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History Day

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Betty Hudson

  • "Hudson was one of the first women elected to the Connecticut State Senate. Her political career began in 1972 when she staged a protest in Madison after having teetered "on the edge of a [bus] seat while chaperoning her son's class trip to a Shakespeare play in Stratford" (Roessner, 1979). The protest brought media attention and led to her successfully getting the school bus seating capacity for secondary school students reduced from 66 to 44.     In 1974, Betty Hudson received the Democratic nomination to run for State Senate from the 33rd District. She won against her Republican opponent in an overwhelmingly Republican Senatorial District (Roessner, 1979). As a State Senator from 1975-1979, she served as chairwoman of the Human Services Committee and the Human Rights and Opportunities Committee. She was also a member of the Appropriations Committee, Regulations Review Committee, and Permanent Commission on the Status of Women (PCSW). During her four years in office, Hudson helped "rewrite the state's rape laws, expand the powers of the Commission on Human Rights and Opportunities, enlarge state day care services and establish an office of advocacy for the handicapped" (Roessner, 1979). She was pro-choice and an active supporter of the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA). Under her guidance, the state passed laws strengthening court-ordered child support with automatic wage attachment, a law requiring police intervention in domestic violence to protect women from retribution, and the establishment of a statewide program of shelters for battered women. She also initiated laws for affirmative action and Medicaid funding for abortion. In 1975, Hudson introduced a bill guaranteeing equal rights to gay people. The Senate passed the bill, making it the first state legislative chamber to pass such a bill in the United States. However, it did not pass in the House, and equal rights for gays did not become law in Connecticut until 1991 (Love, 2006)."
  • https://cslarchives.ctstatelibrary.org/repositories/2/resources/562
  • https://libguides.ctstatelibrary.org/historyday/LBGTQ

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