Washington – Call it ironic, or perfectly fitting, that as she stood within reach of becoming the first female speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, California Rep. Nancy Pelosi faced the ultimate decision of many American women: work or family?
Between updates from New York, where her pregnant daughter, Alexandra, was overdue for a Nov. 2 delivery, Pelosi, the Democrats’ leader in the House, spent the final days of the campaign dashing from one rally to the next, promoting candidates whose defeats of GOP incumbents might put her over the top.
As Democrats appeared to be riding an anti-war wave to take control of one or both houses of Congress, the stakes were historic for the 66-year-old San Francisco liberal, the daughter of a former congressman and Baltimore mayor and the wife of a multimillionaire investor, and who waited until her children were grown to run for office.
“It says to women everywhere that not only a glass ceiling but a marble ceiling can be broken and that anything is possible,” a hoarse Pelosi said outside a Philadelphia-area campaign stop over the weekend.
But for the Roman Catholic mother of five, the idea of missing the birth of grandchild No. 6 was too guilt-inducing to contemplate. If Alexandra went into labor on election night itself, Pelosi had said with her trademark unflinching, lip-glossed smile, “I’ll be at the hospital.”
Pelosi’s expectant daughter, in an e-mail on the eve of the election, joked, “I am really rooting for the Dems to win the House because if they don’t, my mother has volunteered to move in for the nanny job!”
Alexandra’s baby chose not to be born Tuesday after all, at least as of early evening.
If this all seems too much like a Lifetime network movie to stomach, the days ahead promise a reality check. Pelosi is unlikely to be challenged in her caucus for the top leadership post, but nasty fights for majority leader and whip are brewing just below. Those fights could pit Democrats with differing Iraq war stances against one another, blacks against whites, women against Latinos – and present the newly empowered caucus as a fractious and disorganized circus.
Pelosi also can expect sharp criticism from Republicans, who’ve predicted that a House under her control would raise taxes and pander to illegal immigrants, gays, criminals and anti-war activists.
Her big-picture challenge will be strengthening the Democrats’ prospects for the presidency in 2008 by uniting the various factions of her caucus: the liberals versus the conservative “Blue Dogs,” and those who want revenge on President Bush versus those who’d concentrate on passing legislation.
The degree to which Pelosi is deemed effective could color prospects for a presidential candidacy by Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y.
“It sets the stage in a very significant way for electing the first woman president,” said Ellen Malcolm, founder of Emily’s List, which raises money for Democratic female candidates who support abortion rights.
