Henrietta Hay's Column

Jackie Kennedy said "The one thing I do not want to be called is First Lady. It sounds like a saddle horse."

Eleanor Roosevelt commented that, "You will feel you are no longer clothing yourself. You are dressing a public monument."

A presidential spouse is expected to be a cross between Mother Theresa and Madonna, with a large chunk of Betty Crocker. Her family life is to be like the Brady Bunch with Donna Reed as back up. Imperfections are not allowed. A fine mind is not recommended. Cookie baking is really the only requirement.

But our First Ladies are real walking, talking human women. They are not robots that Congress can program.

Presidents' wives have never been treated very well. Eleanor Roosevelt was hated for being "pushy." Nancy Reagan propped up an often-ill husband and was "domineering." Rosalynn Carter - sob - sat in on Cabinet meetings.

Hillary Rodham Clinton, however, has taken a lot more than her share of vituperation. Early in the Clinton Presidency a Republican consultant told a network newscaster that his job was to make sure Hillary Clinton is discredited before the 1996 campaign. According to Time magazine, "Each day anti-Hillary talking points go out to talk show hosts. The rumor mill is cranking out bogus stories."

Hillary Rodham Clinton arrived in Washington with a very impressive resume. She was educated at Wellesley, where she was president of the student body and delivered the valedictory when she graduated. She received her law degree from Yale in 1973.

She practiced law in Little Rock and became a partner in her firm. She was twice named "one of the most influential lawyers in America" by the National Law Journal. She was named Arkansas Woman of the Year and Arkansas Young Mother of the Year. She served on a number of national boards.

Unlike most of her detractors she has never been divorced, and has raised an apparently normal, decent, nice kid.

Hillary is a first -- the first Baby Boomer, the first career woman, the first practicing attorney -- to take over the job of First Lady. She is also one of the smartest.

She was brought up with a middle-western sense of family and responsibility. I find it quite amusing that her basic values, derived from a strong Methodist upbringing, are very close to those that the zealots of the Far Right keep yelling about as they try to tear her down. She told the New York Times, "The very core of what I believe is this concept of individual worth which I think flows form all of us being creatures of God and being imbued with a spirit." Hers was the generation of practicing idealism.

This is the woman who landed in the White House full of energy and ambition. She has been criticized for everything from her hairdo to her housewifery, from the hat she wore to the inauguration to her figure, from her face to her temper, from her sex life to her marriage, and a lot more. But she toughs it out. And she is confident enough to handle the criticism gracefully - in public. We can only guess what she says over the breakfast table.

A lot of it, of course, is aimed at her husband, but come on, guys. She's a threat to the status quo. She is pushing out of the mold you made for Presidents' wives, and you can't allow that. Remember, you need all the brains you can get there in Washington, even if they are in a female head.

She is a strong feminist and has been a leader in the issues vital to women worldwide. She was in Denver last week strongly urging that the United States exert strong leadership in the United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women to be held in Beijing next month. She said that, "Women's rights to economic opportunities and political participation should be a part of the human rights agenda."

Yes she is ambitious, but she is ambitious to do good. And she is a radical in the sense she thinks it's possible to make the world better. Sounds good to me! She's not perfect, but in Washington that's hardly unusual.

What's it going to take for this country to accept a strong, capable, intelligent , imperfect human woman as a First Lady?