Women's+Rights

**1967** [|The National Organization for Women (NOW)], a recently founded feminist group, pledges to fight tirelessly for the ratification of the ERA. **1970** The ERA is approved without amendments by the U.S. House of Representatives in a vote of 354-24. [|The National Education Association]and the [|United Auto Workers] vote at their annual conventions to endorse the ERA. **1972**
 * **February:** Twenty NOW leaders disrupt hearings of the U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Constitutional Amendments, demanding the ERA be heard by the full Congress.
 * **May:** The Senate Subcommittee begins hearings on the ERA under Senator Birch Bayh.
 * **June:** The ERA finally leaves the House Judiciary Committee due to a discharge petition filed by Representative Martha Griffiths. **1971**

> The newly founded National Conference for Puerto Rican Women endorses the ERA, and the [|League of Women Voters] agrees to support it after years of opposition. Phyllis Schafly establishes the National Committee to Stop ERA. **1973-1975** The ERA wins a powerful ally when the [|AFL-CIO] votes to endorse it in 1973. **1975-1977** Pressure from anti-ERA, right-wing groups begins to surface in state legislatures. Indiana becomes the thirty-fifth state to ratify in 1977. NOW chapters in unratified states are succeeding in electing pro-ERA candidates. But instances of "turncoat voting" on the ERA are also surfacing. **1977:** At the first congressionally funded National Women's Conference in Houston, Texas, 2,000 delegates from every state call for ratification of the ERA. >
 * March 22:** The Equal Rights Amendment is approved by the full Senate without changes — 84-8. Senator Sam Ervin and Representative Emanuel Celler succeed in setting an arbitrary time limit of seven years for ratification.
 * **February**: NOW publicizes the ERA boycott of unratified states and gathers even more support for the Amendment. The number of pro-ERA groups grows to more that 450, representing more than 50 million Americans.
 * **March**: NOW seeks an extension of the deadline for ERA ratification with the argument that the Constitution imposes no time limit for ratification of amendments. Further, the seven year provision of ERA is not a part of the text of the amendment, but rather is only in the resolving clause. Congress has the power to establish and change the time limit.
 * **July 9**: Alice Paul, ERA author, dies at age 92
 * **October**: Representative Elizabeth Holtzman introduces a bill calling for an extension of the ERA deadline which had been March 22, 1979. **1978**
 * **February**: The NOW National Board declares a State of Emergency on the ERA. It pledges full resources to winning the deadline extension and to ongoing ratification campaigns.
 * **February-March**: Missouri files suit on antitrust grounds against NOW, claiming it violated the Sherman Antitrust Act by urging groups to boycott unratified states and hold conventions only in ratified states.
 * **July 9**: NOW organizes ERA Extension March of 100,000-plus supporters in Washington, D.C. This March for Equality is the largest in feminist history.
 * **August 15**: After intense lobbying by a united women's rights coalition, the U.S. House of Representatives approves the ERA deadline extension, 233-189.
 * **October 6**: The U.S. Senate joins the House and approves extension by a vote of 60-36. A new deadline of June 30, 1982 is set. **1979**
 * **January-June**: ERA opponents launch all-out attack by attempting to pass rescission bills in at least a dozen states. Rescission bills are defeated in 12 states.
 * **February**: Federal Judge Elmo Hunter rules in the ERA boycott case that NOW's activities are protected by the [|First Amendment] and do not violate antitrust laws. This decision is later upheld by the U.S. Court of Appeals. The Supreme Court in late 1980 declines to hear the case. The ERA Boycott is legal.
 * **May**: Legislators from Idaho, Arizona and Washington state file suit in federal court challenging the constitutionality of the ERA extension and seeking to validate a state's power to rescind a prior ratification. The case is assigned to Judge Marion Callister, who at the time the litigation began (and 6 months after) held a high office (Regional Representative) in the hierarchy of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, commonly known as the Mormon Church. The Church officially and actively opposes the ERA and the ERA extension and supports rescission. **1980**
 * **May**: NOW organizes 85,000 people to march in Chicago in support of Illinois ratifying the ERA.
 * **July**: During platform hearings, the Republican Party reverses its 40 year tradition of support for ERA. NOW organizes 12,000 to march in Detroit at the Republican Convention. The final Republican Platform officially takes no position on ERA, but candidate Ronald Reagan and newly elected right-wing party officials actively oppose the amendment.
 * **August**: The [|Democratic Party] reaffirms support for ERA and the ERA boycott. The Platform pledges to withhold campaign funds and assistance from presidential candidates who do not support ERA.
 * **November**: Exit polls on election day show that for the first time ever recorded, men and women vote quite differently in the race. AP/NBC News reports that men backed Reagan by a 56- 36% edge, but women split their votes 47-45%. Pollsters later indicate that for women, the issue of women's rights and ERA had a significant impact on their votes. By March 1981, leading pollsters are claiming "Ronald Reagan has a woman problem" on ERA.
 * Equal Rights Amendment
 * Section 1**
 * **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.
 * The Equal Rights Amendment was written in 1921 by suffragist Alice Paul. It has been introduced in Congress every session since [|1923]. It passed Congress in the above form in 1972, but was not ratified by the necessary thirty-eight states by the July 1982 deadline. It was ratified by thirty-five states.
 * **Section 3**. This amendment shall take effect two years after the date of ratification.
 * The Equal Rights Amendment was written in 1921 by suffragist Alice Paul. It has been introduced in Congress every session since [|1923]. It passed Congress in the above form in 1972, but was not ratified by the necessary thirty-eight states by the July 1982 deadline. It was ratified by thirty-five states.

Another page w/ brief some on ERA most the stuff is after our decades.... []

A page about Alice Paul the lady who drafted the ERA...

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