Independent first ladies always cop flak
Nearly two weeks after an inane op-ed arguing that Jill Biden, who earned a doctorate in education, is not qualified to identify as a doctor, the future first lady’s professional status is somehow still under discussion. Tiresome as it is to learn that people are upset that awoman who holds an advanced degree doesn’t hide her accomplishments, it shouldn’t have surprised anyone. Whenever presidential spouses break barriers, they tend to face intense criticism.
The sharpest blows have been dealt to first ladies who challenge the norms of their prescribed subordinate roles. One of those norms is that first ladies leave their professional lives behind once their husbands are elected, which Biden, impressively, has no plans to do.
It might seem strange that her decision to keep her job as a community college professor while serving as first lady is such a novelty in 2020. After all, Laura Bush, Hillary Clinton and Michelle Obama each had graduate degrees and careers before entering the White House.
But the impossible contradiction inherent in the role of the first lady has made the path of least resistance – and, as my research demonstrates, most beneficial to the White House – one in which first ladies emphasise their status as benevolent volunteers, political outsiders and relatable mothers and wives, while promoting projects that cast the president’s policy agenda in a favourable light.
In short, the public wants active, accessible and transparent first ladies – they just don’t want them to have their own activities and agendas.
No first lady did more to normalise the image of an active working presidential spouse in the minds of Americans than Eleanor Roosevelt, who publicly and privately shaped many New Deal-era anti-poverty and civil rights programmes.
But in fighting to maintain the professional independence she enjoyed before Franklin D. Roosevelt’s election, Eleanor Roosevelt faced confrontations with journalists and even her husband, who requested that she stop teaching at a private girls’ school and resign her positions at the Democratic National Committee and the League of Women Voters once he was elected. It was even controversial that she drove her own car before and during her husband’s administration.
Hillary Clinton’s use of her maiden name, Rodham, and her infamous assertions of independence – whether she was invoking Tammy Wynette or cookiebaking housewives – were scrutinised throughout her husband’s political career.
She faced a similarly intense backlash when she was appointed to chair the president’s Health Care Task Force, despite her experience spearheading related efforts at the state levelwhen she was first lady of Arkansas.
Of course, not all first ladies have energetically pursued their own interests during their husbands’ administrations. Many have opted to focus on the social and ceremonial functions of their office, providing input and advice behind the scenes, or have appeared to shun politics altogether. They are criticised nonetheless.
Like her predecessors, Jill Biden is learning a tough lesson about America’s discomfort with – and confusion about – an accomplished woman in the White House.
But she can also take heart: history has eventually rewarded bold first ladies, embarrassed their detractors and recognised the work each presidential spouse has done to shape the contours of a thankless and peculiar job.