Equal Rights Amendment update and legal brief

Kati Hornung and Erica Benson discuss the legal status of the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) with Radio Active Magazine host Spencer Graves.  Kati is the Director of both VoteEquality.US and the VA Ratify ERA campaign that helped convince Virginia to ratify the ERA in 2020. And she was a lead organizer and participant of the January 27th rally to commemorate the second anniversary of the ERA obtaining the threshold of “three fourths of the several states”, per Article V of the US Constitution:  Virginia became the 38th state to ratify (three fourths of 50 = 37.5) on that date in 2020.  Erica is ERA Campaign Coordinator for Project 28 MO. She is also a leader in the Women’s Equality Coalition of Greater Kansas City.

Kati focuses especially on legal brief.  Erica discusses what concerned residents of the greater Kansas City bi-state metro area might do to build help overcome the obstacles and make the ERA part of the US Constitution.

VoteEquality.US notes that the US compares poorly with other countries.

• The constitutions of 168 countries includes gender equality.  The US constitution currently does not, unless the ERA officially becomes part of the US Constitution.
• In 2018, the United States was ranked as the 10th most dangerous country in the world for women.

Senate Joint Resolution 1 in the current US Senate is “A joint resolution removing the deadline for the ratification of the equal rights amendment.”  It has 51 co-sponsors including 47 Democrats, 2 Republicans, and 2 Independents.  That should be enough to pass it if it came to a vote.  It is currently stalled in the Senate Judiciary Committee, which is evenly split with 11 Democratic co-sponsors and 11 Republicans, who are NOT co-sponsors.  One of those Republicans is Senatory Hawley of Missouri.

This conversation updates an earlier discussion with Erica Benson on 2022-01-25.

Share This Episode