Equal Rights Amendment
The Equal Rights Amendment is a proposed amendment to the United States Constitution that would explicitly prohibit sex discrimination. It is not currently a part of the Constitution, though its ratification status has long been debated. It was written by Alice Paul and Crystal Eastman and first introduced in Congress in December 1923. With the rise of the women's movement in the United States during the 1960s, the ERA garnered increasing support, and, after being reintroduced by Representative Martha Griffiths in 1971, it was approved by the U.S. House of Representatives that year, and by the U.S. Senate in 1972, thus submitting the ERA to the state legislatures for ratification, as provided by Article Five of the United States Constitution. A seven-year deadline was included with the legislation by Congress. A simple majority of Congress later extended the deadline to 1982. Both deadlines passed with the ERA three short of the necessary 38 states for ratification. Even so, there are ongoing efforts to ratify the amendment.
The purpose of the ERA is to guarantee equal legal rights for all American citizens regardless of sex. In the early history of the Equal Rights Amendment, middle-class women were largely supportive, while those speaking for the working class were often opposed, arguing that women should hold more domestic responsibility than men and that employed women needed special protections regarding working conditions and employment hours. Proponents asserted it would end legal distinctions between men and women in matters including divorce, property, and employment. Opponents have argued that it would remove protections from women and open women to be drafted into the military.
Resolution text
The resolution, "Proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States relative to equal rights for men and women", reads:History
Early history (1920s–1940s)
On September 25, 1921, the National Woman's Party announced its plans to campaign for an amendment to the U.S. Constitution to guarantee women equal rights with men. The text of the proposed amendment read:Alice Paul, the head of the National Women's Party, believed that the Nineteenth Amendment would not be enough to ensure that men and women were treated equally regardless of sex. In 1923, at Seneca Falls, New York, she revised the proposed amendment to read:
Paul named this version the Lucretia Mott Amendment, after a female abolitionist who fought for women's rights and attended the First Women's Rights Convention. The proposal was seconded by Dr. Frances Dickinson, a cousin of Susan B. Anthony.
Following its introduction in 1923, the Equal Rights Amendment was reintroduced in each subsequent Congress, but made little progress.
In 1943, Alice Paul further revised the amendment to reflect the wording of the Fifteenth and Nineteenth Amendments. This text would later become Section 1 of the version passed by Congress in 1972.
As a result of this revision, ERA opponents proposed an alternative in the 1940s. This alternative provided that "no distinctions on the basis of sex shall be made except such as are reasonably justified by differences in physical structure, biological differences, or social function." It was quickly rejected by both pro- and anti-ERA coalitions.
When the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution was adopted in 1868, the Equal Protection Clause, which guarantees equal protection of the laws, did not apply to women. It was not until 1972 that the United States Supreme Court extended equal protection to sex-based discrimination. However, women have never been entitled to full equal protection as the Court subsequently ruled that statutory or administrative sex classifications were subject to an intermediate standard of judicial review, a less stringent standard than that applied to other forms of discrimination.
Split among feminists
Since the 1920s, the Equal Rights Amendment has been accompanied by discussion among feminists about the meaning of women's equality. Alice Paul and her National Woman's Party asserted that women should be on equal terms with men in all regards, even if that means sacrificing benefits given to women through protective legislation, such as shorter work hours and no night work or heavy lifting. Opponents of the amendment, such as the Women's Joint Congressional Committee, believed that the loss of these benefits to women would not be worth the supposed gain to them in equality. In 1924, The Forum hosted a debate between Doris Stevens and Alice Hamilton concerning the two perspectives on the proposed amendment. Their debate reflected the wider tension in the developing feminist movement of the early 20th century between two approaches toward gender equality. One approach emphasized the common humanity of women and men, while the other stressed women's unique experiences and how they were different from men, seeking recognition for specific needs. The opposition to the ERA was led by Mary Anderson and the Women's Bureau beginning in 1923. These feminists argued that legislation including mandated minimum wages, safety regulations, restricted daily and weekly hours, lunch breaks, and maternity provisions would be more beneficial to the majority of women who were forced to work out of economic necessity, not personal fulfillment. The debate also drew from struggles between working class and professional women. Alice Hamilton, in her speech "Protection for Women Workers", said that the ERA would strip working women of the small protections they had achieved, leaving them powerless to further improve their condition in the future, or to attain necessary protections in the present.The National Woman's Party already had tested its approach in Wisconsin, where it won passage of the Wisconsin Equal Rights Law in 1921. The party then took the ERA to Congress, where U.S. senator Charles Curtis, a future vice president of the United States, introduced it for the first time in October 1921. Although the ERA was introduced in every congressional session between 1921 and 1972, it almost never reached the floor of either the Senate or the House for a vote. Instead, it was usually blocked in committee; except in 1946, when it was defeated in the Senate by a vote of 38 to 35—not receiving the required two-thirds supermajority.
