Remember the Equal Rights Amendment?

[Cleita]

Looks like it's time to bring it back to end sex discrimination. I think it could be extended to gay rights to marry as well as women's rights to seek medical treatment for their reproductive health. This lastest push from the powerful religious right against the rights of certain demographics of the population means that we need the protection of a Constitutional amendment or they will continue to erode any rights we have gained in the last 100 years.

http://www.equalrightsamendment.org/

The Equal Rights Amendment, first proposed in 1923, is still not part of the U.S. Constitution. The ERA has been ratified by 35 of the necessary 38 states. When three more states vote yes, the ERA might become the 28th Amendment. In these pages, find out about this historic amendment ... and join the effort to achieve equal rights for women and men.

We need to start pushing hard for this. It can be done. It will take the same dedication and determination that went into the Civil Rights movement of the sixties.

[Lorien]

1. Yes, and I still find it stunning and dismaying that we never ratified it

we are essentially still second class citizens.

[hoya86]

4. redundant

it was redundant - 14th amendment

[Lorien]

5. Incorrect

14th amendment
Section 2. Representatives shall be apportioned among the several States according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed. But when the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice President of the United States, Representatives in Congress, the Executive and Judicial officers of a State, or the members of the Legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such State, being twenty-one years of age, and citizens of the United States, or in any way abridged, except for participation in rebellion, or other crime, the basis of representation therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in such State.

[tonysam]

11. The women's suffrage amendment was needed

to overrule the 14th amendment regarding voting rights; there has never been a USSC ruling which says women are equal citizens to men. That's why the ERA came into being.

[yodermon]

2. synchronicity: i was *just* thinking about the ERA.

kick

[struggle4progress]

3. I can't believe this didn't pass thirty-some years ago, and it was tiresome to hear the idiotic

arguments trotted out against it, like If this passes, women will be forced to pee standing up

But :bounce: :bounce: :bounce: I'd love to jam it down the rightwing's throat any day we can

A list of the unratified states is here: http://www.equalrightsamendment.org/status.htm

[lukasahero]

8. Thanks for the link -

But it was something below the information about unratified states that caught my eye and choked me up:

"(3) Many do not know that a new Equal Rights Amendment was introduced on the floor of the Senate by Sen. Edward Kennedy the day after the initial ratification period had expired, or that it has been introduced in every Congress since 1982. The bills in Congress currently include one which would begin the entire ratification process over again, without a time limit."

He really was one of my heroes, my Senator. And we thought maybe his fervent hope and dream might be honored by finally passing a health care reform bill. He would be appalled by this turn of events.

[niyad]

6. a couple of days ago, I suggested that it was time to resurrect the National Women's Party--

and the first plank in my platform was ratification of ERA.

I was there for the whole battle--the lies, the distortions, the hatred. crossed swords with schlafly a number of times, too--what a piece of work SHE is.

one time, when she was whining that the ERA would require women in combat, I asked her why, if it was so awful for our daughters to go to war, it was so wonderful for our sons. she had no answer.

by the way, we are still fighting for it:

http://www.equalrightsamendment.org/

[Cleita]

9. And women are in combat. They always have been even before it was acknowledged.

They were the nurses in many wars and today they are in the midst of it in various capacities yet they are still second class citizens.

[niyad]

7. kick

[noiretextatique]

10. National Women's Party and the ERA are great ideas

that could energize the women's movement by attracting new generations of women :thumbsup:

[Odin2005]

12. I really can't beleive the ERA never passed.

My mom told me that there was loads of hysteria, people spewing BS about unisex bathrooms and similar crap.

[Cleita]

13. There was the other BS, which I believed actually derailed ERA and that

BS was there were already laws on the books guaranteeing women's rights so it would be redundant. Hoho! Now we see how easily those laws can be weakened or even reversed. This is just the beginning. We have to push back.

[BrklynLiberal]

14. Yep. 86 years of waiting is enough.