Native Women

‘This Is Our Country Too!’: The Enduring Legacy of Spanish-Speaking Women in Early America

PUBLISHED 3/9/2026 by and

Centuries before the American Revolution, Spanish-speaking women crossed oceans and deserts to build communities whose legacies still shape the United States.

As anti-Latino sentiment coincides with the 250th anniversary of the United States, we must remember that long before the American Revolution, Spanish-speaking women inhabited territory that would become the United States. 

Like their English Protestant counterparts in New England, Spanish-speaking women were founding mothers of our nation. Their legacies live on through their descendants and the many other Latinas who immigrated to the U.S. over the past 250 years. Faced with the widespread detention of Spanish-speaking women, it is crucial to remember that it has long been their country too.  

(This essay is part of the FEMINIST 250: Founding Feminists series, marking the 250th anniversary of America by reclaiming the revolution through the women and gender-expansive people whose ideas, labor and resistance shaped U.S. democracy.)

Haudenosaunee Governance: The Matrilineal Democracy That Shaped America

PUBLISHED 3/5/2026 by

I am a member of the Oneida Nation Wolf Clan of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy, whose governance model influenced modern democracy and the women’s rights movement. The Haudenosaunee Confederacy is recognized as the oldest continuous, participatory democracy in the world.

Our representative form of government, organized on local, state, national and international levels, flows organically from our Creation Story, which begins with Sky Woman, pregnant, falling from Sky World. She descends toward an endless water world, where water animals already reside and help form the first land, known as Turtle Island. Through their efforts, the living world we inhabit today was brought forth.

Haudenosaunee women inherently hold political, economic and spiritual authority—a significant difference from colonial patriarchy.

When the U.S. founding fathers drafted their Constitution, drawing inspiration from Haudenosaunee governance, they committed a catastrophic omission: matrilineal leadership. As the U.S. commemorates the 250th anniversary of its founding documents amid political, social and ecological upheaval, the country has a unique opportunity to revisit the original influences of American democracy.

(This essay is part of the FEMINIST 250: Founding Feminists series, marking the 250th anniversary of America by reclaiming the revolution through the women and gender-expansive people whose ideas, labor and resistance shaped U.S. democracy.)

America’s Founding Feminists: Rewriting America’s Origin Story

PUBLISHED 3/2/2026 by

Two hundred and fifty years ago, a small group of men declared that “all men are created equal,” casting a vision of liberty that has shaped the American imagination ever since.

Yet even as they debated freedom in Philadelphia, women were writing, organizing, governing, resisting and insisting on their place within the nation taking form. Some, like Mary Katherine Goddard, literally set their names in print; others, like Phillis Wheatley, wrote themselves into intellectual existence against a backdrop of enslavement and doubt. Still others left their mark through acts of refusal and flight, choosing freedom when the republic would not grant it.

A new series, Founding Feminists—launching at the start of Women’s History Month—unfolds over two months, twice a week. On this semiquincentennial of the United States, Ms. turns to these “founding feminists” not as anachronistic heroines, but as architects of an unfinished democratic project. There is no nation without women at its core—no democracy without their labor, intellect, resistance and imagination.

From Haudenosaunee matrilineal governance, to Black women’s freedom-seeking acts, from revolutionary manifestos to quiet domestic rebellions, our Founding Feminists series reexamines the past to illuminate our present moment of backlash and possibility.

If the Declaration of Independence set forth a promise of equality, it was women—across race, class, sexuality and nationality—who pressed the nation to live up to it.

Two hundred and fifty years later, their questions remain ours: What does freedom truly mean, and who gets to claim it?

There Is Power in the Word ‘Patriarchy.’ We Need to Start Using It.

PUBLISHED 3/1/2026 by

News commentators still overlook the obvious when they speculate about why the majority of white female voters in the last three presidential elections cast their ballots for a dishonest, fraudulent, racist, misogynistic sexual predator or why people who call themselves Christians support someone who embodies in virtually every way the opposite of “what would Jesus do?”

I’m tired of snapping at the talking heads on the TV or computer screen, “Come on, say the P word! It’s the patriarchy, stupid!”

We can trace harmful sex binaries, reproductive control and white Christian nationalism back to the same root system: patriarchy. Naming it is the first step toward dismantling its power. 

Bad Bunny’s Super Bowl Show Was a Love Letter to Puerto Rico, the Americas and the Latino Diaspora

PUBLISHED 2/9/2026 by

Like a 19th-century sugar cane plantation brought to life, Bad Bunny’s Super Bowl halftime show staged a visually rich jíbaro vision of Puerto Rico—the foundational cultural figure representing the island’s self-sufficient, hardworking mountain farmers—in Santa Clara, Calif., a region long shaped by Spanish colonization and U.S. expansion, on land where Ohlone (specifically Tamien/Tamyen) people lived alongside coastal Miwuk, Patwin and Yokut communities.

The show’s imagery underscored layered histories of colonization and empire that resonated beyond the stadium.

A love letter to Puerto Rico, its diaspora and Latino people across the globe, the performance suggested that love was indeed stronger than hate, as millions danced to the sounds of freedom, whether they recognized it or not.

