Diane Edith Watson - Infinite Women

Born: 12 November 1933, United States
Died: NA
Country most active: United States
Also known as: NA

The following is republished from the U.S. Congress. This piece falls under under public domain, as copyright does not apply to “any work of the U.S. Government” where “a work prepared by an officer or employee of the U.S. Government as part of that person’s official duties” (See, 17 U.S.C. §§ 101, 105).

As a former educator, state legislator, and United States ambassador, Diane E. Watson entered the U.S. House of Representatives in 2001 with a wealth of public service experience. Throughout her 35 years in public office, Watson worked to improve the lives of women and children—especially those living in poverty. Her diverse legislative interests included welfare reform, civil rights, foreign aid for African nations facing the crises of HIV and AIDS, and improved health care and education in the United States. “People have trusted me, and I have not let them down,” Watson observed during her first congressional campaign. “People have read my name on the ballot for 25 years. They have been born, grown up and gotten married in that time. That means a great deal. When you work your base, you win.”

Diane Edith Watson was born on November 12, 1933, in Los Angeles, California, the daughter of William Allen Louis Watson, a Los Angeles police officer, and Dorothy Elizabeth O’Neal Watson, a postal worker. After graduating from Susan Miller Dorsey High School in Los Angeles, Watson received her associate degree from Los Angeles City College in 1954 and a bachelor’s degree in education from the University of California, Los Angeles, in 1956. Watson later earned a master’s degree in school psychology from California State University, Los Angeles, in 1967, and a Ph.D. in education administration from Claremont College in 1986. Watson worked as a teacher and school psychologist in the Los Angeles public schools, taught abroad in France and Japan, lectured at California State University campuses in Long Beach and Los Angeles, and worked in the California department of education.

In 1975, Watson won election to the Los Angeles board of education and served until 1978. According to the Los Angeles Times, Watson became only the second Black woman to be elected to the school board. On the board, Watson worked to desegregate the city’s public schools. She went on to win a spot in the California state senate in 1978, becoming the first African-American woman to serve in that chamber. “I think I bring another dimension being a black female,” she said. “But I don’t want to be judged here as a black or a woman but as a senator.” During her two-decade career in the state senate, she chaired the health and human services committee where she worked to provide relief for Californians living in poverty and sought to rebuild central Los Angeles after the violence and property destruction that followed the 1992 acquittal of White police officers in the beating of Rodney King, a Black man. In 1992, Watson ran for the Los Angeles county board of supervisors but lost to former California Representative Yvonne Brathwaite Burke in a close race. After state term limits forced Watson out of the California senate, President William J. Clinton nominated her as U.S. Ambassador to the Federated States of Micronesia in 1998.

In December 2000, Representative Julian C. Dixon of California, Watson’s friend and former high school classmate, died suddenly of a heart attack. A senior member on the powerful Appropriations Committee, Dixon had just won re-election to a twelfth term in Congress. Urged by colleagues to run, Watson declared her candidacy for the vacant seat in January 2001. Watson campaigned on her political experience, community activism, and local roots in the predominantly African-American and Hispanic district, which included West Los Angeles and Culver City. Watson earned a 33 percent plurality in the primary to defeat 10 opponents, including a state senator and a city councilman. In the June 5, 2001, special election, Watson easily carried the Democratic district with 75 percent of the vote against Republican businesswoman Noel Irwin Hentschel. In her four re-elections, Watson won with more than 80 percent of the vote.

Watson took her seat in the House on June 7, 2001. “I never dreamed that this walk would direct me in the footsteps of my dear friend, the late esteemed Julian Dixon,” she said. Watson received assignments on the Government Reform and the International Relations Committees and remained on both panels throughout her tenure in the House. As a former ambassador, she took a keen interest in American foreign policy, particularly relating to issues of racism and health care in the developing world. In the summer of 2001, Watson attended the United Nations Conference on Racism, Xenophobia, and Other Intolerance in Durban, South Africa. She later urged the United States to host its own conference on racism and called for reforms to American education, justice, and health care systems as possible means for reparations for the long and painful legacy of American slavery. Watson also supported the Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Prevention Act, noting that incidents of violence against people of Middle Eastern and North African descent, which had risen since the 2001 terrorist attacks, were “the tip of a proverbial iceberg.”

Watson worked to increase U.S. aid to sub-Saharan African nations fighting a pandemic of HIV and AIDS. She argued that the crisis was a humanitarian issue with repercussions that affected both regional stability and America’s national security because of the strain it placed on so many developing economies. The disease, she observed, “in the very near term, if not more is done, may challenge the very notion of law-based nation states.” Such instability, she also noted, could be taken advantage of by terrorist groups. Speaking in November 2001, Watson said “Let us not forget that Al-Qaeda terrorist leader Osama bin Laden has exploited the misery of another state where civil society has collapsed—Afghanistan—to serve as a base for his terror network.”

In addition to her humanitarian efforts, Watson sponsored reauthorization of the U.S. Advisory Commission on Public Diplomacy, a bipartisan panel under the U.S. State Department overseeing both private and governmental efforts to promote American ideals abroad. Watson introduced bills proposing an expansion of the commission to include publicly available resource centers and libraries. Speaking in support of the bill on the House Floor, Watson suggested the program might “help redeem the status and prestige that the United States has lost around the world in recent years.” She added, “An important point of regaining our rightful leadership role is to find more effective ways to let the world know who we are as Americans and what we stand for.” The proposal passed the House by voice vote but stalled in the U.S. Senate.

Watson used her seat in Congress to call attention to the needs of poor and underserved communities—particularly those in her district. Building on her work in the state legislature in support of “commonsense” welfare reform, Watson called on Congress to give the states leeway to manage their own need-based initiatives by reauthorizing the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program to provide education, childcare, job training, and employment opportunities to aid recipients. A consistent supporter of increased funding for Head Start, Watson also lobbied for federal assistance to combat gang violence and protect at-risk young people. Supporting President Barack Obama’s agenda, Watson held town halls promoting aspects of the Affordable Care Act that would help seniors and families control the costs of health care. She regularly supported health care reform in House Floor speeches, specifically highlighting the benefits for maternity care.

During her time in the House, Watson highlighted the achievements of important civil rights activists. In the 108th Los Angeles after the violence and property destruction that followed the 1992 acquittal of White police officers in the Congress (2003–2005) she introduced a measure to award a Congressional Gold Medal to Dr. Dorothy Height, a longtime advocate for civil rights in Washington, DC. She also sponsored legislation to extend the construction deadline for a national memorial honoring Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. to allow the project more time to raise funding. Both bills were approved by the House and eventually became law.

On February 11, 2010, Watson announced her decision to retire at the end of the 111th Congress (2009–2011) in order to spend more time with her 100-year-old mother. Reflecting upon her career, Watson said, “I have been really thrilled by the opportunity to help my constituents in whatever way I could.”