A recent poll shows that 73 percent of Americans favor the Equal Rights Amendment. Why, then, is Nebraska joining a handful of states seeking to stop Congress from acting on it? Could it be politics?
Constitutional amendments must be ratified by three-quarters of the 50 states, or 38. But the ERA’s future is uncertain, in part because the ratification deadline set by Congress expired so long ago.
Nebraska Attorney General Doug Peterson said there's been a movement to get states that had not previously ratified the ERA to reconsider their prior decision in spite of the expiration of the time limit.
In their lawsuit against the archivist of the United States, Nevada, Illinois and Virginia seek to ratify the 1972 ERA, concluding the time limit issued by Congress was not enforceable, and that states like Nebraska that rescinded their ratification vote (in 1973) should still be counted as supporting it.
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Peterson noted that a prior U.S. Supreme Court decision held that once the time period expired, the ERA had become moot. He said Nebraska intervened in the lawsuit because the case asks the court to ignore Nebraska's rescission.
"As attorney general, I cannot allow the formal action taken by the Nebraska Unicameral to rescind its prior ERA vote to be ignored," Peterson said. "Therefore, intervening on the matter was necessary. This is consistent with my oath of office."
Lincoln Sen. Patty Pansing Brooks, a Democrat in the officially nonpartisan Legislature, told her colleagues during floor debate she was more than aggravated and disturbed that state dollars are being spent on the lawsuit. "Of all the messages for Nebraska to send," Pansing Brooks said, "'We do not want to protect women. We do not want to give women equal rights.”
The five states — Nebraska, Tennessee, Alabama, Louisiana and South Dakota — filed a motion last month to intervene in a lawsuit filed by Virginia, Nevada and Illinois. All five intervenors rescinded their approvals of the ERA amendment before a congressionally mandated ratification deadline more than 40 years ago. Virginia recently became the 38th state to ratify the measure, designed to guarantee women the same legal rights as men.
The ERA says, “Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.”
A recent poll conducted by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research shows that 73 percent of Americans support the gender equality amendment, which is now before Congress following Virginia’s ratification in January. Only 4 percent of the 1,353 individuals polled were in opposition with 22 percent neutral. The margin of error was 3.6 percent plus or minus.
The poll indicated that 89 percent of Democrats favor the ERA with only 61 percent of Republicans in favor. Of those Democrats, one percent was in opposition and 10 percent were neutral. Republicans were 9 percent in opposition and 30 percent neither. Seventy six percent of women and 70 percent of men favor it. There’s the politics. The ERA also faces opposition from conservative activists who see it as endangering their positions on abortion and transgender rights.
Pansing Brooks does not like the message Nebraska’s intervention sends to the rest of the country when the state is trying to get people to move here, notably its rural areas, to allow businesses to grow and thrive. Nebraska was one of the first states to ratify it in 1972. She called the change of direction shocking.
In their argument to stop the ratification process, the states argue the ERA could put enacted laws at risk, such as those to prohibit expenditure of public funds on abortion, restrictions on abortion, regulations that protect women's health or rules that bar boys from playing on girls' sports teams.
It could force states to spend massive amounts of time and money to defend or change laws, they said.
Pansing Brooks said the states don't know that this would affect any of their laws, but just in case, they are going to take a stand against economic development and bringing businesses to the state, she said.
"We need all people," she said. "Quit discriminating.”
Agreed. Let’s make something work for the good of every Nebraskan.
J.L. Schmidt has been covering Nebraska government and politics since 1979. He has been a registered Independent for 20 years.
