Democrats reintroduce the Equal Rights Amendment
Following up on the historic Women’s March turnout on Saturday, Democrats have decided to reintroduce the Equal Rights amendment.
According to the Baltimore Sun, “On Saturday, Ben Cardin joined Sen. Bob Menendez of New Jersey in reintroducing the amendment. Co-sponsoring were Sens. Cory Booker of New Jersey, Sherrod Brown of Ohio, Chris Coons of Delaware, Dianne Feinstein of California, Kirsten Gillibrand of New York and Ed Markey of Massachusetts in reintroducing the constitutional amendment first proposed in 1923. The 28th amendment would guarantee that ‘equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.‘”
In addition to reintroducing the Equal Rights Amendment, Democrats introduced legislation to extend the amount of time that states have to ratify the new Constitutional Amendment. Congress originally approved the amendment in 1972 and set a seven-year deadline for ratification.
The Equal Rights Amendment received ratification by 35 but fell short of the 38 state requirement to amend the Constitution.
Senator Cardin said of the Equal Rights Amendment, “America was built on the promise of equal rights. It’s long past time for us to recognize the equality of women in the foundational document of our nation.”
