First I want to thank Carnacki on his diary about the objectification and sexism that women face in the world today. It was a thoughtful, well-expressed diary and was a welcome addition to the several insightful diaries that Steven D has written about women’s issues. It inspired me to get off my butt and write this diary which was triggered by a newspaper story I saw on Sunday.
The story by Rob Hotakainen, of McClatchy Newspapers, was about the reintroduction of the Equal Rights Amendment.
Wait a minute. The Equal Rights Amendment was reintroduced? How’d I miss that? Surely the MSM was all over that story – or not.
Well, it appears that I was not the only one unaware of this development. According to Sarah Rosenfeld Clark, writing in the Bay Area Business Woman , many people missed it.
I told my mom, who spent the bulk of her career initiating and managing programs to empower women and girls, that the ERA had been reintroduced in Congress. She said, “How come I didn’t hear about that?”
When I mentioned the ERA reintroduction to a member of my church who is active with the League of Women Voters, she said she “hadn’t seen anything about that.” My Mom lives in Boston and my church is in Oakland. Based on my quick personal survey, intelligent, politically-involved women from coast to coast are unaware that the ERA, now renamed the Women’s Equality Amendment, is back on the political landscape.
Imagine my surprise when my research led me to the information that the Equal Rights Amendment has been introduced every year since 1982!
On March 27, 2007, the newly renamed iteration was introduced with many co-sponsors by Carolyn Maloney (NY) in the House of Representatives and Edward Kennedy (MA) in the Senate.
The Amendment reads as follows:
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. This amendment shall take effect two years after the date of ratification.’.
That’s it in a nutshell. Who wouldn’t want to co-sponsor that? What Democrat wouldn’t want to co-sponsor it? What woman wouldn’t want to?
The answer apparently includes Democrats Claire McCaskill of Missouri (darling of the netroots), Mary Landrieu, of Louisiana, Blanche Lincoln, of Arkansas, and Amy Klobuchar, of Minnesota. Oh by the way, none of the five Republican women in the Senate are behind the legislation, either.
Apparently McCaskill isn’t against equality for women — she’s just not sure it is worth the fight.
The ERA — just because of the history of it, just in and of itself — is an incredibly divisive thing, and sometimes I’m not sure that the divisiveness is worth it.
McCaskill’s fearless rationale for not sponsoring the amendment (although she claims she would vote for it) is as follows:
It’s not that I’m against it. It’s not that I don’t support the concept, but frankly we’ve all seen how amending the Constitution doesn’t necessarily get America there. You know, we did a lot of changes to embrace African Americans in this country, and clearly putting it into law doesn’t make it happen.
As for our sporadically progressive Speaker of the House, whose name is not to be found among the sponsors, Nancy Pelosi had this to say:
Women want what men want: an equal opportunity to succeed. Yet in terms of policies to assist women, we are lagging behind. That is why I support the Women’s Equality Amendment. We are working hard to promote this legislation, but until we have significant support for it, we will not bring it to the floor. Nevertheless, I am hopeful that we can get it done.
Wow. That was truly inspired!
I mean seriously what the hell is going on? Why is this even debatable? Are we willing to allow this to be another pro forma ritual? Or are we going to insist that women have equal legal footing in the United States of America in the 21st century?
There is a lot of good information about the history of the ERA here. A list of states that previously ratified the amendment can be found here. And information about whether or not those ratifications may still be valid can be found here.
Whatever you do, don’t news google the abbreviation ERA – all you’ll get is baseball stats!
In 1972, I was in first grade. My mom was active in the League of Women Voters and bought me a green t-shirt which had the text of the amendment on it. It was super cute. At any rate, I had the text of that shirt memorized because so many other kids asked me about it. The big debate in the halls of an elementary school were whether it would mean we would have to use the same bathroom! :>)
It is hard to believe that 35 years later, we are still no closer to passing the amendment (and in fact may be further away) than we were back then. It should be a no-brainer.
Do you still have the shirt?
I’m getting tired of having to fight for things that are just, sensible and progressive.
Sadly, I don’t. I don’t remember much of my elementary school days, but I can still picture that shirt (and standing in the halls with our heads against the wall in case of nuclear attack). I used to wear it a lot and argued fiercely with my classmates about why we must pass the ERA.
I worked really hard to get the ERA passed in my state and having it pass is still the sweetest political victory I’ve ever celebrated. It really hurt when it didn’t get enough states to pass it but a lot of good came out of that effort — in preparation for the ERA, the state legislature changed or rescinded over 300 discriminatory laws and I’m sure that a lot of states did the same.
Thanks, Andi, for your work on this issue. It is hard to believe that the work that went into the passage of the ERA in the 1970s — the picketing, petioning, lobbying, hunger striking and civil disobedience — still came up short. But as you say the effort was not wasted — the laws in your state changed. I wonder if I’ll live long enough to see the passage of the constituational amendment.
