What would the ERA mean for women today?

into motion. A century is enough. The proposed addition to the Constitution says, quote equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex. End quote. This one sentence, written all the way back in is that the heart of a national constitutional debate that may now finally be nearing its end. Virginia is for e

r A lovers a lot of great things. This is Zion, who, along with her mom, Lily Bernard, an artist and activist in l A, made this p s A a year ago to spread the word that Virginia could be the last state needed to ratify the e R A. She was just ten. The next great things to come out of Virginia is the Equal Rights Comming first approved by Congress back in nineteen seventy two when I was fifteen, the e r A has been dormant for the better part of four decades, just three state shy of ratification.

But now, thanks to the tireless work of e r A activists and a whole new generation of voices like Zions, the amendment achieved its goal on January. All those in favor of the resolution that the resolution passed a century after women secured their right to vote in the US, for Gino became today the crucial thirty eight state to ratify the two Equal Rights Amendment. The passage marked a historic moment for the e r A, which was written

eyest nine nays, forty one abstention zero. For the women of Virginia and the women of America, the resolution has finally So what does the passage of the e r A mean for the women of America and when will it actually take effect? Later we'll hear from playwright Heidi Shrek of the Tony nominated play what the Constitution means to me? But first we turned to Carol Jenkins, the co president and CEO of the e r A Coalition, doubt us answer my next question, does the e r

A actually have a shot this time? And why in do we still need it? We always think Ellis Paul a really courageous, smart, determined woman for giving women the right to vote. She was at the head of that. Alice Paul is a critical figure in the fight for women's equality. Born in New Jersey in eighteen five, Alice was ahead of her time. Her parents embraced gender equality

and education for women. She herself earned multiple degrees, including a law degree and a pH d. In the early twentieth century, she became one of the most vocal leaders of the suffrage movement, putting pressure on Congress and President Woodrow Wilson to give women the right to vote, which they finally did with the Nineteenth Amendment, passed in nineteen

nineteen and ratified in nineteen twenty. When she got that Nineteenth Amendment, she said, you know what, we need one more step, one more insurance for equality, and that was to amend the Constitution where the drafters deliberately left women out. It was Alice Paul her elf who wrote the very first version of the Equal Rights Amendment. The National Women's Party proposed it in nineteen twenty three and two Republican

senators introduced it to Congress. Year after year thanks to Alice, the e r A is introduced into every new session of Congress, but year after year it fails. From three to nineteen seventy two, that fifty year chunk, Alice Paul and her colleagues were always working for it. The groups would get small and they would get large. And when some of our colleagues met up with her in the nineteen seventies, apparently Alice Paul shouted out, there, the young

ones are here. They're going to take it on. Ye last year, women god year. But we just sat on dusty hills because we never helped. Also, I have been refused departments by landlords who not rank with women. I have been refused full participation in politics. Tomorrow is Women's Strike Day, the day that women are being asked to stop typing, stop selling, stop cleaning house, stop doing dishes, and start demanding equal rights with men, to demand that

women be given their rightful place. And the pages of the Ladies Home Journal, you do you mean by rightful place? It is a woman's magazine. It is a woman's magazine. And that's the ironic aspect of the whole problem women here. There is one woman above middle management, one token woman out of the four men who control this magazine. Women here make paltry salaries as secretaries. They're not promoted, they're

not given their rights. There's a lot of women that are really doing men's work, and I really do believe that they should have the equal rights on the equal pay that a man does receive. Now, thanks to the spirit of equality in the air, and to the work of many of my more of four sided sisters, I no longer accept the sciety's judgment that my group is

second class, So please stop fine. Second wave feminists of the nineteen sixties like Gloria Steinham and grassroots organizations like the National Organization for Women picked up where Alice left off, convincing political leaders in Congress to consider adding the e r A to the Constitution. By nineteen seventy, Congress began hearings, and in nineteen seventy two, the Equal Rights Amendment, with

support from President Nixon, sailed through. Tonight, after a forty nine years struggle, a constitutional amendment appears on the way, proclaiming once and for all that women have all the same rights as that. Other says there was just one hitch, a seven year time limit for ratification. This sort of wrinkle was put into the e r A that there would be a what they used to refer to as the deadline. We don't think of it as that that

