for Women (CCLOW), the Canadian Research Institute for the Advancement of Women (CRIAW), and the National Action Committee on the Status of Women (NAC).17 Conference delegates were encouraged to lobby MPs and government officials for courses to help women integrate into the burgeoning micro-technology industry and encourage girls to study math and science in order to take leadership roles in these fields.18 There were also proposals for a charter of rights related to micro-technology; for safeguards against de-skilling19 and reductions in the workforce; for lobbying efforts in favour of freedom of information; and for protective legislation against theft or sale of personal information.

CFUW also chose as its 1982 triennial theme “Our Technological Society.” The meeting’s keynote speaker was Dr. John Madden, president of Pacific Microtel Research Limited in Burnaby, BC. The Program Committee had been asked to choose a speaker for the banquet who was a non-political woman. They chose Dr. Naomi Griffiths, dean of arts and professor of history at Carleton University, who spoke about the “Ethical and Social Implications of the New Systems of Communications” and mused about the non-technical aspects of the computer revolution. The overall program was worthy of the largely liberal arts graduates in attendance.

Some of the clubs also joined the timely discussion. A mini-conference held at Hycroft included a workshop on “The Computer in Education” and the Winnipeg Club ran a series entitled “Computers and the Human Brain.” CFUW’s Education Committee focused on computers in the school. Technology reappeared as a theme at the Calgary triennial meeting in 1985, where “Women’s Work—The Reality of Tomorrow” was explored. One of the meeting highlights was a panel discussion moderated by Sylvia Teare of the Calgary Club on the “Social Impact of Women’s Changing Work.” Invited speakers included a psychologist who talked about “Superwomen, the Stress, Guilt Cycles” and Pat Cooper from CACSW who addressed “Social Change, Women’s Work, Family, and Society.” Clearly change was in the air!

• • • • • • • • •

CFUW meetings retained an element of past formalities, despite changing times. The 1982 triennial at the University of Winnipeg began, as usual, with the singing of “O Canada,” followed by a moment of silence for deceased members, welcome remarks from the Winnipeg Club president and the chancellor of the university. Then came the granting of charters to three new clubs, and greetings from the presidents of IFUW, the British Federation of University Women (BFUW), and the American Association of University Women (AAUW). Past presidents Marion Grant, Doris Saunders, and Vivian Morton were also introduced before the resolutions, speakers, and workshops followed with vigorous debate. At the end of it all, the gavel was passed from outgoing president Eileen Clark to new president Margaret Strongitharm.

A University of British Columbia (UBC) nursing graduate in 1940, Strongitharm worked as a public health nurse, married a lawyer, raised four children, and was committed to voluntary work and advocacy. She followed the usual trajectory from club to regional to national level of leadership. CFUW’s History and Heroines stresses that Strongitharm “maintained her important status as a wife and mother while being recognized as a ‘lady,’” which meant showing genuine interest in the lives of others “while being fastidiously groomed and appropriately dressed for every occasion.”20 Such a description would have undoubtedly angered younger members of the women’s movement but it reflects CFUW values. Strongitharm epitomized the undervalued female volunteer whose roles as executive, administrator, and politician were persistently minimized because they were performed not only by women but by volunteers.21 Aware of tensions within the federation and the movement, her presidential address in 1983 emphasized unity:

We must head off the confrontation between home-based and job-based women for economic recognition. We must bridge the gap between moms and career girls, unionists and managers; we must educate ourselves about the strategies of affirmative action and equal pay and TOGETHER build a platform that will lead, however slowly, to greater economic justice for women and a more humane work/home world for women, children, and their men.22

Through the special Ad Hoc Committee, Strongitharm launched a study of CFUW aims, objectives, policy, procedures, and resolutions. The study surveyed members about their opinions on the importance of the various goals of the organization and found that they were split three ways—maintaining high standards of education; stimulating interest and participation in public affairs; and encouraging women graduates to put their education at the service of the community.23 Some 70 per cent of the members also gave priority to friendship as a goal. The review also looked at demographics, finding that the membership was aging and a substantial number of them were long-time members, and that a whopping 65 per cent of members had already served on the executive. 24

