The Women in Sports Foundation, founded by Billie Jean King, celebrates a day on Capital Hill in Washington, DC, February 1, 2012. That day is celebrated annually as National Girls and Women in Sports Day. This year the theme is “Title IX at 40.”
Title IX was passed by the U.S. Congress in 1972. It amended the Higher Education Act of 1965. Title IX states, “No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be subject to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving federal financial assistance.” It covers all education programs, not just athletics. Affects on women and girls in sports have been profound.
Billie Jean King won her first Wimbledon championship in women’s doubles at the age of 17 in 1961, before she enrolled at California State College in Los Angeles. She won it again the following year. Despite being a Wimbledon champion, there was no athletic scholarship for her. That was when athletic scholarships for girls were rare, if they existed at all.
Before Title IX it was it was rare to see a girl throw a ball from third base to first base, shoot a basket, score a goal, or launch a softball over home plate for a strike. Forty years later you see these feats by girls at high school and college athletic contests all the time. In large part this is due to Title IX which caused high schools to offer girls the same athletic opportunities as the boys were offered and colleges to offer athletic scholarships to young women student athletes if they were to continue to offer them to male athletes. There is not parity yet, but it is far better. In 2005-2006, men received $2,192,500 in athletic scholarship money compare to $1,809,500 for women.
Billie Jean King was a strong supporter of women’s rights and a vocal supporter of equal treatment. Before Title IX was passed in 1972 , King testified in support before Congress. A year after Congress passed Title IX, King defeated Bobby Riggs in the famous "Battle of the Sexes". Women's athletics took off. The progress has been truly astounding, in high school athletics, college, and professional sports from the Women's Tennis Association professional tour to the Women's Basketball Association to Women's PGA in golf to women's professional soccer.
King was the driving force behind the women's movement in tennis, challenging the status quo and eventually winning equal prize money for women players. In 2003 at the William H.G. Fitzgerald Tennis Center in Washington, DC, when she was captain of the U.S. Fed Cup team in a tie versus Italy, King said when asked about her passion for equal rights, "It's not just equal rights for women, but for the guys too. If the guys are being treated unfairly, then I'm against that as well."
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