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Kimberly Simmons is a part-time associate professor at the University of Southern Maine. This column reflects her views and expertise and does not speak on behalf of the university. She is a member of the Maine chapter of the national Scholars Strategy Network, which brings together scholars across the country to address public challenges and their policy implications. Members’ columns appear in the BDN every other week.
One hundred years ago, Rep. Daniel R. Anthony Jr. introduced the Equal Rights Amendment to the United States Congress. This bill sparked contentious ongoing debate. What might change if we guarantee “equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex?” Why might some find this idea objectionable? Is this amendment necessary?
Alice Paul and Crystal Eastman, leaders of the National Women’s Party, penned the ERA in the wake of the Women’s Suffrage Movement. They saw voting rights as just one aspect of equality, and hoped the ERA would confer broader rights of citizenship to women. They lacked the political momentum to move the bill forward, but the idea seeded and passed to future generations.
The women’s liberation movement of the1960s revitalized the ERA (and opposition, too). Congress passed the ERA in 1972, but constitutional amendments must be ratified by three-quarters of the states (38 total). Maine was the 31st state to ratify, in 1974, led by Maine NOW. On June 30 1982, a deadline proposed by Congress, ratification was still three states short and the ERA was pronounced “dead.”
After the 2016 election, the ERA campaign again resurged. Ratification by Nevada (2017), Illinois (2018) and Virgina (2020) brought the ERA to the finish line. However, an argument about the legality of the congressional deadline remains unresolved, and enactment is far from guaranteed.
Only 15 percent of constitutions across the globe lack explicit protections for women’s rights; the United States is among them. The Global Gender Gap report ranks the U.S. 43rd out of 146 countries. We are 91st for women’s healthy life expectancy. We are one of six countries in the world without paid maternity leave and one of the most dangerous countries to be pregnant or give birth, especially for Black women.
U.S. women are 35 percent more likely to live in poverty than men. This year, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported alarming increases in teen experiences of gender based violence. Men occupy more than two-thirds of congressional seats federally and in state houses across the country. Advocates hope that the ERA would provide new legal tools to address these persistent and dangerous disparities.
States also have constitutions, and while they cannot restrict rights that are protected federally, they can expand them. Some states, like Wyoming, specifically prohibited discrimination on the basis of sex from the start. Others, like Nevada, quite recently amended their state constitutions to prohibit discrimination on the basis of almost all “protected classes.” According to the Brennan Center, 21 state constitutions fully protect equal rights on the basis of sex, and six offer a limited version.
Maine came close to enacting a state-level ERA in 1984. The Legislature referred the proposed amendment to voters, but it lost by more than 138,000 votes. State Rep. Lois Galgay Reckitt, a lifelong feminist and advocate for the ERA, re-introduced a state amendment in 2017, and every legislative session since. In 2023, Reckitt expanded the language to include all groups protected by the Maine Human Rights Act, but this spring the Legislature declined to move LD 1412 forward.
Recent Supreme Court decisions limiting abortion and LGBTQ civil rights have galvanized more interest in constitutional protections for all of us and a new generation of ERA activists and legislators are working alongside steadfast advocates, like Equal Rights Maine and members of the ERA Coalition. 100 years after the introduction of the ERA, Americans overwhelmingly value equality and the ERA. If we currently have the momentum to turn our shared values into policy remains a question. To learn more, see this resource guide.
