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"    TAMPA, Fla. \u2014 The Future of Republican Women did not speak from the convention podium on Tuesday night. Instead, it was found a few blocks east across Channelside Drive, on the floor of the Tampa Convention Center, a small package of coiled outrage. &amp;quot;It&amp;#039;s a troubling sign when the Republican Party is succumbing to mob rule,&amp;quot; said the incensed Maine Republican National committeewoman and delegate Ashley Ryan. Elected earlier this year at a contentious Maine state convention, the 21-year-old Ron Paul supporter and math major at the University of Southern Maine is the youngest person ever to hold a National Committee seat. &amp;quot;The credentials committee used faulty logic to rule against my state&amp;#039;s duly elected delegates,&amp;quot; explained Ryan, her high heels kicked off and her toes digging into the carpet. Though narrowly defeated by Romney in the Maine primary, Paul supporters were able to claim into 21 of the 24 delegate spots to the national convention. But RNC muscle stripped Paul of half his delegates and all of his alternates. New party rules were adopted, giving the RNC the power to change party rules between conventions. (Click here for more on all of that.) Ryan, who won&amp;#039;t assume her committee seat until after the close of this convention, attempted to submit a minority report challenging the change, but session chair John Boehner refused to recognize calls from the floor for the report&amp;#039;s consideration. In response, Ryan and half her delegation walked out. Ryan and her compatriots form the core of the new Republican Party in Maine, a party that has an unusually robust legacy of electing strong women candidates. First wining a house seat in 1940, Margaret Chase Smith was the first woman to serve in both houses of Congress. Both of Maine&amp;#039;s current senators, Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe, are Republican women. Snowe has also represented Maine in the House and as First Lady. Apparently knocked down by unprecedented Senate partisanship, she announced earlier this year that she would not run for re-election. Listening to the string of elected women officials take to the podium on Tuesday night, though, it was hard to remember that Republican women once carried a certain gravitas. The first time women were seated at a Republican convention was in 1892. The first woman elected to Congress, in 1917, was a Republican. For generations, Republican women were ladies who lunched with a purpose. They sustained the League of Woman Voters, local school boards, the Girls Scouts, the hospital auxiliary, and the American Association of University Woman. When they worked for money, they were career gals or small business owners. For every Nancy Reagan, there has always been a Betty Ford and a Liddy Dole. Until quite recently, it seemed quite likely that when a woman finally topped a major party ticket, she would be a Republican. A veritable flotilla of women Senators, Representatives, and Governors drifted passed the microphone on Tuesday night, highlighting their accomplishments as mothers of handicapped children, daughters of immigrant laborers, helpmates to struggling husbands and cousins. All this was a set up-for Ann Romney \u2014 hard to believe the same Ann Romney who once ran and was elected to town meeting, the same Ann Romney whose mother-in-law, Lenore Romney, tried (unsuccessfully, but she still tried) to defeat a popular, two-term Democratic incumbent Senator \u2014 to share a meandering love letter to her main squeeze, a just-folks guy who likes to eat dinner off an ironing board and to keep his charitable acts private. Less the point be missed, Romney brought it home with the Temptations: I don&amp;#039;t need no money, fortune, or fame / I&amp;#039;ve got all the riches baby one man can claim. But back in the convention center, Ashley Ryan was having none of it. &amp;quot;In Maine, we have a strong history of electing strong women,&amp;quot; she told me. &amp;quot;The Republican Party was founded to represent the republic, to restore the republic. It&amp;#039;s about not telling people how to live their lives, about not telling them how to spend their money.&amp;quot; &amp;quot;I&amp;#039;m very disappointed with the convention today,&amp;quot; Ryan concluded, stepping back into her high heels. &amp;quot;It&amp;#039;s not a political party anymore. It&amp;#039;s a cocktail party.&amp;quot; FOLLOW MORE LIVE COVERAGE FROM TAMPA ALL WEEK LONG RIGHT HERE AND WITH @ESQPOLITICS ON TWITTER &amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;gt; "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.esquire.com/news-politics/news/a15553/maine-delegates-rnc-12158498/>