has more of a concrete feeling to it. This was a time limit that was not even included in the amendment, so it's not what states voted on. Time limits are not required by the Constitution, but by the nineteen seventies, Congress was in the habit of setting these arbitrary deadlines for ratification. In fact, the eight amendments preceding the e r A from the through we're all given time limits,

and we're all ratified. After the e r A S passage, most Americans supported the amendment, but over time public enthusiasm waned thanks to a highly visible and highly coordinated e r A opposition campaign led by a conservative activist named Philish Laughly. How do you view the relationship of women and men? Is it equal? Women should not be equal to men. I think under our present system in the United States, women enjoy a very wonderful status. I think

it's better than equality. I think women would be sacrificing many of the good things they now have, and it would be taking a step downward to go for equality. Philish Laughly, who was herself a very accomplished woman, uh felt that women did not need to be that accomplished. She was afraid that they would lose things like alimony and you know, social security, and they would have to go to war, they would have to join the army. That would be same, say the picture that was painted

then as Armageddon. Slaughley's whole campaign hinged on the belief that the e r A would unravel traditional American values. In fact, her anti feminist, pro family crusade was one of the catalysts propelling an evangelical resurgence on the right that is still thriving today. And while there's no doubt Shlaughley helped stop the Equal Rights Amendment, Carol Jenkins says

she shouldn't get all the credit. I think it was more the businesses who understood that if they gave women equal rights and that would mean equal pay and equal consideration, they would have to stop charging women more for insurance and dry cleaning. To to disparate examples. One of the reasons that corporate America is so successful is that it's still generally pays its women less than it pays its meant. There was also a feeling amongst some progressive women that

maybe they didn't need the e r A anyway. We all, even the women, bought this notion of our being in the pipeline, which is the phrase that used to be used, don't worry about it. When we are in the pipeline and at a certain point they'll emerge and be totally equal. And we bought into that progress, you know, the first woman, this, the first woman that. And I think we got lulled into thinking that we were making extraordinary progress when in fact we were still only doing you know, one by one.

After the time limit expired in Democratic leaders continued to champion and reintroduced the amendment to Congress every year, but for decades, for most Americans, the fight for the e r A was a distant memory. But then in two thousand fourteen, a group of women led by women's rights lawyer and activists Jessica new Worth, formed the e r A Coalition. When we started, ere A had vanished from public consideration. Uh so many people thought it had already

been passed. Of course, how could we be a country without an Equal Rights Amendment? Uh? And others thought, oh, had been defeated years ago, and good thing. Uh. So when we came along, our job was to inform the public that no, it had not been ratified, even though Congress passed it in nineteen seventy two, and at that point five years ago, we still needed three states and

it seemed an impossibility. So some of what we were working on was starting all over again, which also seemed incredible, uh, knowing what it would take to start from the very beginning. Uh. And then suddenly, in two seventeen, Nevada, thanks to this magnificent state legislator Pat Spearman, ratified the Equal Rights Amendment. And we were all sitting in the office and looking at each other and saying, does that count? And our

lawyers said it counts. Then we began to look around to see what other states were that that this could happen in. Illinois just took it right up that s j r. A Four is adopted. Illinois is now the thirty seventh state to ratify the amendment. The night's vote was symbolic the country still needs one more state to

ratify it to make it federal law. And that last state, of course, would be Virginia, which means three states ratifying in three years, like a beautiful contagion of equality after no nine seven years, which raises the question why now we've gone through this period where we thought, oh, incremental progress will mean equality in our lifetime, and when I think a lot of women looked around and said, no, it's not going to happen in my lifetime or my

daughters are probably my granddaughters either that they will be faced with the same kinds of insane, you know, discriminatory tactics that have been used through my grandmother's lifetime. So I think there was that there was the Me Too movement. We of it full credit for an uproar the women's marches, you know, that kind of massive gathering. I think women have said that's it, that's enough, And it's only recently that people have begun to understand, hey, wait a minute,

there's something wrong with our constitution. It's the playbook by which this country lives, and women are not in it. And until you fix that, uh, you're not going to fix anything. Congress approved it in nineteen seventy two. By two thirds, so we have the thirty eight state. You know we are there. Coming up, we'll talk with playwright Heidi Shrek about what the Equal Rights Amendment means to her.

