Rest In Peace

A few days ago, on the Op Ed page of the New York Times, there was a column by Gail Collins entitled The Senate Bathroom Angle. In it Ms. Collins related the tribulations of Maryland Senator Barbara Mikulski. (It will be soon be former senator, Mikulski having retired after four terms representing her state.) The senator bewailed the lack of adequate rest rooms for women in the Senate and the column's author, in fact, noted that “Almost every veteran woman legislator, in every level of government, has a story about the shortage of bathroom facilities at work.”

It's a valid criticism. When the original government was formulated, and when the government buildings were first designed, the idea of women in the government was not on the radar (and neither was radar). In relation to the particular situation, no one conceived of the idea that there might be a woman senator. So no rest rooms were included to meet the needs of a group of people that no one expected to exist. There were, of course, facilities ultimately constructed to serve senators' wives, and for tourists, but none for woman legislators. The public rooms, and the one meant for Senate wives, became the place for female senators to rest.

But with increasing numbers – about a fifth of all senators now are women, and it's likely to increase – a more fitting solution was necessary, and, in its wisdom, Congress authorized a rest room with two stalls to satisfy the women, and perhaps there will be more. Wait and see. But in the meantime, just wait.

It doesn't seem adequate, but perhaps it's excessive.

The same issue of the Times held an article entitled North Carolina Fails To Repeal Measure That Caused Boycotts. It lamented the fact that North Carolina didn't overturn legislation (H. B. 2) that “requires transgender people [and everyone else] in public buildings to use the bathroom that corresponds with the gender [sex] on their birth certificate.” It's a touchy subject.

Elsewhere in the article it notes “Chad Griffin, the president of the Human Rights Campaign, which opposed H. B. 2 and helped to organize the economic backlash to the law, said on Twitter that Mr. Berger's measure 'doubles down on discrimination … '” (Phil Berger is a state senator who had offered a compromise bill.) The Human Rights Campaign, which has, as its motto “Working for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Equal Rights,” had this to say about Senator Mikulski: Sen. Mikulski received a 100% rating on the HRC Scorecard for the 113th Congress. The scorecard rates members of Congress on their positions on LGBT-related legislation.

With the knowledge that Congress is a government institution, and is housed in public buildings, I cannot but wonder that the senator sought additional, and separate, rest room facilities for women. Senator Mikulski's support for LGBT positions in the past suggests that a better solution from her point of view would be an elimination of the entire notion of sex-limited rest room facilities, and I'm inclined to believe that even for Senators and Representatives there is no reason why “people in public buildings [should have to] use the bathroom that corresponds with the gender on their birth certificate.” Whether they're LGBT or not isn't the issue, and making it such is a disservice to the public that Congress serves.

It's a foreign concept I suppose, but shouldn't our representatives have to follow the same rules that they say should govern the rest of us?