The Equal Rights Amendment may finally be ratified

Congress held a hearing on the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) on Tuesday, the first in 36 years. The development comes amidst a renewed effort on the part of state and federal Democratic legislators to push for the amendment’s ratification.

“I hope you’re ready now," actress Patricia Arquette told lawmakers as she testified in front of the House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties. "Because women have been waiting 232 years for equality in this country and it's failed them ... but we’re done waiting.”

The ERA is a proposed amendment to the U.S. Constitution, designed to ensure that all American citizens have equal protection under the law, regardless of sex. The amendment was first introduced in Congress in 1921 but did not even reach the floor of the House or the Senate for a vote. It was reintroduced to Congress in 1971 by U.S. Representative Martha Griffiths (D-Michigan) and was approved by both the Senate and the House the subsequent year. From there, the ERA moved to the state legislatures for ratification. When the deadline set by Congress arrived, only 35 states had voted to ratify the amendment – three states short of what the U.S. Constitution requires.

The amendment languished in Congress for decades until 2017. Just months after President Donald Trump was sworn into office, and on the heels of sustained growth in feminist activism, Congresswoman Jackie Speier (D-CA) put forward a measure to remove the long-expired ratification deadline set by Congress in the 1970s. Nevada lawmakers voted to ratify the amendment in March of the same year and in May 2018, Illinois followed suit by voting to ratify the ERA.

Democrats organized Tuesday’s hearing in response to these developments. Actors, advocates and legal scholars urged the subcommittee to approve Congresswoman Speier’s measure. At the hearing, opponents argued that time had run out to ratify the amendment. Republicans also expressed concern that the ERA would serve the interests of pro-choice activists. “[T]he people’s right to protect the unborn would be eliminated if the ERA were to pass,” said Rep. Mike Johnson (R-La.), the ranking member of the subcommittee.

ERA proponents staunchly denied Johnson’s claims, arguing that they had no basis in fact. Constitutional law expert Kathleen Sullivan also told the Representatives at the hearing that the Constitution provides a clear process for the ratification of new amendments, and that process does not outline specific time frames. As such, Congress could simply opt to lift the deadlines it had imposed in the past, which would leave the country only one state short of ratification.

If Speier’s measure is not approved, the entire process of ERA ratification would have to start over, beginning with the passage of the law through the Senate and the House. The current make-up of the Senate would make passage of the ERA all but impossible.

At a press conference following the hearing, actress Alyssa Milano expressed strong support for the ERA. “Not ‘We the men,’” she said. “Say it with me: We the people.”