As CFUW’s relations with their international colleagues warmed in this decade, Strongitharm helped chair the International Women’s Peace Conference in Halifax and a very successful Asia-Canada Women in Management Conference held in Victoria.25 CFUW also worked on “Women, Leadership and Sustainable Development,” a conference in Ghana in 1989, and established its own Committee on Peace and Security following a failed IFUW resolution.26 The committee sponsored an essay contest on the topic of peace for schoolchildren and some of the winners’ essays were read at an AGM; a Truro Club study group produced a kit for teaching about peace in schools. At the end of the decade, CFUW asked the Canadian government to refuse US President Reagan’s invitation to participate in the US strategic defence initiative infamously known as Star Wars.27

As always, clubs remained the backbone of the organization, with meetings, social events, and study groups filling the need for friendship and fun mixed with fundraising and learning. The Hamilton UWC established a gourmet cooking group in 1975 that followed the format of accepting ten women plus spares:

The hostess decides on the menu and provides the food. Then each member takes one task and begins to prepare one part of the meal. Somehow it all comes together, and by 10 p.m. they are all sitting down to enjoy a gourmet homecooked meal. With wine, of course.28

Through study groups and committees, CFUW members kept up to date on issues such as pensions, educational reform, part-time work, and child care. The Kingston Club had an armchair travellers’ group; the Perth Club researched its town’s history; and in Oshawa, members set up a school for gifted children. Several clubs had successful children’s film series. The St. John’s program ran from 1962 to 1982 and won a Chatelaine award for “combining fund-raising with imaginative public service, the showing of children’s classic movies at a University theatre.”29 There were new investor groups and CFUW North Bay helped establish a Hands-On Museum for children aged four to twelve, a project that had originated with the International Year of the Child in 1979. Interestingly, the museum featured the role of Canada’s voyageurs, “Native” people, and French Canadians in history, but apparently no women.30

The Toronto clubhouse underwent major structural alterations and redecoration in the latter part of the decade and the Vancouver Club won a Heritage Award in 1982 for Hycroft. In 1989, the Christmas at Hycroft event featured an immense Christmas tree decorated with puppets hand-made by club members. In the previous year, the Peace and Security Committee decorated the tree with doves to symbolize peace.31

CFUW placed great importance on role models to inspire the young and were always looking for ways to draw attention to women’s potential through the recognition of outstanding women. The organization was happy to report, for example, that two CFUW members won the 1981 Persons Award that had been established in 1979 on the fiftieth anniversary of the Persons Case: Governor General Edward Schreyer presented the awards to Florence Martel of Montréal and Agnes Davidson of Regina.32

Dr. Roberta Bondar (left) presenting a picture to Margaret Strongitharm with Dolly Kennedy.

Although the CFUW executive decided in September 1980 to cease promoting its roster at the federal level, it continued to collect the information.33 In 1982, the federation passed a resolution urging the government to give women equal access to appointments on government agencies, boards, committees, commissions, councils, and crown corporations. CFUW also continued to be active in mentoring young girls. The twenty-third triennial held at the University of Calgary featured astronaut Roberta Bondar, who was also a zoologist, neuroscientist, and medical doctor as a keynote speaker. The organization made her an honorary member, which required a change in CFUW bylaws but most members felt that she made a fine role model. When she took a CFUW banner and T-shirt into space with her in 1992, President Peggy Matheson was thrilled. She was invited to watch Bondar take off at the launch of the Space Shuttle Discovery STS-42 at Kennedy Space Center and remembers it as a highlight of her tenure:

The tension and excitement was almost tangible as the countdown progressed, was halted, and then re-commenced…. Lift-off was heralded by the familiar spurt of flame and cloud of smoke, and after a significant pause, by the tremendous bang, “Discovery” broke the sound barrier, metaphorically severing her connection with earth…a thrilling experience and one in which all Canadians, especially Canadian women can take pride. Dr. Bondar, an honorary member of CFUW is a remarkable person who has dedicated her life to scientific discovery.… As a mentor and role model, no one could serve the young people of Canada better than Roberta Bondar.34

