Yet Jane Swift only gets flak for suggesting that she’ll work from home after she gives birth (which will likely happen in June). Joe Fitzgerald, a columnist for the Boston Herald, is particularly critical of Swift, and belittles her efforts by suggesting that running the state from home would be like “taking a correspondence course.” And even Secretary of State William Galvin went on the record criticizing Swift, telling the Herald that “it remains to be seen” whether Swift can balance motherhood and being governor. “It’s a novel challenge,” Galvin told the Herald.

Even among my relatively liberal group of friends, I’ve been surprised by the amount of antipathy there is towards the acting governor. I was shocked to hear one (very liberal, male) friend tell me he resented that Swift hadn’t known better than to postpone her pregnancies until a time when she had fewer responsibilities. Another (female) friend, told me she thought that Swift was giving working women a bad name.

But part of the reason why Swift’s situation is so controversial is that few men ever have to deal with this type of scenario in such a public forum. Surely scores of male politicians have been in office while their wives have had children, yet they are almost never asked how they will balance their job responsibilities with the needs of a new family member. Even in this day and age, it’s assumed that a woman will be there to pick up the slack.

We’re lucky, in a sense, for the bizarre series of events that brought Jane Swift, and all her challenges, to the spotlight. Swift is doing a big service to society by taking on the responsibilities of governing a state and having children. Her efforts will illustrate that it is not impossible to reconcile politics, and work in general, with raising a family.

Swift doesn’t deserve the flak she’s getting. Young voters—and college students in particular—should support Swift, in the hope that her experience will convince other young, family-minded politicos to enter politics. Our system will be much better off.

Now if only she were a Democrat....

Scott A. Resnick ’01 is an economics concentrator in Cabot House. His column appears on alternate Wednesdays.