Women and the Democratic Party: The Evolution of EMILY's List
Powered By Xquantum

Women and the Democratic Party: The Evolution of EMILY's List By ...

Chapter 2:  The Second Wave and Emily's List
Read
image Next

For example, in 2008, the NFIB PAC (the SSF of the National Federation of Independent Business), acquired receipts of $2,718,621 from over 2,000 donors.10 That same year, NOW/PAC (the SSF of the National Organization of Women) brought in $252,008 in receipts from 132 individuals, even though the organization has over 500,000 contributing members.11 Although both of these PACs are connected and have a parent organization that covers their overhead costs, clearly the NFIB PAC is in a better position to capitalize on the other advantages associated with being a connected PAC. Thus, the formal structure of the PAC can be an advantage but does not guarantee a PAC's success or failure.

Knowledge of the advantages connected PACs enjoy makes the history of women's PACs and the story of EMILY's List even more intriguing. Within six years, EMILY's List, a non-connected PAC, catapulted itself to the top, becoming the premier women's PAC. Souraf (1992) cast the organization as a member of a new class of ideological non-connected PACs:

…that go beyond the stereotypical PAC. EMILY's List, for example, is registered as a PAC and makes contributions in the usual ways, but in its pursuit of its feminist agenda it is also a donor network in which membership requires dues of $100 per election and a pledge to contribute at least $100 to at least two candidates endorsed by EMILY's List. It is an organizational form that suits especially the autonomous, politicized contribution, and it may well be a PAC variant with a future. (111)

ELIST achieved this notoriety against the odds. Before explaining its transformation from a donor network, to the premier women's PAC, to a multipronged influence organization, one must first understand the history of women's PACs and their role in electoral politics.