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Sep 19, 2018 · October 11, 1991: Hill testifies that Thomas had sexually harassed her while she worked with him at the Education Department and Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Hill said...
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- HISTORY Vault
The uncomfortable spectacle of the hearings reverberated across the nation and had lasting consequences.
In October 1991, Americans were riveted by the spectacle of an all-white, all-male Senate Judiciary Committee questioning Anita Hill, the African-American law professor who had accused Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas of sexual harassment.
TV viewers, both male and female, watched in increasing discomfort as the senators asked Hill about large-breasted women, a porn star named Long Dong Silver and pubic hair on a Coke can, among other previously unthinkable subjects for a Senate committee hearing.
But for women, Hill’s testimony would have special significance, as it was the first time someone had so publicly shared her account of workplace harassment—something that so many of them had experienced.
Though the committee would eventually confirm Thomas, making him only the second Black man to serve on the Supreme Court, the impact of Hill’s televised testimony would reverberate dramatically across the nation, with lasting consequences that endure today.
“I think women saw play out, in the most human terms, Anita Hill—credible and very much reflecting the experiences of so many other women—being demeaned, being dismissed and being mistreated by an array of male senators,” says Marcia Greenberger, founder and co-president emerita of the National Women’s Law Center. “And when they reflected upon it at the end of the hearings, their anger began to rise, and their determination to do something about it began to increase.”
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- Sarah Pruitt
Sep 28, 2021 · In 1991, attorney Anita Hill testified that Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas had sexually harassed her when he was chair of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and she...
- Terry Gross
Sep 27, 2021 · Thirty years after Hill delivered testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee about Thomas, she is still a "crusader" -- not just on the topic of sexual harassment but also on the larger issue of gender violence.
- Danielle Genet
- 7 min
Apr 23, 2018 · A University of Oklahoma law professor and former assistant of Thomas’ during his tenure in the EEOC, Hill accused Thomas of sexual harassment. Thomas, she claimed, had made unwanted...
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Apr 13, 2016 · HBO's new movie Confirmation chronicles the intense confirmation battle for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas after Anita Hill, a former employee, claimed he sexually harassed her....
Sep 20, 2018 · In 1991, senators questioned Anita Hill about her accusation that Clarence Thomas, a nominee to the Supreme Court, had sexually harassed her. The questions and remarks that lawmakers...
