Linked with The African American Women’s Institute AAWI, and with NOW and Abortion Rights /Reproductive Issues.
She is one of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005.
Aileen Clarke Hernandez (born 1926) has worked tirelessly for labor rights, women’s rights, and civil rights for US people of color for over 50 years, and sees these issues as ultimately interconnected. Her life of service includes public appointments and innumerable projects at local, state, and national levels. A committed feminist, she was the second national president of the National Organization for Women, and is currently chair of the California Women’s Agenda, a coalition of 600 local women’s organizations. (1000peacewomen).
Find her Biography on Answers.com; on e-notes; on spock; on NWHP; on AAWI.
She says: « Racism and sexism have made it possible to institutionalize mediocrity; by eliminating these evils we can free minds of all women and men to focus on the humane solutions to the world’s problems ».
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Aileen Clarke Hernandez – USA
She works for the California Women’s Agenda.
She is named in the following books : Betty Friedan, 189 pages, 2008; Women’s Issues, 1041 pages, 2008; Black Women in America, 2136 pages, 2006; Great Lives from History, 1961 pages, 27 Dec 2006; and the rest result of Googl’s book-search.
… She is the State Chair of the California Women’s Agenda, a network of 600 organizations serving women and girls; the Coordinator for the Bay Area’s Black Women Stirring the Waters; and Chair of the Coalition for Economic Equity, which advocates for increased contracting opportunities with the private and public sectors for businesses owned by women and minorities. She was the second national president of the National Organization for Women (NOW) and currently serves on the Steering Committee of the California Coalition for Civil Rights and the Board of Directors of the Center for Governmental Studies. In 1995, she was one of the 1000 women globally nominated collectively for the Nobel Peace Prize. (full text).
Feminist Chronicles 1953 – 1993.
She says also: « My comments to the thousands of persons at the peace march [the 1971 Another Mother for Peace march in Los Angeles] were directed not just against the Vietnam War, but against all war, against the masculine mystique which glorifies violence as a solution to problems, and against the vast diverting of American energies and resources from socially needed programs into social destructive wars », (on feminist.com).
Find her name by Google Book-search.
… In today’s environment, the « second wave of feminism » is connected to the global struggle for human rights — raising women’s voices, in concert with men’s, to create a world community committed to peace, economic and environmental security — and justice for all. In spite of how far we have come, we still have so far to go. Let’s all move forward together … (full text, July, 2006).
Honoring Our Founders … Aileen Hernandez, 1926.
During her education at Howard, she began her life-long work of confronting racism and sexism and working to promote respect for all people. For over 50 years, she has worked tirelessly for labor rights, women’s rights, civil rights, and human rights seeing all these issues interconnected. Her life of service includes public appointments and innumerable projects at local, state, national, and international levels. (full text).
Make a Difference in the World and Still Get to Work on Time.
She writes: Thanks for setting up the blog; I sent the link out widely so you should be hearing from Bay Area folks. Just finished listening to Michelle Obama – who was absolutely fantastic as was Barack’s sister!! Most of the “die-hards” were on their feet and cheering and even some of the remaining
few “determined to be die-hards” were caught applauding once in a while. It was a good night with outstanding speeches by Jackson, Jr., Ted Kennedy – and I also really liked the speech by the Republican Senator. A really nice start! Hope you are enjoying it all! (her response to “congressional black caucus”, Aug 26, 2008).
… Coming of Age in the 1960’s and an eye witness of sorts during the « Black Rebellion Movement » in Berkeley, California in particular and the San Francisco Bay Area in general, I recall vividly that the Women’s Movement had among its early leaders, a Black Woman, Aileen Clark Hernandez (BA Howard, MS work New York University and the University of Oslo; leader in the International Garment Workers Union; U.S. Equal Employment Commissioner; NOW Vice-President, 1967-1970; President of NOW, the National Organization of Women, 1970-1971); and yes even lecturer at the University of California, Berkeley, where I met her in 1969. One could imagine that this kind of mature women’s leadership would not have be so easily blind to the defects of Clinton in support of a kind of reverse sexism, namely that it is time for a woman to be president even if she is a rogue or worse … (full text).
… Mrs. Clarke Hernandez was the second national president of the National Organization for Women (NOW) and currently serves on the Steering Committee of the California Coalition for Civil Rights. She has received numerous awards over her five decades of work for human rights and in 2005 was one of the 1,000 women collectively nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize. In 2006, the National Women’s History Project selected her as a Builder of Dreams and Communities and in 2007 Soroptimist International of San Francisco honored her with its prestigious Making a Difference for Women award. (full text, 17, 2007).
… Aileen Clark Hernandez is an American union organizer and civil right activist. She was born May 23, 1926, in Brooklyn, NY, of Jamacian-American parents, was educated in New York City, and attended Howard University, where she received a magna cum laude degree in Political Science and Sociology; she also has a Master’s Degree in Government from California State University at Los Angeles and an Honorary Doctorate in Humane Letters from Southern Vermont College She married Alfonso Hernandez in 1947; and was divorced in 1951. She was initially active as an organizer for the International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union, and became the Education and Public Relations Director for the Pacific Coast Region of the Union. She was later appointed Deputy Chief of the California Division of Fair Employment Practices from 1962 to 1965. As a result of this work, she became known nationally and was appointed by Lyndon Johnson in 1964 as the only woman to serve on the newly established Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, and resigned in 1966 to formed an independent urban consulting firm, Aileen C. Hernández Associates. She was second national president of the National Organization for Women in 1970, and in 1973 was a co-founder of Black Women Organized for Action in San Francisco. It was under her leadership,that NOW organized the Women’s Strike for Equality in 1971. She was one of the 2006 honorees of the National Women’s History Project; she also was the 1993 Tish Sommers Lecturer at the Institute for Health and Aging of the University of California, San Francisco, as well as the 1993 Regents Scholar in Residence at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Her current position is coordinator of Black Women Stirring the Waters and chair of the California Women’s Agenda, a state action alliance of over 600 organizations … (full text).
A native of Brooklyn, New York, Aileen Clarke Hernández migrated to California in 1951 to become an organizer and later the Education and Public Relations Director for the Pacific Coast Region of the International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union. After eleven years with the union, she was appointed by California Governor Edmund G. “Pat” Brown as Assistant Chief of the California Division of Fair Employment Practices where she served from 1962 through 1965. With the passage of the national Civil Rights Act of 1964, President Lyndon Baines Johnson appointed her as the only woman member of the new United States Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Frustrated with the limited power of the civil rights agency, she resigned after eighteen months as a Commissioner, returned to San Francisco and founded her own urban consulting firm in 1967. The firm works with major American companies, governmental agencies, and community-based organizations on a wide variety of issues facing cities – such as housing, employment, education, sustainable development and transportation. She appears frequently on television, radio and the lecture circuit discussing race and gender relations, human rights and civic activism. She has been a consultant to United Parcel Service (UPS) for many years and is a member of their Corporate Diversity Council. On a volunteer basis, she is currently the State Chair of the California Women’s Agenda (CAWA), a network of 600+ organizations serving women and girls; the Coordinator for Black Women Stirring the Waters which has published a book of personal essays written by 44 of its members; and Chair of the Coalition for Economic Equity, which advocates for increased government contracting opportunities for businesses owned by women and minorities. She was the second national president of the National Organization for Women (NOW). (full text).
links:
American Heroes, Contents by Cultural Identity: African Americans;
Newspaper Archive.com, (and specially for Aileen Clarke Hernandez);
Forum of Common Ground Common Sense.