Presidential Document2023-18883
Women's Equality Day, 2023
Primary source
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Published
August 30, 2023
Signed
August 25, 2023
Issuing agencies
Executive Office of the President
Full Text
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<title>Federal Register, Volume 88 Issue 167 (Wednesday, August 30, 2023)</title>
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[Federal Register Volume 88, Number 167 (Wednesday, August 30, 2023)]
[Presidential Documents]
[Pages 59787-59788]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [<a href="http://www.gpo.gov">www.gpo.gov</a>]
[FR Doc No: 2023-18883]
Presidential Documents
Federal Register / Vol. 88, No. 167 / Wednesday, August 30, 2023 /
Presidential Documents
[[Page 59787]]
Proclamation 10609 of August 25, 2023
Women's Equality Day, 2023
By the President of the United States of America
A Proclamation
America is the only Nation in the world based on an
idea--the idea that all people are created equal and
deserve to be treated equally throughout their lives.
We have never fully lived up to that idea, but we have
never walked away from it either. On Women's Equality
Day, we honor the pioneering suffragists who persisted
through decades of struggle to finally win American
women the right to vote, and we celebrate the advocates
and everyday heroes who have continued the long march
for equality ever since. On this day, we recommit to
delivering a better future for all of America's
daughters and for our Nation.
The 19th Amendment was certified 103 years ago, but
more remained to be done--especially for women of
color, many of whom fought for the right to vote for
another four decades until the Voting Rights Act passed
in 1965. Today, women still face discrimination and
threats to their health and safety, as well as gaps in
pay, access to health care, and caregiving
responsibilities. These gaps are often even greater for
women and girls of color. Last year, the Supreme Court
overturned Roe v. Wade, eliminating a woman's
constitutional right to make fundamental decisions
about her own body and putting women's health and lives
at risk. And we are facing new efforts to suppress the
fundamental right to vote and undermine our democracy.
My Administration is committed to realizing the promise
of the suffragists, who knew that equality begins at
the ballot box and requires women to have a seat at the
table. That is why we will keep fighting to pass the
John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act to restore and
strengthen the Voting Rights Act and the Freedom to
Vote Act to ensure fair Congressional maps give all
Americans an equal chance to be heard. It is also why I
have delivered on my promise to build an Administration
that looks like America--with courageous leaders like
Vice President Kamala Harris and the record number of
women who serve in our Nation's first gender-equal
Cabinet leading the way. I have also appointed more
Black women to Federal appellate courts--including the
first Black woman on the Supreme Court, Justice Ketanji
Brown Jackson--than all prior Presidents combined. And
I established the White House Gender Policy Council to
advance gender equity and equality across all domestic
and foreign policy.
Equality also means ensuring women's economic
security--and I am pleased that a majority of the
record 13 million jobs we have added to our economy
since I took office are held by women. We are working
to ensure women have access to opportunities in sectors
like manufacturing and construction, where women have
long been underrepresented. I also signed an Executive
Order to eliminate discriminatory pay practices and
advance pay equity. I have fought for safe and healthy
workplaces, including by signing into law long-overdue
protections for pregnant, postpartum, and nursing
workers. I signed an Executive Order with the most
comprehensive set of actions ever to support caregivers
and expand child- and long-term care, and we have made
other historic investments in affordable child care
while requiring firms that receive significant Federal
dollars to ensure that high-quality
[[Page 59788]]
child care is available so parents can actually take
the new jobs that we are creating.
We have to ensure women's physical safety as well. As a
United States Senator, I wrote the Violence Against
Women Act to not only change the laws but also the
culture that had allowed the scourge of domestic
violence, sexual assault, and other forms of gender-
based violence to persist in America. As Vice President
and now as President, I have worked to reauthorize and
strengthen that law, improving law enforcement
training, increasing support for survivors, addressing
online harassment and abuse, expanding services for
LGBTQI+ survivors, and more. I have also pushed to
improve our military justice system, signing into law
and implementing bipartisan reforms to better prevent
and respond to sexual assault, sexual harassment, and
domestic violence in the Armed Forces.
This year, we also mark the 100th anniversary of the
introduction of the Equal Rights Amendment. It is long
past time to definitively enshrine the principle of
gender equality in the Constitution, and I will
continue to fight for the Equal Rights Amendment as I
have throughout my career. Together we can and must
build a future where our daughters have all the same
rights and opportunities as our sons, where all women
and girls have a chance to realize their God-given
potential, and where we can finally realize the full
promise of America for all Americans. May we be a
Nation worthy of the abilities and ambitions of our
women and girls.
NOW, THEREFORE, I, JOSEPH R. BIDEN JR., President of
the United States of America, by virtue of the
authority vested in me by the Constitution and the laws
of the United States, do hereby proclaim August 26,
2023, as Women's Equality Day. I call upon the people
of the United States to celebrate and continue to build
on our country's progress toward gender equality and to
defend and strengthen the right to vote.
IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this
twenty-fifth day of August, in the year of our Lord two
thousand twenty-three, and of the Independence of the
United States of America the two hundred and forty-
eighth.
<GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT>
(Presidential Sig.)
[FR Doc. 2023-18883
Filed 8-29-23; 8:45 am]
Billing code 3395-F3-P
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</html>Indexed from Federal Register on August 30, 2023.
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