When I was fifteen years old, I would travel the country giving speeches about the Constitution at American Legion halls for prize money. Is this was a scheme invented by my mom to help me pay for college. That's playwright Heidi Shrek in two thousand nineteen, performing in her acclaimed Broadway show What the Constitution Means to Me. I was actually able to pay for my entire college education this way. Thank you, Thank you. It's it was thirty years ago

when it was a state school, but thank you. A few years ago, I was thinking about the Constitution for various reasons, and I thought it would be interesting to go back and see what my fifteen year old self loved so much about this document. Because I did. I loved it. I was a zealot. I was a true believer. The play is funny, poignant, and moving. Over the course of an hour and a half, Hiding manages to make this incredibly dry document incredibly warm, personal, and resident by

revisiting her fifteen year old self. She reveals just how complicated and problematic the Constitution is. What I would do is resurrect the speech and the contest based on what I remember about myself at fifty, which is why the

Equal Rights Amendment, or lack thereof, is so personal. What I wasn't able to put together at that time, I think was the way it had influenced my life and the life of my women ancestors, the sort of negative impact, um, that our laws had actually had on the lives of my mom, my grandma, my great grandma, um, my great great grandma. And I didn't sort of viscerally start to put that together until I began making the play. Um. So,

my mom is a feminist. She fought for the e r A. I remember I was eleven in two when it decided it couldn't be ratified when there weren't enough states to ratify. I remember were crying about it, not totally understanding that though, and then when I went to do the contest, I didn't sort of put together that This document I loved so much, it was part of the reason my mom was crying. And when I started to do research for the play. Uh, I began to

connect those things. So I have this long history of domestic violence in my family UM and sexual assault. And when I began to understand the ways our laws and this constitution had failed the women in my family and seen firsthand the effects that failure had had in my mom, who had to grow up in a violent and abusive household, I started to question the document more deeply and that it wasn't as inclusive as you might have originally thought. Yeah,

the protections weren't afforded to everyone. They weren't and are not afforded to everyone. And it says in the Fourteenth Amendment we all must be treated equally under the law, and I took that at face value, and I didn't understand that that that wasn't happening in practice. And not only was it not happening in practice, obviously not just for women, but for many groups of people, immigrants, indigenous peoples, all people of color in this country, especially black people.

I didn't understand that discrimination on the basis of sex was not actually prohibited by the document. So, you know, the Supreme Court came out and has established that um that the Fourteenth Amendment does not cover sex in the way it covers race, religion, and other protection protective groups. Real yeah, very famously said, Um, well, the Constitution does not require discrimination on the basis of sex, which is

nice of him to say. Uh, the issue is whether it prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex, and he said it does not prohibit it. And so there have been all these decisions that have been made that, from my perspective, have enshrined sexism in our laws. And I've also failed to overturn sexist laws. And it's clear that we need a constitutional amendment so that the courts have to be held accountable for overturning these laws or challenging

these laws. Heidi says there are several examples of court cases that have enshrined sexism into our laws, but there's one in particular that hit home for her. The case of Jessica Gonzalez now Jessica Lenihan versus the Town of Castle Rock, Colorado. You know the case of Jessica Lenahan, Jessica Gonzalez, who in two thousand five um took her case to the Supreme Court. Well, your argument on we're all four to the town of Castle Wrap versus Jessica Ganzals.

