L.A. Feminist Groups Say Vote Aids Their Cause : Activists: Some expect outrage over Senate action to spur interest in the women’s movement. About 150 people protest at Seymour’s office.

Feminist activists in Los Angeles on Tuesday vowed to turn their anger over the Senate’s confirmation of Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas into action they say will galvanize the women’s movement across the country.

“This has shown the need for more women in the Senate better than the entire feminist movement has been able to show in the last 25 years,” said Katherine Spillar, national coordinator for the Fund for the Feminist Majority.

A crowd of about 150 people demonstrated Tuesday night outside of the West Side offices of Republican Sen. John Seymour, who voted to confirm Thomas.

Many at the rally, organized by the National Organization for Women and the Fund for the Feminist Majority, said they would work to defeat Seymour, who is up for election next year.

“The sexual harassment charges (against Thomas) have hit a nerve with women,” said Linda Burstyn of the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California. “It feels like our concerns are not being taken seriously.”

Although the protest was peaceful, two people were arrested for blocking traffic on Santa Monica Boulevard near Seymour’s office and refusing orders to return to the sidewalk, police said.

Representatives of several conservative organizations, speaking in Los Angeles, hailed the Thomas vote.

Some said the allegations of sexual harassment raised against Thomas by Anita Faye Hill demonstrate how far liberal interest groups will go to block the nomination of a conservative nominee.

“The radical fringe of the liberal left has shown America how ugly, despicable and low they will go,” said Susan Carpenter-McMillan, a spokeswoman for the Right to Life League who described Thomas as “the Abraham Lincoln of the unborn.”

People throughout Southern California halted their regular routines Tuesday to watch the nationally broadcast Senate vote.

The meeting of the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors was temporarily halted as supervisors watched the proceedings on television sets in the board room. After the vote, the supervisors voted to send Thomas a congratulatory telegram.

Board Chairman Mike Antonovich called Thomas’ confirmation “a tribute to the American people’s sense of fair play.” The conservative Republican supervisor added: “A vast majority of the American people believe that Judge Thomas was telling the truth.”

However, Supervisors Gloria Molina and Ed Edelman asked that their names be omitted from the telegram.

Spillar and a spokeswoman for NOW said the telephones at their offices have been jammed with calls since the vote. Most have been from women expressing outrage and asking how they can get involved in the women’s movement, they said.

Staff writer Richard Simon contributed to this story.