A 1987 Journal article quoted Bondar as saying that the sky was the limit, advising girls to keep their options open and take math and science.35

More provincial and regional councils, some of which mirrored the national CFUW structure with committees on education, library, status of women and human rights, etc. were established in this period. As Lyn Hardman, VP Ontario noted, the councils provided a valuable training ground for future CFUW presidents.36 The Ontario Council’s Education Committee, for example, monitored the 1984 Bovey Commission on the Future Development of the Universities. Its Status of Women Committee worked on resolutions to ensure pensions and benefits for part-time workers. While part-time work had been proposed specifically for married women with children in the 1950s, employers soon discovered that by denying part-time workers pensions and other benefits, they had created a cheap source of labour.

Councils and clubs did not always agree with the federation’s policy directions, particularly in relation to daycare. At the Ontario Council meeting in 1985, a seminar on “Social Change and Mental Health” given by Edwin Clarke, executive director of Family Services in Windsor, Ontario, led group members to conclude that “there should be money provided to keep mothers who need to work to support their family at home,” as is done in Finland.37 Similarly, CFUW Etobicoke’s Daycare Committee rejected a proposal for universal publicly funded daycare largely because of cost and because they felt it would exert “even more pressure on a woman to work outside the home and place her child in an organized setting where individual needs may not be fulfilled.” The group did concede that subsidized and partially subsidized places were needed for those whose family income was below the poverty line. CFUW’s official policy as expressed in a 1978 resolution was to ask federal and provincial governments to increase financial support for “quality daycare, including daycare for infants, private home daycare, lunch and after-school programs, as well as licensed daycare centres.”38

Provincial Council meetings provided a forum for discussion, learning, and fun. In British Columbia three mini-conferences dealt with multiculturalism, genetics, and society, and the computer revolution. In Kelowna BC, a daylong workshop taught participants how to research resolutions and lobby for them. There was also a skit called “Have you the Minutes? Please say you have the Minutes.” The Québec Provincial Council conference at Sherbrooke in May 1984 held a “Hands Across the Border” conference with AAUW, where they discussed mutual concerns such as acid rain; the Sherbrooke Club invited Dr. Mariafranca Marcelli of the University of Vermont and a member of the Burlington Club to speak on this topic as well.39

At both provincial and especially federal levels, resolutions dealt with postwar social welfare programs, which CFUW monitored to ensure that women were dealt with fairly. The “feminization of poverty” that put elderly and single women at the highest risk of living in poverty was a growing concern. Lester B. Pearson’s government had introduced the Canada Pension Plan (CPP) in 1965 and it was amended in 1978 to allow for the equal splitting of pension credits between spouses after divorce or marriage annulment. However, less than 1 per cent of those eligible were taking advantage of it. Former CFUW member and senior civil servant June Menzies conducted research leading to a CFUW proposal that CPP and the Québec Pension Plan (QPP) make the splitting of Canada pension plan credits acquired during marriage mandatory, automatic and unrenounceable following divorce or annulment. CFUW worked on this with Monique Bégin, federal minister of health and welfare, whose department sponsored eighteen conferences across Canada on “Pensions—Focus on Women.” The high attendance at these conferences reflected women’s interest in planning for old age, especially in the event of divorce or widowhood. Such experiences reinforced the importance of having sympathetic women in government.

CFUW also played an active role in one of the most heated controversies of the women’s movement in this period—pornography. There was a heightened realization within the women’s movement of the 1980s that rape, incest, wife battering, and violent pornography needed to be addressed along with the long-standing economic issues, and events relating to violence against women began to appear on club programs.40 Some women linked violence to the widespread dissemination of pornography, and it became a subject of fierce debate in the 1980s. CFUW joined a coalition formed in 1983 called the Canadian Coalition Against Media Pornography, led by Maude Barlow, then an advisor to Prime Minister Trudeau on women’s issues.41 The organization sought to raise awareness and lobby politicians, protesting to the Canadian Radio-Television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) in January 1983 against “First Choice” pay-television channels that were planning to broadcast “soft porn” movies. It also wrote letters to Ronald Reagan urging him to take action against the US pornography industry.