Mr Eastman, Mr Chief Justice, I may have pleased accord. What happened here is undeniably tragic. She had had a restraining order against her violent husband UM. He violated the restraining order, kidnapped their daughters. She contacted the police UM many times, nine times, I believe, went to the station twice in person. They laughed at her, told her she was being silly, refused to enforce the restraining order, and

her husband that night killed their daughters. She sued the police department for failing to protect them, for failing to uh enforce this restraining order, and in fact, Colorado had just passed a law that required police to enforce these restraining orders. UM. The police department appealed. The case went all the way to the Supreme Court, and the Supreme Court decided that the police department could not be held accountable,

even though there was a state law saying that they could. UM. And that is because we don't have an equal rights amendment. That's because there was nothing in the constitution that said that you could not discriminate on the basis of sex. They decided there was no way to hold the police accountable or to address this larger problem of police not listening to women when they're in these situations, refusing to

protect them. The Colorado Law had been enacted in order to like address this problem uh in police departments, which was like the They discovered like all over the country that police departments were failing to protect women in this way, and so the law was an attempt to rectify that, and the Supreme Court essentially killed the law. For me,

that story is very uh personal. I mean, I was researching the story of my family and trying to understand why my grandma Betty did not leave her violent husband. I was looking into what kind of laws would have protected my grandma if she had wanted to take her kids and run away. What does the constitution say, if anything, about women in my grandma's situation. And when I was trying to understand that, I found Jessica's story. I listened

to her case. Um, we've since become friends, and I I understood in a much deeper way why my grandma chose to stay. The fact is, and this is still true in this country, that the moment a woman decides to leave a relationship like that is the moment her life is in the most danger. And that's because we don't have laws that protect women in these situations. We don't have adequate laws. How would the A. R A

rectify that? Heidi? So, if we had an equal Rights Amendment, then the Supreme Court would have to say a. Scalia was unwilling to say that the Constitution of the United States prohibits to discrimination on the basis of sex, and what this police department was doing was discrimination on the basis of sex. They were not listening to a woman, they were dismissing her, they were calling her ridiculous. They they didn't have an understanding of what circumstances are like

for women in in violent relationships. Um. So, it would I think, in her case, have allowed the law to stand for one thing. Um And it would have provided a way for people to take action on a state level to say, like, let's let's address this problem of of sexism and police departments, Like let's address the fact that, um, these cases are often misunderstood and therefore bad policing happens. What's the difference between the Fourteenth Amendment and the Equal

Rights Amendment. Uh that's a wonderful question. Uh. So the fourteen Amendment says no state shall deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws. So that's fourteen Amendment, Section one class. The only reason I know that is because he has been trying to figure that out. Um so, so when that include women? Uh? Ideally? Yeah, And actually, you know, it's a really interesting clause too,

because it uses the word person. Uh, not citizen or man or man or, but citizen, which means also that if you are here as an undocumented immigrant, it's it would seem that the text is saying you almost you must also be treated equally under the law because of person, because of what you're a person, and other parts of the amendment used the word citizen. Um so, yes, so

that that is the argument people make. Uh, And I get the argument if you read the I mean, I think that's what I thought when I was fifteen too. If you read that amendment, it seems very clear, no person, I'm a person. You're a person. But that has not actually played out in the laws or in the decisions made by the Supreme Court. In addition, heidi to helping people like Jessica Lenahan. What other ways would the e

R A protect and ergo help women. Having that amendment in our constitution would go a long way towards supporting legal protections like across the board having to do with equal pay, having to do with UM, maternal mortality, and the health crisis for women in this country, having to do with paid parental leave UM obviously UM. Making sure that a woman's right to control over our own body, to the right to have an abortion, the right to

get birth control UM. It would strengthen all of those protections, either strengthen them or allow people to pass better laws UM to protect women in these situations. As you know the UM, we have the highest maternal mortality rate UM of any westernized nation UH, and it's going up. And having a constitutional amendment would allow us to have laws UH that could stick. It means you could pass a lot to try to address that problem and not then

eventually have it overturned by the Supreme Court. I also think it has the potential to change attitudes, because often laws happen before there's a real shift in public perception and attitudes. Absolutely, you saw that in the Civil rights movement. For example, we needed Brown versus Board of Education UH to end segregation in this country. Like if we had just waited for people to change their minds or for example, yes, I think that would have taken much longer to happen

than it did. When we come back Heidi Shrek and Carol Jenkins on what happens next with the e r A. Is this finally the era for the e r A. Just because it's been ratified by the necessary thirty eight states doesn't mean the fight is over. Once again, here's Carol Jenkins to help us understand what comes next. The first thing that will happen is that we will have

