After a sorely missed hiatus, the Equal Rights Amendment is facing ratification in Illinois and Florida, two of the states that narrowly failed to pass the ERA during the early 1980's ratification efforts. I and other 'third wave' feminists who grew up in ratified states, are actively dedicating ourselves to the ongoing struggle. I am hoping to get involved with the restarting national campaign efforts during the fall semester.
Did you know that :
Pay inequality exists throughout United States,despite the fact that it's illegal?
Support The Equal Rights Amendment now!!
The ERA is exactly modeled after the 14th Amendment (giving equal rights based on ethnicity), and as we all know, white people (myself included) have NOT been the victim of reverse hatred. Likewise, the ERA would ensure that "we the people" weren't just some feel good words at the beginning of the constitution. Neither gender can fully work to their potential until their personhood is recognized.
Unfortunately, the far right has distorted the issue by insisting that the ERA is unnecessary and/or a threat to the sanctity of the family. At the same time they were proposing a "Human Life Amendment" they were vehemently opposing something which would have given legal protection to born women. Go figure!!
Another lie warned women would loose their "right" to stay home with the kids. Obviously, they've never run across a woman whose husband HAS deserted her and the kids. Some of my classmates at school have found themselves in this exact position, each of these women (some who were previously opposed to the ERA) has to now figure out how to put food in the table. This sobering reality has been around much longer than women's rights; only the most heartless of people would claim "the good old days" were “pro-family”. family.
""Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied on account of sex by the United States, or any state. Congress shall have the power to enforce this amendment"
Not very earth shattering is it? According to far right doctrine, women do not need such equality and they're happy with:
ERA Summit
Forced pregnancy (aka Rape).
Low educational enrollments--especially in "male fields" (since
they can't bar women from publicly funded schools anymore).
Unequal pay for equal work, commonly touted as a "pro-family" policy so women theoretically head back home.
Un-enforcement of the Violence Against Women Act, since VAWA disrupts
family privacy by allowing battered women to get recognized as crime victims.
In the very recent present, some judges across America have seen fit to disregard
this lifesaving legislation, by ruling it unenforceable.
JFK signed the first executive order which gave federal women equal pay. Although his appointment of women is deplorable by modern standards (no women in the cabinet), the Presidential Commission On the Status of Women made many important recommendations (legalized abortion, contraceptive information, shared gender roles, child care availability...etc) which are common place in today’s feminist groups AND increasingly in the government itself.
In it’s October 1963 final report, The PSCW concluded that existing laws and customs discriminated against women. It also made specific recommendations about how to implement policies which would reverse this American history. Just because law and custom previously had discriminated against women did not make those practices right.
The same “protective labor laws” (which said that women could not lift the weight of a toddler on the job) were earnestly supported by Florence Kelley and other previous feminists, but such laws had actually created more harm than good If women were barred from doing many things in the work place, this was supposedly justification to keep upper management all male and never promote women. While women did previously resent and protest these policies, the arrangement’s ultimate unfairness did not start making headlines until the 60's. Independent women's liberation groups (also dissatisfied with the selective 'freedom' agenda of a male-dominated left) pointed out contradictions embedded throughout the "American dream".
Even if the commission was largely intended for fact-finding/ political reasons, it was a catalyst (along with the Feminine Mystique) for the "second wave" of American feminism. Once the public began realizing women's second class status, there was talk of organizing new feminist groups to force these policies and enact others. Many of the earliest founders of NOW were PCSW (or state commission) members who had wanted to immediately accomplish more than the bureaucratic structure would then-presently allow. These veterans realized they needed an organization with enforcement powers.
One other unintended consequence of the PCSW was to convince many pro-labor people that the ERA was necessary (Labor unions initially opposed the amendment because they believed women actually needed more protection on the job) Eleanor Roosevelt and others eventually realized protective legislation statues hindered women's employment chances. If women employees had so many restrictions on their participation, it became more economical to hire men for the job.
By the 1970's, the labor movement became one of the staunchest and well funded backers of the ERA. If JFK had lived, he probably would have endorsed the ERA whole heartedly, if nothing else because the same unions he had depended on for his own political support have finally recognized that constitutionally shortchanging women shortchanges the workforce. During his own 1980 presidential campaign, younger brother Ted openly supported the Amendment ratification efforts and has repeatedly reintroduced the ERA in the Senate.
At the risk of further sounding partisan, support for this document is written into the Democratic Party's national platform and endorsed by most of their party members. Although the Republican Party has not been enlightened enough to take an official stance, there are a few activists and politicians who realize the importance of this amendment.
View My Guestbook