Are Black Women Not Women?

Hell hath no fury like women scorned.

Hillary Clinton supporters are furious because they think she has been counted out by the media. In a full-page ad in USA Today, WomenCount, a newly organized political action committee, declared:

Not So Fast...
Hillary's Voice is OUR Voice,
And She's Speaking for All of Us

They were just getting started:We cannot stand by as a cacophony of voices demand that she step aside to smooth the road for another.

Women risked all they held dear to make this country great. They put their lives on the line in all our quests for justice – from Abigail Adams to Sojourner Truth to Susan B. Anthony to Eleanor Roosevelt to Fannie Lou Hamer to Barbara Jordan to Dolores Huerta to Hillary herself.

We know that when women vote, Democrats win. Now it is the responsibility of our party to hear our voices and count all our votes.

We want Hillary to stay in this race until every vote is cast, every vote is counted, and we are convinced our voices are heard.

It's ironic that WomenCount includes Sojourner Truth in the mix. In an address before the 1851 Women's Rights Convention in Akron, Ohio, Sojourner asked "Ain't I a Woman?":

That man over there says that women need to be helped into carriages, and lifted over ditches, and to have the best place everywhere. Nobody ever helps me into carriages, or over mud-puddles, or gives me any best place! And ain't I a woman? Look at me! Look at my arm! I have ploughed and planted, and gathered into barns, and no man could head me! And ain't I a woman? I could work as much and eat as much as a man - when I could get it - and bear the lash as well! And ain't I a woman? I have borne thirteen children, and seen most all sold off to slavery, and when I cried out with my mother's grief, none but Jesus heard me! And ain't I a woman?

WomenCount reportedly was organized "to ensure that the 51 percent of American citizens who are women have their values and votes counted in the political process."

In this primary season, black women have voted overwhelmingly for Barack Obama. Should their voices be heard? Should their votes be counted? Are they not women?