Several government reports dealt with the issue. The Badgely report, released in August 1984, shocked many Canadians by detailing the prevalence of child sexual abuse,42 and stressing the importance of protecting children.43 In June 1983, Canada’s Liberal justice minister, Mark MacGuigan, established the Special Committee on Pornography and Prostitution chaired by BC lawyer Paul D. K. Fraser. CFUW’s members put forward their position to the Fraser committee, and Legislation Committee chair Theodora Carroll Foster called the response by clubs “superb.” She remarked that the issue had “grabbed women emotionally” and showed what can be done when women are galvanized.”44 At least twelve clubs submitted briefs and others took local action. One of these briefs, submitted by the Vancouver Club asked the government to

…stop the manufacture, importation, and distribution of pornographic material. We expect the government of Canada to guarantee the right of all Canadians, including women and children, to live with dignity in a society free from pornographic exploitation.45

At its 1985 triennial, CFUW showed the controversial documentary Not a Love Story, a landmark production from Studio D of the National Film Board, that examined the pornography industry and made a powerful statement on pornography’s inherent violence against women. One woman sitting in that audience was particularly moved by this evocative production—Tammy Irwin, who later became a CFUW president. She had joined the Edmonton Club in search of friends, then got involved in their recycling and environmental initiatives. Seeing Not a Love Story convinced her to study the issue; she heard Maude Barlow speak and even took the subject to her church social committee, arranging to show the film there.46

CFUW’s first anti-pornography resolution had originated with the Montréal South Shore Club in the late 1970s and had requested that the Canadian government define pornography to facilitate regulation, set up a committee to study it, raise public awareness, and enforce anti-pornography laws. They were especially concerned with protecting minors against the contempt, hatred, and violence transmitted by pornography.47 In 1985, CFUW passed three more resolutions on the issue, which primarily focused on protecting children from exploitation in both the making of pornography and exposure to it. One resolution, that came from the North York Club, called for more research into long- and short-term alternatives to censorship. Other resolutions asked that municipal bylaws be enacted to protect minors from the display of pornographic materials and that the government implement the recommendations of the Badgely report. Finally, in 1986, CFUW took a resolution to the IFUW meeting in New Zealand to draw the problem of child pornography, its widespread circulation, and its transportation across borders to the attention of all national affiliates. It passed unanimously.

The Fraser committee was called largely to satisfy women’s groups and took a legal and human rights perspective.48 There were well-qualified women on the committee, such as constitutional expert Mary Eberts, Montréal lawyer Andrée Ruffo, human rights champion Joan Wallace, and sociologist Susan Clark, who was dean of human and professional development and director of the Institute for the Study of Women at Mount St. Vincent University. In the end, the report avoided concluding that pornography was a manifestation of male violence against women and ignored feminist recommendations for increased funding for women’s organizations that provided assistance to victims of male violence and did public education on sexuality.49 The pornography issue proved one of the most divisive issues within the women’s movement. While most feminists saw pornography’s degrading and sometimes violent portrayal of women as sexist, not everyone agreed that there was a direct causal relationship between it and sexual violence, and many women were uncomfortable with any form of censorship. Radical feminists did not trust the Criminal Code and the police to enforce anti-pornography laws equitably, fearing that gay and lesbian materials, rather than commercial pornography, would be targeted. It was for this reason that the media dubbed these debates as the “porn wars.”

