“Some ideas are so absurd that only an intellectual could believe them.” – Paraphrase of Bertrand Russell, 1959, misattributed to George Orwell.
Today’s contestant for that would be Lisa Murkowski, who having nothing better to do in her last term in the US Senate has decided to dust off the mercifully dead Equal Rights Amendment and push for its passage a mere 40 years after the ratification deadline expired. But not to worry, Lisa is on the job! https://www.adn.com/opinions/national-opinions/2019/01/26/its-time-to-finally-pass-the-equal-rights-amendment/
I expect the corpse of the sadly departed Phyllis Schlafly is doing around 1,200 rpm by this time.
The original ERA was passed in 1972 with the appropriate 2/3 majority in both houses of congress. The legislation passed had the traditional 7-year deadline for ratification by ¾ of the states, or 38 states in all. By the deadline, 35 states had ratified the amendment. Four states had rescinded their ratification, leaving a total of 31 states.
Under pressure from organized feminists, the democrat congress under Jimmy Carter moved the goalposts on ratification, granting a 3-year extension of the deadline to 1982. Unlike the amendment legislation, the extension did not receive the 2/3 majority in either house of congress, which is an important point.
And just to make sure the situation was completely muddled, South Dakota passed legislation that would render its ratification null and void unless the amendment was ratified by the original 1979 deadline.
The ensuing court challenge found that congress had no power to extend the ratification deadline. The SCOTUS nimbly bypassed the need to render an opinion, noting that that the whole mess was moot because no other state had ratified the amendment 1979 – 1982.
There is a 1939 SCOTUS case concerning ratification of the 14th Amendment that determined that congress is the sole arbiter of whether an amendment is ratified or not. The current group of feminists dusted off this case in 2017 as their avenue to create the current push for ratification a mere 45 years after the fact.
They also point to this case as SCOTUS precedent making state ratification of constitutional amendments like the Hotel California, you can check out, but you can never ever leave. Problem with this viewpoint is that the ability of a state to rescind ratification before ratification by ¾ of state legislatures has never been tested by anyone.
The amendment was considered dead until the last few years, when a leftist push to get the last 3 states (never the last 8 states) to ratify it.
As it stands today, the pro ERA backers believe they can get Virginia with a democrat governor and razor thin Republican majorities in both houses of their legislature as the 38th state to ratify. Then the entire mess will get tossed into congress to determine if this was actually ratified or not. And nobody knows whether that act of congress will require a 2/3 majority or a simple plurality.
All in all, a big mess. One that Lisa is perfectly happy to inflict on us because women.
While I think the ERA will be a disaster, it would also open the door for some real Alinskyite action by men.
Over the last half century, radical feminists conducted their long march through cultural institutions, thoroughly feminizing them, and in doing so, turning the institutions into male-bashing places where anti-male bigotry is not only celebrated but also demanded and rewarded. I think they have a lot more to lose than to gain in pushing this.
When the new Law of the Land demands no discrimination based on sex, you end up with a weapon to completely deconstruct the Family Courts, public education (lot of male-hating there), and Academia, particularly the liberal arts, which today graduate 20 – 30% more women than men with degrees. What better demonstration of discrimination based on sex than that? Fathers would finally get a say on abortions, as treating them as sperm donors or walking wallets is by definition discrimination based on sex. And we haven’t even started with the multi-sex construct of the left, which allows you to identify as whatever you want to based on little more than the position of the sun, moon, stars and which side of bed you got out of that morning.
And this is the world that Lisa Murkowski wants to bring to Alaska because women? I defy Lisa and those who support her in this to point to a single venue in today’s United States where women have fewer rights than men. Generally the reverse is true. Pass this and we will true things up a bit. And she and her supporters won’t like it much at all. Will be fun to watch, though.
Be very careful what you are supporting, Lisa, as there are some victories too painful to embrace. If the ERA is so important, perhaps you ought to introduce legislation and see if you can get a 2/3 majority in congress before sending it out to the states once again. A lot of things have changed in this country since 1972.
Any other approach is little more than gaming the system, something we have come to despise out of the swamp; something you were sent to Washington to stop; something you forgot.
Alex Gimarc lives in Anchorage since retiring from the military in 1997. His interests include science and technology, environment, energy, economics, military affairs, fishing and disabilities policies. His weekly column “Interesting Items” is a summary of news stories with substantive Alaska-themed topics. He is a small business owner and Information Technology professional.
