Why is AAUW of Arizona once again supporting the introduction of the ERA to the Arizona Legislature in 2019?
Prescott Public Policy Chair has written a draft editorial (click here for draft) that any member of AAUW can feel free to use to express her support for the ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment to the U.S. Constitution by the Arizona Legislature. The Bill failed last year when the chairman of the Senate Judiciary and the House Judiciary committees, which must vote to send any bill referred to them forward to a vote of the whole house, refused to submit the bills for consideration. Hence, no action was taken last year.
This year, the effort to pass the ERA began early and AAUW Public Policy Chairs met in Mesa in December of 2018,to write a legislative agenda that included support of ERA passage by the Arizona Legislature. The full Agenda
- Full funding for public education;
- Economic security for Arizona women and families through pay equity;
- Ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment;
- Improved access to health care; and
- Sexual harassment and assault prevention to fully realize the promise of Title IX.
To carry out this plan, the Public Policy Chairs have circulated the agenda to the membership of each branch, and the AAAUW Arizona Public Policy Chair have sent the agenda to the leadership of both parties in the legislature as well as to individual members of the legislature in her district. She asked all the Public Policy Chairs to write her own legislators and include the agenda for their attention. Reports are that most branches have carried out the request. Further, many branches have asked friends and family to contact legislators to support the agenda.
Prescott Branch has been especially active since the President of the Senate is Karen Fann of Prescott. Public Policy Chair Sue Marceau and others have asked for President Fann to refer the ratification bill to a friendly committee, but to date she has only sent it to the same committee as last year, the Judiciary committee led by Sen. Farnsworth, who opposes the bill.
We don’t know yet how the bill, sponsored by Rep. Pamela Powers Hannley, will fare in the House.
Therefore, we ask that the attached draft letter be used by supporters of the passage of the ERA to urge their own legislators to vote to make equal rights for women part of the U.S. Constitution.
We will continue our efforts to persuade the Arizona Legislature at Legislature Day 2019 on Feb. 26. Proceedings begin at 8:30 at the Capitol. Contact your Branch President for full information, or feel free to email the AAUW Public Policy Chair, Harriet Young at young.harriet3@gmail.com for information.
History of the ERA and Why AAUW of Arizona Supports It
The 1972 ERA was given a deadline by which time the necessary 38 states would be required to approve this amendment to the US Constitution, but it failed by three states to get the necessary votes. The women’s movement began an alternative plan to win the rights women seek on a case by case basis. This was expensive and time consuming.
Beginning in the mid 1990s, ERA proponents began an effort to win ratification of the ERA by the legislatures of states that did not ratify it between 1972 and 1982. These proponents claim that Congress can remove the ERA’s ratification deadline despite the deadline having expired, allowing the states again to ratify it. They also claim that the ratifications ERA previously received remain valid. Proponents of the three-state strategy have promoted ratification resolutions in the legislatures of most of the 15 states that never ratified the ERA before the time limit on its ratification expired.
On June 21, 2009, the National Organization for Women decided to support both efforts to obtain new ratifications and any strategy to submit a new ERA to the states for ratification. In 2013, the Library of Congress‘s Congressional Research Service issued a report saying that ratification deadlines are a political question.
ERA proponents claim that the Supreme Court’s decision in Coleman v. Miller gives Congress wide discretion in setting conditions for the ratification process. Recently, ERA Action has both led and brought renewed vigor to the movement by instituting what has become known as the “three state strategy”. It was in 2013 that ERA Action began to gain traction with this strategy through their coordination with Senate and House members not only to introduce legislation in both chambers to remove the ratification deadline, but also in gaining legislative sponsors. The Congressional Research Service then issued a report on the “three state strategy” on April 8, 2013 entitled “The Proposed Equal Rights Amendment: Contemporary Ratification Issues,” stating that the approach was viable.
In 2014, under the auspices of ERA Action and their coalition partners, both the Virginia and Illinois state senates voted to ratify the ERA; however, votes were blocked in both states’ House chambers. In the meantime, the ERA ratification movement continued with the resolution being introduced in 10 state legislatures. Then, on March 22, 2017, the Nevada legislature became the first state in 40 years to ratify the ERA, and Illinois began to see movement again as well.