CFUW was careful to distinguish between pornography and erotica. Following the 1984 election, Progressive Conservative Minister of Justice John Crosbie became a CFUW ally when he proposed changes to legislation to stem the flood of pornography coming into Canada through the United States. Those opposing the legislation on the grounds of censorship included the Canadian Periodical Distributors and the Canadian Association of University Teachers. In 1987, when R.E.A.L. (Realistic, Equal, Active, for Life) Women of Canada appeared on the scene, CFUW felt the need to distinguish themselves on this issue. R.E.A.L. Women gained a significant amount of media coverage by claiming that feminists did not represent all women and demanded the same access to government funding as other women’s groups. That summer, CFUW President Linda Souter noted that while both groups opposed pornography, R.E.A.L. women did not recognize the difference between erotica and pornography, and was opposed to both sex education and abortion. CFUW opposed government funding for R.E.A.L. Women because the organization could not demonstrate their support for the Charter of Rights and Freedoms and the UN Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women. She also pointed to their lack of accountability and undemocratic procedures. While the PC government did formally recognize R.E.A.L. Women after 1984, it is not clear how much, if any, funding they received.50

Linda Palmer Souter assumed the president’s chair in 1985 and was the last to preside over a triennial meeting. A McGill graduate, who had done extensive volunteering and worked her way up from club president in Sudbury to the national office, her profile was similar to her two predecessors, underlining the fact that the demands of the president’s job nearly precluded candidates who had full-time employment.51 Adept at fostering decisions through consensus and at organizing people, Souter went on to a second career with IFUW, becoming the second Canadian president.52

Linda Souter, CFUW President 1985–1988.

Linda Souter was the first president to benefit from the new CFUW office established on Parkdale Avenue in Ottawa, and she moved to the city with her husband to take up the position. Elizabeth Cureton, a qualified pilot and a niece of the artist Emily Carr, served as its first executive secretary—later director—from 1985 to 1994.53 With operating funds always tight, the office had to also rely on a number of part-time paid staff as well as volunteers from the Ottawa Club to take on everything from scholarships to advocacy, but the stability of an office allowed the organization to accomplish more.

Souter continued the reforms begun by Margaret Strongitharm’s Ad Hoc Committee, such as the creation of an Executive Committee to deal with the new emergency resolutions that could be brought to the AGM on twenty-four hours’ notice. Urgent resolutions could be voted upon by mail, provided that two-thirds of the Resolutions Committee and the majority of the board agreed that the matter could not wait until the next AGM.54 Other improvements included the creation of a policy handbook that included all CFUW resolutions, a new logo that incorporated the Fédération canadienne des femmes dîplomées des universités (FCFDU), and membership kits were sent to clubs with ideas on how to recruit and retain members.55

One of Souter’s lasting achievements was to open more sustained access to government. This strategy took advantage of the increased number of women holding political office and reaped some early rewards from the successes of the women’s movement. One friend and CFUW member was the Honourable Flora MacDonald. Having earlier helped on the constitutional issue, she spoke at the 1984 CFUW council meeting56 in Saint John, New Brunswick on “Human Values—Women’s Responsibility” the day after the federal leaders’ debate on women’s issues. Organized by NAC, this was the only such debate in Canada before or since. In preparation for the election, NAC published extensive information on the candidates and their platforms.57 The organizing committee had asked MacDonald not to speak on the debate, so instead she spoke about the concept of a women’s debate. She argued that all issues were women’s issues and while she conceded that a women’s issues debate was necessary today, she hoped that someday women would reach a level of participation when it was no longer needed. In September 1984, when the Progressive Conservatives won the federal election, twenty-seven women—a record number—were elected. MacDonald was one of the six women appointed to Cabinet.

The CFUW delegation that met with representatives of the federal government, circa, 1985–1988. Left to right: Suzanne Coallier (Finance), Betty Tugman, (VP Ontario), Tammy Irwin (VP Prairies/President elect), Linda Souter (President), Eleanor Chilacombe (Oakville Club), Theodora Caroll Foster (Legislation).