I think another good thing is that the effort politicized a lot of women who weren’t very political before and even more importantly made them more concerned that their daughters were politically aware as well. I know we still have a long way to go in getting women to fully participate in the political process but I think we’d be even further away without that battle.
I was just starting high school. The only discussion I heard then was about the unisex bathrooms, and how we would be forced to use the same restroom as the men. I wonder what inane sound bite they’ll use this time.
As I recall the other threat opponents used was that women would be subject to the draft and would have to go into combat. Though the draft went away I don’t think the threat did.
Where does it say these people get to decide whether they are for or against equal rights for women?
Oh silly me, I am under the delusion that the question should be whether the people they are paid to represent are for justice or not.
Just remember if you want to write a Congressperson about this matter, be sure to address her/him as “The Honorable.”
Well, I’m not allowed to communicate with McCaskill, because I’m not a constituent, but as was pointed out the other day, that didn’t stop her from taking my donation.
Honorable, my ass.
McCaskill’s comment about “clearly putting it into law doesn’t make it happen” seems to me to be a creative restatement of Reagan’s stated justification for opposition to the ERA in the 1980 election: he wasn’t opposed to equality (riiight) but he wanted to see it enacted legislatively rather than constitutionally. Of course, ever since his election, we’ve had neither.
Slightly tangential here, though: if the ERA or whatever name you wish to call it were enacted, would that have changed the outcome of yesterday’s announced Supreme Court ruling? Not an attorney, but I have to think that since their justification was a strict interpretation of the civil rights law, it wouldn’t make much difference. Perhaps I’m wrong.
But, as important as this amendment is, it reminds us that we need to keep working at the legislative end as well.
That is a really interesting question? I’m not sure what the answer is. Theoretically, if the ERA was in effect there wouldn’t be any wage discrimination. Theoretically.
I’m not a lawyer but I worked for a civil rights agency many, many years ago and I’m pretty comfortable saying that the answer is ‘no’ because the case was about interpretation of legislation,, not about enforcement of a constitutional right (in the same way that the 15th amendment doesn’t stop lawsuits over the interpretation of the voting rights act).
Displaying an unerring consistency with yesterday’s Supreme Court decision. It remains unclear how a continuing pay “discrepancy” can be accomodated as an acceptable outcome.
Each pay period should give rise to an actionable claim, and not just the initial setting of salary.
Thanks, Boran2. That makes sense.
Well thanks a freaken bunch McCaskill and Pelosi for your ringing endorsement of equality for all. Sounds like you embody the saying ‘with friends like this who needs enemies’. If you can’t even say you’re a feminist how the hell are you going to fight for the rights of women and men? What is this, the Sally Field syndrome of being a congresswomen where you just want people to really really like you..good luck with that.
Too divisive eh, well then I guess that means you don’t want to talk about abortion or being pro-choice, to divisive or hey gay rights, sorry can’t talk about that, to divisive, how bout impeachment, well no I think thats a bit to divisive, well then how about the Trillion dollars the War Dept. can’t account for..guess that’s too divisive as no one is really talking about that, electric cars, nah, too divisive I bet..just why exactly did you people want to become Congresswomen anyway?
Well, I suppose its not ladylike to be divisive. Grrr.
Hi Kahli..that’s another term ‘ladylike’ that just tee’s me off..hey if you’re a women-your ladylike right. Ladylike is just a patriarchal code word for women who know their place and don’t make waves..heaven forbid if you’re not ‘ladylike’-and that’s the whole problem too that the MSM seems to have against Rosie O’donnel(besides her being gay)-she doesn’t fit their physical definition of ladylike and she has the audacity to speak her mind and have strong opinions. Grrrrrrrrrrr indeed.
Indeed. I never wanted to be a “lady” and I certainly never taught my 13 year old daughter to be a “lady”. I can’t believe that she gets told by teachers (young ones at that) that she should sit like a “lady” in effing 2007. Grrrr. I tell her to ignore them and sit however she is comfortable sitting and wear whatever she is comfortable wearing, etc. Crimany…when my kid’s supposed “role models” perpetuate antiquated ideas like being ladylike, how will we ever get equality!
It’s pretty damn sickening and depressing isn’t it Kamakhya how much of the inequal social structure and stereotyping is still in place, alive and going strong. Boys will be boys but girls have to be ladylike and have to be told/controlled as to even how we sit. Welcome to the 21st century.
One of my favorite bumper stickers is the one that say: Well-behaved women seldom make history.
Let’s do it!
Yes, indeed. Let’s do it. I noticed that neither of my senators nor my congresscritter is among the sponsors. I’m calling their offices tomorrow.
