How to De-Radicalize

They wore knee-length linen dresses, white pumps and pearls instead of blue jeans, T shirts and sandals. When upset, they exclaimed only "Oh, heavens!" or "Darn it!" They called themselves ladies as often as they said women, and they sometimes said hero when they meant heroine. They were, in short, Republicans, not Democrats. But for all their modesty of style and rhetoric, they had unexpected influence. 'I'm a Democrat," said Betty Friedan, who was observing the proceedings for McCall's, "but the emergence of women at this convention may be more important than what the women did at the Democratic Convention."

The woman who was most visible was the first woman ever to give a keynote address at a major national political convention: Anne Armstrong, co-chairman of the G.O.P. National Committee. Indefatigably amiable, perpetually smiling, cello-voiced, she was charged, appropriately, with winning over Democrats to the Republican ticket. Her speech was perhaps the best offer a Republican ever made a Democrat. She herself is a convert. Brought up in upper-crust Creole society in New Orleans, graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Vassar, she remained a Democrat until--it must be said--she married the very model of a Marlboro man, sandy-haired Tobin Armstrong, whose Texas ranch is measured in miles rather than acres. She has thoughts of running for public office when the last of her five children reaches college age.

Less on display but working just as hard behind the scenes were other softspoken, steely, resolute women intent on hammering out a party platform that would recognize women's rightful role in the G.O.P. The Republicans' answer to Gloria Steinem was Jill Ruckelshaus, wife of the director of the Environmental Protection Agency. "She has helped to de-radicalize the movement in the eyes of Republican women," says Kitty Clyde, a comely press aide to Anne Armstrong. De-radicalize? A phrase is born. A Roman Catholic mother of five with the clear-eyed look of a swimming instructor at a fashionable girls' camp, Jill made a determined plea for an abortion plank. It had no more chance with the Republicans than it did with the Democrats. But the plea's the thing. "You can't be abrasive and hostile in a convention like this," says Jill. "We had to come softly through the door to get women moving."

The main mover was Congresswoman Peggy Heckler of Massachusetts, a peppery redhead who likes to talk and talk. And people listen. She was determined to include in the G.O.P. platform a plank on federally sponsored day-care centers for children, thereby challenging her own President, who had vetoed a child-care bill because, he felt, it would weaken the family. Refusing to take no for an answer, Peggy had a way of converting it to yes. "Language is a barrier," she says. "Words do not mean the same to men as to women." So she held a class for the men on the Platform Committee, who had probably not received such a lecture since they were caught filching apples from the orchard down the road. "I sure did learn a lot," sighed New Jersey Congressman Peter Frelinghuysen.

Quality. While the White House offered stubborn but diminishing resistance, Peggy worked over a staggering total of 96 drafts on child care. For two hours she argued for the inclusion of a single word: quality. During the tedious wrangling, she left the impression that she was willing to walk out of the convention. "I think there should be a higher level of consciousness at the White House," she complained. But she raised it enough to get a strong endorsement of child care into the platform and a pledge from Platform Chairman John Rhodes, a Representative from Arizona, to co-sponsor a child-care measure with her next year.

Rather effortlessly, Republican women managed to combine play with work. Fashion shows were anathema to the more rigidly militant Democratic women, but the Republicans found a solution of sorts to this ideological dilemma: a fashion show with a Women's Lib theme. At a Tuesday brunch, prominent Republican women impersonated famous females of the past. First to appear was Shirley Temple Black, outfitted as the earliest American Women's Liberationist, Margaret Brent, a 17th century land speculator who bought up a large chunk of Maryland and demanded two seats for herself in the colonial assembly. Anne Richardson, wife of HEW Secretary Elliot Richardson, gave Mary Todd Lincoln a luster she never had in life. Lenore Romney dressed up as Lucretia Garfield, Anna Chennault appeared as Grace Coolidge, Clare Boothe Luce came as herself. It really did not matter--and went largely unnoticed--that Lester Lanin's orchestra played Stout-Hearted Men, when the head table was introduced.

Ever alert for ideological slippage, Betty Friedan decided that the Republicans needed some shoring up as the week waned. At a session of the Republican Women's Political Caucus, she seized the microphone and denounced the women for pussyfooting on abortion. Moderator Ruckelshaus made a genteel grab for the mike, but Betty hung on. Then rising magisterially, more formidable than Friedan, a black physicist named Natalie Moorman joined the fray. The associate director of the Center for Energy Information in New York, she exuded power. "It is vahstly unfair to take over this program," she boomed at Betty, who responded: "You took over the name of our organization."* "Honey," said Mrs. Moorman, "these people are less sophisticated than you are. You want to be a dictator, but I'm more experienced at it than you are." Betty gave up, let go the mike and went outside the caucus room to continue the battle. A flashbulb popped. A camera-toting member of the Republican Host Committee asked her: "Are you Bella Abzug?"

If the Republican women have fought both the White House and Betty Friedan to a standoff, it can safely be said that they are here to stay.

*The National Women's Political Caucus was founded in 1971 on a bipartisan basis to encourage women to take an active part in politics and to run for public office.

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