Good morning all,

Today’s topic is the law and legal pioneers. Very much sort of. We start with a genuine legal pioneer, in the form of Patsy Mink, who was the first woman of colour in the US house of representatives, the first Asian-American woman to serve in Congress, AND ALSO she wrote Title IX which, as noted below, is a big deal for women in America:

Her best-known achievement was Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, of which she was the principal author. Title IX prohibited sex discrimination in academics and athletics at institutions receiving federal aid. The law, together with the larger women’s movement, changed the country. In 1971–72, for instance, nine percent of law students were women. In 2011–12 almost half were.

https://mag.uchicago.edu/law-policy-society/political-pioneer

A dear friend and subscriber has been watching The People Versus OJ Simpson, which I found almost impossible to watch for its theme of (amongst other things) a strong, clever woman being thwarted by a man’s hubris. Here’s a Vogue interview with said strong, clever woman, Marcia Clark. This plays on a common horror, I think, of the possibility that people actually might notice if you look less than perfect every day:

After the trial, friends of mine who realized that I actually had straight hair and permed it said they wanted to kill me. But I had two little boys in diapers. I had the perm because I wanted wash-and-wear hair. I didn’t want to be bothered with it. The thing that happened was, the perm grew out, and I didn’t have time to get myself re-permed, so I kind of gave up. I just blew it out. I know this is going to sound so clueless to you, but at the time, I thought, Oh, people aren’t going to notice.

http://www.vogue.com/article/american-crime-story-marcia-clark-interview

You might remember that Sarah Paulson played Marcia Clark in that show, so now let’s all enjoy some classic the dash toast dot net on what it would be like if Sarah Paulson were your girlfriend:

If Sarah Paulson were your girlfriend you’d routinely finish things before the deadline; that’s just how your life would go. You wouldn’t send them in when you’d finished them because that would feel a bit too much like boasting, but you’d send them in a couple of hours early.

http://the-toast.net/2016/06/09/if-sarah-paulson-were-your-girlfriend/

Happy Friday!

Alex.