Mrs America and the myth of the American left

Mrs. America (BBCiPlayer) is one of the best American TV dramas in recent years. It has a catchy soundtrack, brilliant opening titles and a superb cast: Cate Blanchett as the right-wing American activist, Phyllis Schlafly (pictured above); John Slattery (Roger Sterling in Mad Men) as her husband, Fred; Rose Byrne as the 1970s feminist, Gloria Steinem; Margo Martindale (Claudia in The Americans) as Bella Abzug; and Tracy Ullman as Betty Friedan, author of The Feminine Mystique.

The series tells the story of the fight for the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA), one of the two great battles which defined 1970s American feminism, along with the fight over abortion rights and Roe vs. Wade. On one side, there are the leading American feminists of the 1970s: Steinem, Abzug, Friedan and Shirley Chisholm, the first Black politician to be elected to Congress. On the other, are socially conservative women led by Phyllis Schlafly, a right-wing Catholic from Alton, Illinois.

What is so interesting about Mrs. America is that it gives due attention to Schlafly, as opposed to the better-known east coast feminists like Steinem, Abzug and Friedan. Portrayed by Blanchett, Schlafly comes across as part monster, part spokeswoman for the conservative revolution which changed 1970s and 1980s America.

The series, created by Canadian TV writer, Dahvi Waller (Desperate Housewives, Mad Men), does a good job of putting the battle over the ERA in a larger context: the battle between the east coast left and the social conservatives of middle America who made Reaganism possible, devoutly Christian, anti-communist and passionately opposed to the big social changes of the Sixties and Seventies, abortion, feminism, gay rights and the ERA. Figures like Jesse Helms, a far-right Republican from North Carolina who served in the Senate for thirty years, and Jerry Falwell, a Southern Baptist and conservative activist, are name-checked.

Activists from Left and Right are routinely betrayed by Washington politicians, and the series does a good job of presenting the splits within both movements. Will white feminists stand by a Black politician like Shirley Chisholm? Will lesbian activists be sold down the river by the more pragmatic women behind the ERA? Will Reagan give a top political job to Schlafly, who did so much to get him elected in 1979?

The best thing about Mrs. America is how even-handed it is in its politics. Of course, the production’s heart lies with the feminists, but Schlafly steals the show. She is not treated as a fool or a bigot. Above all, there are scenes reminiscent of the BBC2 documentary series, Thatcher: A Very British Revolution, with its extraordinary footage of Thatcher, the only women in the shadow cabinet, surrounded by middle-aged men in grey suits. Schlafly is clever, passionate, principled, but she is living in a man’s world, patronised by male politicians (at one point she is asked to take minutes at a meeting, as the only woman there). The series is a superb reminder of what kind of place 1970s America was. Secretaries are harassed by their bosses, women are constantly talked down to, treated as second-rate citizens by their husbands.

But in the last two episodes, the producers can’t help themselves. Their left-wing views come to the fore. Reagan’s election in 1979 was the beginning of sixteen years of Republican rule. The right won four elections in a row. But the producers downplay this sea change. There’s a scene where the feminists resign from a commission in solidarity with Bella Abzug when she’s fired by Carter’s right-hand man. This is treated as a huge moment. But this is peanuts compared to Reagan’s election, just a few months later. That changed America. Steinem and Abzug didn’t. Liberal TV execs may wish that hadn’t happened, but it did, and if you’re making historical series you need to be true to history.

At the end, we see Schlafly on her own in her kitchen, the right-wing housewife betrayed by Reagan, whose election she made possible. Gloria Steinem, by contrast, is shown being cheered by an adoring audience in some college auditorium. We never see Schlafly’s followers en masse. They are usually presented as a handful of housewives in an office. The feminists, on the other hand, are seen as leaders of a mass movement. But Schlafly’s social conservatives were also a mass movement, one that changed late 20^th century America and rolled back the gains of the Sixties. Like it or hate it, this was one of the great social movements in post-war America. You cannot understand Trump’s America, or his success in 2016, without Phyllis Schlafly and her mailing lists.

Mrs. America has many virtues. It is compelling TV drama. But it also shows how British and American TV still can’t let go of their myths of the Sixties when the Left always wins.