Linda Souter persuaded Barbara McDougall, then minister for the status of women, to hold an annual briefing with CFUW, ushering in a new era in advocacy. Apparently, it all began when CFUW representatives cornered her while she was eating lunch at her desk. This led to McDougall inviting CFUW to appear before House of Commons standing committees on issues such as generic drugs and the Meech Lake Accord. Near the end of her term, Souter took advantage of CFUW’s links within government and challenged its proposed amendment to the Patent Drug Act, which would extend the period of protection for drug companies and delay the production of cheaper, generic drugs. Unfortunately, the government went ahead with their amendment despite CFUW efforts, which led to an escalation in the already rising cost of drugs.58

In 1987, McDougall invited sixteen women’s organizations to a public policy forum designed to improve consultations between government and the women’s groups. Advisors from fourteen federal departments attended the meeting and gave advice on how to approach government by focusing on major issues and learning when and where to key those issues into the system. In 1988, CFUW was granted their first “bilateral consultations” with the federal government. McDougall distributed sections of CFUW policy briefs, derived from resolutions from the previous council meeting, to the appropriate cabinet ministers, briefs relating to peace, daycare, equal pay for work of equal value, part-time work, pensions, the Meech Lake Accord, and protests against funding cuts to women’s programs. Each minister responded to CFUW on the appropriate item, then the CFUW team gathered to study the responses and plan their strategy for the ministers’ meetings that McDougall arranged.

CFUW delegations usually consisted of the president, president-elect, and executive director, but, depending on the issues to be discussed, they might be joined by committee chairs and, sometimes, provincial council representatives. In 1988, CFUW delegations met with McDougall and Jake Epp, minister of national health and welfare, to discuss child care and abortion, and with Benoît Bouchard, minister of employment and immigration, to discuss a job strategies program. They also had discussions with Shirley Potter, special assistant to David Crombie, secretary of state, and with the undersecretary of state regarding post-secondary funding and adult literacy. Ministers often sent their experts; Joe Clark, for example, sent in his place a representative of the External Affairs’ Arms Control and Disarmament Division to a planned meeting on the establishment of a nuclear weapons-free zone.59 The women described the experience as a “hectic, exciting and rewarding day on Parliament Hill.” They believed that they had established themselves as a group that could make a valuable contribution to policy discussions.60 It is impossible to know for certain whether this was a polite comment or a sincere belief, but CFUW did get invited back.

The following summer the CFUW executive was busy planning for the next year’s meeting on the Hill, where they again found themselves dashing from one minister’s office to the next. Connections always helped and one delegation proudly reported that the half-hour they had scheduled with Perrin Beatty, minister of health, was extended to more than an hour—his wife was a CFUW member. There was an aura of excitement around these encounters and the women found “individual presentations to be effective in establishing a rapport” with the minister and his or her staff. They discussed the 1988 resolutions and other areas of concern. On the Meech Lake Accord and funding for R.E.A.L. Women of Canada, they “agreed to disagree” but overall the members of the delegation felt that their positions were given a fair hearing.61 Thanks to the efforts initiated by Souter and carried on by subsequent presidents, CFUW began its regular and fruitful consultations with the federal government. This was a period before power became more concentrated in the prime minister’s office and federal ministers became less open to discussion and input from the public.62

The CFUW delegation in Minister Barbara McDougall’s office, Ottawa, April 1989. Left to right: Elizabeth Cureton, Susan Mohamdee (Russell), Tammy Irwin, Barbara McDougall, Linda Souter, and Rose Beatty.

Toward the end of the 1980s, women began to reap the rewards of an increasingly effective Charter of Rights and Freedoms. When Angelique Lavallee was acquitted of murdering her abusive common-law husband in 1987, the battered wife syndrome was used successfully as a defense for the first time, and it renewed women’s faith in the courts.63 CACSW estimated that one million Canadian women—one in eight—had been abused by a spouse. In 1984, Flora MacDonald, PC minister of employment and immigration, had named Judge Rosalie Abella to lead the Royal Commission on Equality in Employment. Her report, released the following year, included visible minorities, Aboriginal women, and women with disabilities, and it sought definitions for what came to be called employment equity. While some thought that the federal legislation passed in 1986, the Employment Equity Act, was weak, it was a beginning.64 In Ontario in 1988, pay equity came into effect, phased in over several years and including the private sector. Nova Scotia began applying employment equity with the civil service in 1990, and other provinces followed.65 This not only lessened the gender gap in pay but encouraged people to think differently about how work was defined and valued.

