Are we there yet? I must have asked that question thousands of times during the family car trips of my youth, excited as I was to get to my grandmother’s house. Now as a grown woman, I’m asking the same question, but about getting to a different kind of destination. The journey from the not-so-ancient dark ages of few women candidates even on the Massachusetts ballot, to this new day of women ascending to top leadership.
If the prognosticators are right, after November’s election, women will hold most of the most powerful roles in state government: governor, lieutenant governor, attorney general, state auditor and state treasurer. Victories in the Democratic primary have set the table for the sea change. Attorney General Maura Healey won the Democratic nomination for governor, Salem Mayor Kim Driscoll won the lieutenant governor nomination, former Boston City Councilor Andrea Campbell won the attorney general nomination, State Senator Diana DiZoglio won the state auditor nomination and Deb Goldberg was unopposed in her reelection bid for state treasurer. Nearly a possible clean sweep in a state where women have struggled to claim political victories.
Nearly because the fifth top seat, Secretary of State was claimed by 27-year incumbent Democrat Bill Galvin. Galvin beat challenger Tanisha Sullivan in the primary and is expected to easily defeat another woman Republican Rayla Campbell in November. Healey, Campbell and DiZoglio will have to best their male Republican opponents, while Driscoll will face another woman, Republican Leah Cole Allen. So, no matter what happens, the lieutenant governor will be a woman. Massachusetts voters tend to support Democrats across the board — except for the governorship. But the latest Boston Globe poll shows Healey way ahead of the Republican nominee Geoff Diehl. If the polls and past trends hold true, this year, women will capture the state’s top-tier leadership roles.
Win or lose in November, history has already been made. According to the Axios newsletter, the Democratic party’s “slate of nominees [was] the most female in state history.” Before she ran for governor, Maura Healey made history as the first openly gay attorney general in the nation. And until reporters brought it up, Democrat Attorney General nominee Andrea Campbell said she didn’t realize her primary triumph positioned her to be the first Black woman to win a statewide contest. Advocates for women in political office are exhilarated about the possibility of Massachusetts’s first elected female governor. What’s more, no state has ever simultaneously elected women for both governor and lieutenant governor. Now, several states including Massachusetts all have women candidates up for both roles. Experts say Massachusetts may have the strongest chance of making that first-in-the-nation reality happen.
Could it be that the state is one election away from a giant leap for history and women leaders? I don’t yet believe the vision. When I was riding in the car on those family trips of long ago, I had trusting confidence that I’d get there. I don’t have that innocent certainty about a cohort of women taking the oath of office in the State House in 2023. But I sure would like to see it.
