MS. SMITH GOES TO WASHINGTON: FEMINIST INTERNSHIPS IN THE NATION'S CAPITAL

by Nichole M. Bennett

In the 1939 film Mr. Smith Goes to Wushington, Jimmy Stewart plays Jefferson Smith, a politically naïve leader of the boy rangers who is appointed to fill a vacant US Senate seat. His appointees are two conniving state political leaders who hope that Smith unwittingly will help them gain large amounts of "pork-barrel" for their state interests. In the end, Senator Smith stands up for the good of the "little" people, filibustering until he wins his cause. In this now classic American film about a political neophyte who makes the trek to Washington, DC, Senator Smith's colleagues in the US Senate are a sea of white men in dark suits, a symbolic statement about the dominance of men and the power of male privilege in US politics.