In 1986, Sylvia Gold, president of CACSW, spoke to the Vancouver Club about the legacy of the Royal Commission on the Status of Women, still in the process of implementation. She pointed out that forty-three of the 122 recommendations within federal jurisdiction had been fully implemented and fifty-three more had been partially implemented. There was still work to be done on issues such as the enforcement of court orders in custody settlements, benefits for part-time workers, and improvements to pension benefits for women, but all in all, things were looking up. She even expressed hope that the masculinized version of “O Canada” that they had just sung would one day be replaced with words that included daughters as well as sons.66 Gold did signal one note of caution—CACSW funding had not kept up with inflation. CFUW’s resolutions on family law reform, recognition of midwives, violence against women and children, pension reforms, and daycare made a significant contribution to these measures of progress.67

Change was coming in many areas, even within CFUW. Theodora Foster, Ottawa Club member and chair of the Status of Women and Human Rights Committee, initiated language reform. In considering a 1987 CFUW resolution to urge governments “to draft all future federal and provincial laws in non-sexist language,” she pointed out that this contradicted CFUW’s own practices. Foster had earlier chastised this federation of university-educated women for not taking the lead in challenging language that masculinized women or made them invisible.68 This discussion led to reform of language conventions and the persistent term “chairman” was finally dropped from federation records.

Tammy Elder Irwin came to the CFUW presidency in part through her interest in the anti-pornography campaign in Edmonton. She was a graduate of UBC in English and psychology, was born in Tillsonburg, Ontario and grew up in Sarnia and Winnipeg. She joined the university women’s club in Winnipeg, sponsored by two of her mother’s friends, while she was employed as a welfare worker for the Manitoba government. She moved back to Vancouver in 1962 at the time of the Hycroft acquisition and in 1968 relocated again, this time to Edmonton.69 Irwin and her husband had a long involvement with social justice issues in the United Church and with truth and reconciliation issues.70

President-elect Irwin had advocated for the change to a biennial structure to attract more candidates for the job, but did not know until the vote was taken at the 1988 meeting in Ottawa whether her term would be two years or three.71 The two-year presidential term and the establishment of CFUW’s new head office in Ottawa made leadership transitions go much more smoothly. Before these changes came into effect, the new president and secretary had had to devote months to finding inexpensive space, moving files, then hiring and training staff. With the biennial format, executive members also only had to commit to two years instead of three. As part of this transition, CFUW began having annual general meetings, which meant that policy could be established every year at the AGM instead of every three years. Irwin chose as her biennial priorities increased efficiency, increased membership, and a strong study and action program.72

The 1980s reflected an optimism born of women’s accomplishments. Satisfied with their growing contribution to advocacy and community service, CFUW chose as its theme for the 1988–1990 biennial “Our Health, Our Planet, Our Future.” At the AGM in Edmonton delegates attended workshops on recycling, garbage, and the environment interspersed with relaxed trips to Fort Edmonton and the West Edmonton Mall.

In December 1989, tragedy struck when an angry, young, anti-feminist man shot and killed fourteen female engineering students at Polytechnique Montréal. Leaving behind a hit list of Québec’s feminist leaders, he sent anger, sadness, and shock through the community and across the country. The CFUW president acknowledged the sad event by portraying Lépine as a “disturbed” young man; it was the commonly held, moderate viewpoint. Some feminists characterized his actions as a madness that reflected Western society’s resentment of the progress women were making; some of them even characterized it as a hate crime. Today CFUW remembers the lives of those fourteen women with fellowships offered through the CFUW Fellowships Committee.

In the 1990s, CFUW would continue to find the federal government open to its representations and conducted a major survey of the place of women on university campuses. But there were challenges ahead, including cuts to the funding of women’s programs.

Footnotes for this chapter can be found online at: http://www.secondstorypress.ca/resources