The Trap of ‘Existence as Resistance’: Surviving Authoritarianism by Expanding Networks of Care

PUBLISHED 1/3/2026 by

So you and your polycule have found a cute little house to rent, and you’re finally going to build the queer commune of your dreams. All that’s missing is the rainbow flag in the window and the “In Our America…” sign on the lawn. 

While it would be all too easy to subscribe to the idea that your very existence is a form of resistance, we should all be mindful to avoid this trap. It’s true, for those of us in blended, non-normative, queer and chosen families, our ability to succeed and thrive is something to celebrate.

However, our existence alone is not enough to challenge the oppressive systems we live under.

However, our existence alone is not enough to challenge the oppressive systems we live under.

(This essay is part of a collection presented by Ms. and the Groundswell Fund highlighting the work of Groundswell partners advancing inclusive democracy.)

Keeping Score: 137 Women Are Killed by Partners or Family Per Day; Bipartisan Push for Epstein Files; Trans Day of Remembrance and Native Women’s Equal Pay Day

PUBLISHED 12/9/2025 by

In every issue of Ms., we track research on our progress in the fight for equality, catalogue can’t-miss quotes from feminist voices and keep tabs on the feminist movement’s many milestones. We’re Keeping Score online, too—in this biweekly roundup.

This week:
—137 women and girls are killed by intimate partners or family members every day.
—Congress votes overhwlemingly to force the Justice Department to release their Epstein files.
—Donald Trump snaps at women journalists: “Quiet, piggy” and “you are an obnoxious—a terrible, actually a terrible reporter.”
—Violence against trans women remains high.
—DACA recipients are being targeted and detained under the Trump administration.
—Higher-income college students often receive more financial support than they need, while low-income students struggle.
—Tierra Walker died from preeclampsia in Texas after being repeatedly denied an abortion.
—Viola Ford Fletcher died at age 111. She was the oldest living survivor of the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre. 
—North Dakota’s total abortion ban was reinstated after the state’s Supreme Court reversed a temporary injunction from a lower court. There are now 13 states with total bans.

… and more.

State Courts Hold the Power to Free Us Or Erase Us

PUBLISHED 8/30/2025 by and

While national headlines fixate on the U.S. Supreme Court, state courts shape nearly every part of our lives. From traffic violations and business disputes to child custody and criminal charges, an estimated 95 percent of all legal cases in the United States are handled in state courts. 

State courts decide whether you can access abortion care, whether your protest leads to jail time, whether you keep custody of your child and whether your gender identity is protected or punished.

Despite their vast power, state courts remain one of the most overlooked battlegrounds—and opportunities—in the fight for justice. As organizers, we’ve seen the cost of that neglect. Now we’re calling on progressive movements to treat state courts not as a footnote, but as a headline.

(This essay is part of a collection presented by Ms. and the Groundswell Fund highlighting the work of Groundswell partners advancing inclusive democracy.)

Doesn’t Gen Z Have the Right to Life? Young People Sue Trump Administration Over Climate Catastrophe as State-By-State Battle Continues

PUBLISHED 7/26/2025 by

At least 137 people are dead after devastating flash-flooding in Texas in early July, including many children. As climate change induced disasters grow more common and the Trump administration rolls back environmental protections, several organizations are pursuing creative legal strategies to defend children’s fundamental right to a safe, healthy and stable natural environment.

On behalf of 22 young people, Our Children’s Trust filed Lighthiser v. Trump in May as part of its multi-case Youth v. Gov effort, asserting that three of the president’s pro-fossil fuel executive orders violate their constitutional rights to life, health and safety.

On July 16, hundreds gathered outside the U.S. Capitol to hear from Lighthiser plaintiffs and members of Congress at a press conference hosted by Our Children’s Trust and several organizational partners.

The same day, the Children’s Fundamental Rights to Life and a Stable Climate System resolution was introduced by Sen. Merkley (D-Oreg.) and Reps. Schakowsky (D-Ill.), Jayapal (D-Wash.) and Raskin (D-Md.). More than 50 additional senators and representatives joined the resolution as cosponsors.

Eva Lighthiser and Lander Busse were also plaintiffs in Held v. State of Montana, in which the Montana Supreme Court ruled that state law restricting consideration of climate change in environmental reviews violated youth plaintiffs’ right to a clean and healthful environment. The suit saw success largely because Montana has a Green Amendment—a constitutional amendment in the Bill of Rights section of the state Constitution explicitly declaring the legal right to a safe, healthy and stable natural environment for all people. Thus far, only Montana, Pennsylvania and New York have Green Amendments. The organization Green Amendments for the Generations (GAFTG) is working state-by-state alongside community partners to get new state-level Green Amendments passed.

‘I’m a Native Woman Before I’m Anything Else’: The Personal Is Political for New Mexico Senator Angel Charley

PUBLISHED 7/7/2025 by

New Mexico state Sen. Angel Charley’s journey to elected office began with feminist organizing. Now she’s centering Indigenous women’s rights during a historic moment for gender representation in New Mexico politics.

“I’m a mom. I’m a daughter of parents that are getting older. I’m a wife and a partner, but I’m also an Indigenous woman. I’m a Native woman before I’m anything else in this world. … I’m constantly asking: How is this going to affect tribes, nations and pueblos? Have we consulted with them?”

Hear more from Charley and other feminists on the newest Ms. podcast, Looking Back, Moving Forward—the first episode is out now on Spotify, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.