Post-World War II developments (1940s–1960s)
was correlated with a rise supporters of the ERA. Due to the war, many women had to take on untraditional roles at home and in the workforce. Protectionists were against the ERA because they believed women need to be treated differently than men, because they are biologically different. Women entered the workforce and proved they could handle working the same jobs as men, including joining the U.S. Armed Forces. Women were supporting their country, despite not being compensated or respected fairly. With the increased patriotism in the country people began to see the value of women being involved in their country. As the war continued, more opportunities for women to work opened up due to fewer men being available. The support for equality grew with this as women continued to prove their ability and willingness to work.Initial support from the Republican Party and the Hayden rider
The Republican Party included support of the ERA in its platform beginning in 1940, renewing the plank every four years until 1980. The main support base for the ERA until the late 1960s was among middle class Republican women, while some Southern Democrats also supported it.In 1950 and 1953, the ERA was passed by the Senate with a provision known as "the Hayden rider", introduced by Arizona senator Carl Hayden. The Hayden rider added a sentence to the ERA to keep special protections for women: "The provisions of this article shall not be construed to impair any rights, benefits, or exemptions now or hereafter conferred by law upon persons of the female sex." By allowing women to keep their existing and future special protections, it was expected that the ERA would be more appealing to its opponents. Though opponents were marginally more in favor of the ERA with the Hayden rider, supporters of the original ERA believed it negated the amendment's original purpose—causing the amendment not to be passed in the House.
ERA supporters were hopeful that the second term of President Dwight Eisenhower would advance their agenda. Eisenhower had publicly promised to "assure women everywhere in our land equality of rights," and in 1958, Eisenhower asked a joint session of Congress to pass the Equal Rights Amendment, the first president to show such a level of support for the amendment. However, the National Woman's Party found the amendment to be unacceptable and asked it to be withdrawn whenever the Hayden rider was added to the ERA.
Initial opposition from the New Deal Democrats
and most New Dealers opposed the ERA. They felt that ERA was designed for middle-class women, but that working-class women needed government protection. They also feared that the ERA would undercut the male-dominated labor unions that were a core component of the New Deal coalition. Most Northern Democrats, who aligned themselves with the anti-ERA labor unions, opposed the amendment.The ERA was also opposed by the American Federation of Labor and other labor unions, which feared the amendment would invalidate protective labor legislation for women. The League of Women Voters, formerly the National American Woman Suffrage Association, opposed the Equal Rights Amendment until 1972, fearing the loss of protective labor legislation.
At the 1944 Democratic National Convention, the Democrats made the divisive step of including the ERA in their platform, but this was a hotly contested change not reflected in later party platforms. At the Democratic National Convention in 1960, a proposal to endorse the ERA was rejected after it was opposed by groups including the American Civil Liberties Union, the AFL-CIO, labor unions such as the American Federation of Teachers, Americans for Democratic Action, the American Nurses Association, the Women's Division of the Methodist Church, and the National Councils of Jewish, Catholic, and Negro Women.
Between 1948 and 1970, chairman Emanuel Celler of the House Judiciary Committee refused to consider the ERA in the House of Representatives.