two years the waiting time before it's enacted. There will be legal cases, a really strong, vibrant legal life that the Equal Rights Amendment will have to tackle, you know, various things that have come up, like the time limit. Uh. The r A coalition has been working for years on on getting the time limit removed. We have the votes

in the House. We are also working in the Senate with Senator Ben Cardon and with Lisa Maurkowski, a Democrat and a Republican who both support the e r A and are working to remove that time limit in the Senate. But the time limit is just the beginning. While an overwhelming majority of Americans support the Equal Rights Amendment. Conservative opponents, worried mainly about the e r a s effect on abortion,

are already fighting. In fact, five states have voted to resent their ratification of the r A. Five states have tried to rescind. Our legal team tells us that it's not possible that you cannot have a subsequent body undo what a previous body has done. So legally, we think

we're safe there. But there are three states who have filed a lawsuit against the head librarian because it is the archivists job as a strange as it seems nothing personal, but that the head of librarian is the one who certifies ratifications of amendments, and so uh, they have filed a suit against the archivists, saying that he cannot assert

that Virginia is as a ratified state. But then a pro equality group filed a dueling suit, and then the Department of Justice weighed in, effectively siding with conservative states, saying the archivists can't verify the amendment because the time limit had passed. I know, stay with me, people. All of which is to say, the next steps for the e r A are complicated, legally, fraught, and will likely go all the way up to the Supreme Court, but

supporters say they're ready. We have colleagues who have been waiting for that Supreme Court hearing for years and then and are ready to to engage in that. So ultimately we will win this because the women of America deserve equality and this is the way to get it. When Heidi and I talked about the laundry list of continued hurdles the e r A now faces, she was also optimistic that the amendment would ultimately be a part of the constitution she loved so much. Clearly, there's great political

will behind it. There have been various polls taken and the amount of Americans who support and Equal Rights Amendment is always in the like or higher. And frankly, if we had to start over, I think we could do it. I imagine that, like every state now could take up the mantle and try to pass it again if that's what we needed to do. But I think that, like the there's there's momentum. I feel like we're at in a moment in our country's history when we understand that

things have to change. Uh well on so in so many ways, but we understand that um, that things have to change for for women culturally and legally in this country. That it's time. You're pregnant with twins this spring, which is so exciting. So do you feel an even greater sense of urgency to usher in some of these changes that many women have been waiting for for so long? H Yes, I do, I do. I UM, so I'm pregnant with girls, and uh, I do feel I do. I mean I felt a sense of urgency already. But

I really want them. I really want them to be born into a world or to grow up in a world in which, um, they know they are valued by their country, by the legal system, by the culture. UM. I want them to be able to open a constitution and look and see that there protected there um. And I want actually I sort of feel out on both sides. I want my mom to see that before she dies, and I want my girls to grow up in a

world in which that's true. And I think I think that's the other thing about the Amendment is like simply on a symbolic level, it's really important, Like it's crucial that a girl or woman, or mother or grandmother or a person could look in this document and say I'm represented here. Um, yeah, that's what I want. Meanwhile, what is Carol Jenkins want to see? I wish as Paul we're here. I'm giving her a heavenly hug. Thank you for starting this rolling, Shirley Chisholm, and all of the

people who worked on this endlessly. Uh and you know, I'm hoping that we'll be able to celebrate a final, final victory for for them as well as for every girl in America. And that does it for this week's episode. Thanks so much everyone for listening. We hope they've provided you with some information and context to help you better understand the e r A and the constitutional fight for equality.

There's gonna be an awful lot happening around the e r A in the coming months, maybe even years, but I hope we can ultimately see those twenty four words make their way into the two hundred and thirty three year old piece of parchment that's the foundation of our democracy.

As Alex P. Keaton once said, you say you are A I say y e s. But for now, keep up with Next Question second season by subscribing on Apple Podcast, the I Heart Radio app, or wherever you get your favorite shows and we hope we're one of them, and if you're looking for more context on the day's biggest headlines, subscribe to our daily morning newsletter, wake Up Call, at Katie Currek dot com. You can also follow me, of course, on your go to social media feed. Until Next Time

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