A Woman in the House

For decades, Patricia Saiki worked tirelessly to bring positive change to Hawai‘i and the nation, improving life for women, Japanese Americans, small business owners and others. In A Woman in the House, the former congresswoman shares her journey from student athlete to schoolteacher to political crusader and business advocate.

Time after time, when confronted with unfairness and inequity, Saiki vowed to create change—and did. “My father constantly reminded me that girls could be successful in sports—and in any career we might choose,” she recalls. “His voice remains clear and strong in my memory: ‘You can be anything you want to be and do anything you choose to pursue. Being a girl should not hinder you in any way.’” Being “a girl” may have set obstacles in Saiki’s path, but she has done a remarkable job of clearing a path for herself and those who came after.

Born and raised in Hilo on the island of Hawai‘i, Saiki was one of three daughters of the second-generation Japanese Americans Kazuo and Shizue Fukuda. An educator by training, she spent fourteen years in classrooms in Hawai‘i and on the US mainland. It was her experience in Hawai‘i's public school system that led her to form the state's first teachers' union, an experience that was central to her quick rise in state politics, starting with her election to Hawai‘i's first Constitutional Convention in 1968. She went on to serve in the state House and Senate, two terms in the US House of Representatives, and then in the administration of President George H.W. Bush.