Shouldn’t there be something about DailyKos about this?
I supported and fought for it then, I’ll support and fight for it now, but why the heck is this still even an issue? Been singing this song for most of 40 years now, the tune is beginning to become stale.
You know that “quaint” statement “All men are created equal?” I have a hunch that the well off white, male, religious folk in power read that as literal as they do their bibles. How else can you explain that there is any question that equality covers EVERY PERSON, regardless of gender, race, station, or religious preference? That the inherent obviousness of that statement has to be fought over, defined, redefined, amended, clarified, codified, defended, and meticulously spelled out endlessly is so totally indefensible is just mind boggling.
And sometimes I am utterly ashamed of those of my gender who are so without principles and any form of inner strength that they not only are afraid to “stir the waters” but they will work against there being any true support of this basic freedom.
The more history I have here on this planet, the more I see that after brief forward movements on many important issues, the cycle then reverts to more controlling and stripping of rights. We seem to move in large 40 or 50 year cycles where we have to continually do again what was already done, to reinvigorate what was presumed to be alive and well before it dies all together. It is a strange and very tiring way to attempt to have on going progress.
So lovely to know that Pelosi won’t bring it to the floor, regardless, too scared of there not being enough votes, she says.
Guess I’m not a “pragmatist.” Geeze, anyone that knows anything about negotiations surely knows that you ask for 3 times what you actually want so you have room to bargain. You do not start with what you want and then give back, give back, give back until you have nothing resembling what you had hoped to gain.
Nothing here surprises me any more. So color me not surprised.
Thanks for another very good post, Kahli
Hugs
Shirl
That’s right shirl..that phrase has always always stuck in my craw…created equal my ass. I know I was told growing up that ‘men’ was used generically to denote all people(yeah sure)but we know that ain’t the truth. That phrase only conjures up pictures of men for me no matter what..if we used ‘all women are created equal’ I imagine men-some men-would scream bloody murder and say we were excluding them but hey I’m just using ‘women’ generically buddy to encompass men and women.
More specifically our founding fathers used all men only to denote white male landowners who could vote and that didn’t even include all white male landowners..if you were Catholic male/Quaker male/Jewish male and some other subgroups of male men you were also excluded from voting. I think this left about only 16% or so of men allowed to vote.
We are equal, there should be no and/if/but’s, no categories, no subgroups, no religious justifications, no divisions…which reminds me of another song..We are Family..all my brothers and sisters and me..It doesn’t say all my white sisters, or just my black brothers…I’ve been thinking about old songs a lot since you wrote that diary the other day Shirl. Could we maybe change our national anthem to something like Louie Armstrong’s ‘It’s a Wonderful World’..?
Back when I was in college, I read about a study in which a group of people read a standard textbook that used the male pronouns generically. They were then asked to pick pictures to go with the text. The pictures were equally male and female. I can’t remember the exact percentage, but by and large, the reader would choose a picture of a man over a woman.
I’ve noticed a growing trend to mix gender pronouns in a single work. I’m all for that trend!
The usage that I keep seeing is to use the feminine pronouns when the article is expected to appeal more to women, family issues, fashion, etc. The few times that I have seen both genders used in the same article, it seemed more distracting than anything.
We need a set of usable non-gender pronouns. Till then, I would rather stick with the traditional usage because other approaches usually come off as more insulting.
If you look at it the other way round, English has no pronoun that is exclusively male. She means a women, but He might mean a man, or it might mean a person.
When I’m reading any kind of nonfiction book and the use of the male generic is used I always try to substitute a neutral noun/pronoun. I’ve done this for years and it becomes easier all the time for that usage to sound normal. It also points up just how much in use the generic man/he is still used.
Funny you should mention that. I went back to school when I was 30-well to the two year college here and one of my classes had a pompous jackass who taught Philosophy. At the beginning of the class he handed out a syllabus and happened to make mention of the very fact that he was using the male pronouns throughout it but that this was generic. This happened to be in the early 80’s and I got it into my fevered brain(as he said he welcomed student input) to go through half of the syllabus and change all the male references to female pronouns. Stupid me.
So the next day after class I asked to speak to him, showed him what I had done and suggested in innocence this could be a great learning experience for the class-that he use female pronouns for half the semester generically…..hahahahahahahhaha Needless to say I was quickly and summarily put in my place by the old fool as his face turned red. He even went on to say the next day at the beginning of class-not mentioning me by name-that some student took offense and basically made fun of what that student had mentioned to him and tried to do..of course he said it was stupid and that was the end of that. He also basically said he was all for equality but………..
Our language is still littered with the minefield of exclusionary sexist language.
I love your idea for an anthem!
Thanks, it certainly beats ‘God bless American-and no one else’ or singing about bombs.
Thanks for your thanks, Shirl.