Hillary Clinton Shows Wellesley Seniors Softer Side of Feminism

Voicing a homey and decidedly centrist brand of feminism, Hillary Clinton on Friday returned to her alma mater to remind graduating seniors at Wellesley College that they could help America’s children “by making policy or making cookies.”

The remark won cheers from students and reflected Clinton’s theme that young women today face “tough choices,” topped by the difficult challenge of trying to balance family and career.

“It is a false choice to tell women--or men for that matter--that we must choose between caring for ourselves and our own families or caring for the larger family of humanity,” said the wife of Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee. She was the class speaker at Wellesley in 1969.

“When all is said and done, it is the people in your life, the friendships you form and the commitments you maintain that give shape to your life,” said Mrs. Clinton, who went on to earn a law degree from Yale University.

“And if you choose,” she added, “a marriage filled with love and respect.”

Hillary Clinton’s warm words about marriage and emphasis on the importance of the personal side of life were in some ways reminiscent of the “family first” commencement speech delivered here two years ago by First Lady Barbara Bush.

Mrs. Bush’s lecture on family values sparked a controversy on campus and generated more than 7,000 news stories about the event.

But the similarity ended with the subject matter. In her first jab at the Bush Administration, Clinton declared that women today “don’t need lectures from Washington about values.”

She called on her audience to “recognize the need for a sensible family policy that reverses the neglect of our children.”

In a further stab at Washington, she sympathized with women “all over America” who are “anguishing over the prospect that abortions will be criminalized again” and lamented the fact that “children in schools have bullet drills instead of fire drills.”

Then, contrasting the specter of communism that hung over her own generation’s future with the dangers of today’s world, Clinton said the greatest threat comes “from our own internal Indifferent Empire that tolerates splintered families, unparented children, embattled schools and pervasive poverty, racism and violence.”

Clinton’s speech was well received by students and alumni. Many hailed her as a role model.

“I was really glad she didn’t decide to use this as a political forum for Bill Clinton,” said Dana DeCristoforo, a 21-year-old junior from Southbury, Conn.

“I wish she was the one who was running,” said Nancy Shapiro, who graduated from Wellesley in 1983.