Help Pass the Equal Rights Amendment!

Most people are familiar with the Equal Rights Amendment (commonly known as the ERA), which is intended to guarantee equal rights under the law for Americans regardless of sex. These are rights that all of us take for granted -- so it can be surprising to learn that the ERA has never been passed into law.

Even though the ERA has been introduced in every session of Congress between 1923 and 1970, it has never been ratified by the 38 states needed to add the amendment to the Constitution.

Congresswoman Carolyn B. Maloney (NY) seeks to change that. Earlier this year, she and Sen. Edward Kennedy (MA) presented the Equal Rights Amendment to the Senate with the hopes of finally seeing it ratified. We asked Rep. Maloney about her role in getting this legislation finally passed, why she feels it is of vital importance to do so, and what you can do to help.

Why is getting the ERA passed important to you personally?

Women have certainly made significant strides since I was a young woman, but there is still so much more we can do. Unfortunately, I’ve experienced gender discrimination firsthand, and I’ve dedicated much of my political career to ensuring that my daughters, and future generations of women, never do.

Judges and elected officials come and go, but the Constitution remains. We cannot continue to rely on a patchwork of legislation to protect and defend our rights. With the ERA in the Constitution, it would be clear that our society, for all time, rejects acts of gender discrimination and supports equality of rights for both men and women.

What changes have you proposed in the ratification process in the ERA bill you and Sen. Kennedy introduced into Congress this year?

The text of our amendment is very straightforward:

Section 1. Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.

Section 2. The Congress shall have the power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.

Section 3. The amendment shall take effect two years after the date of ratification.

What kind of support are you receiving in and out of Congress for this bill, and approximately how many sponsors do you have for it now?

I’m pleased to report that we’re receiving a lot of support for the bill. In the House, we now have 195 co-sponsors.

What do you think will be accomplished by having the ERA added to the Constitution? Would you view its ratification as a symbolic victory or something more?

Women have advanced a great deal since the ERA was first introduced into Congress in 1923 and even further since the Declaration of Sentiments stating that “all men and women are created equal” was written at the first Women's Rights Convention in Seneca Falls, New York in 1848.

However, the obstacles to full equality are still substantial and serious. Women continue to earn less than men, earning 77 cents for every dollar that men earned in 2002, according to U.S. Census data. Women continue to be under-represented in many powerful and high-paying fields. Women constitute 47% of the labor force in the U.S. but head only six Fortune 500 companies. And the U.S. ranks 60th in the world in terms of female political representation with women making up only 14% of the legislators in the House of Representatives and Senate.

Many critics suggest there is no longer a need to amend the Constitution to protect women's rights because the 14th Amendment protects women's rights. The fact is that the 14th Amendment was not applied to sex discrimination until 1971 and since then, the 14th amendment Equal Protection Clause has never been interpreted to grant equal rights on the basis of sex in the same way that the ERA would. The ERA would force judges to review cases of sex discrimination with a keener eye than they do now under the 14th Amendment.

Seven out of ten Americans think the Constitution makes it clear that men and women are entitled to equal rights. Unfortunately, they’re wrong. The ERA never became law. Fortunately for the nine out of ten Americans who believe that the Constitution should state that men and women are entitled to equal rights, the effort to gain Constitutional equality for men and women is still ongoing.

But it's not enough for most Americans to say they support equal rights -- it needs to be made into law as a bedrock of our society so that public sentiment is reflected in reality.

Is there anything that college women can do to spread the message and get involved in getting the Equal Rights Amendment finally ratified?

Absolutely – working together we can spark the kind of grassroots movement needed to ratify this amendment and finally codify equal rights for women in our Constitution. For starters, college women can spread the word – to friends, professors, mothers and grandmothers. Talk to them about the ERA, inform them it’s been reintroduced, and explain why it’s about time women had their equal rights recognized in the Constitution. I would also encourage young women to pen a column in their college newspaper about the ERA, or write letters to the editor in their local papers.

The sky’s really the limit – if any of your readers have ideas about how we can reach out to college women and get them excited about the ERA, I would love to hear them. People can go to my website, www.maloney.house.gov, to send me an email.

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