Now, my read of the Constitution tells me that the Equal Rights Amendment is redundant. Remember, I think that the equal protection and due process clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment do all the work. Of course women are entitled to equality under the law. Of courst that includes employment rights, health and safety protections, and the economic right to equal pay for equal work. Of course women have the substantitive right to control their own bodies, including their reproductive system, and to access medical care.
I support the ERA, because sometimes you have to really dumb things down for men to get it. But if you ask me, the Equal Rights Amendment was ratified in 1868 and the problem is that white guys have spent the last 150 years trying to undo it.
If you don’t agree with me—if you don’t think that the Fourteenth Amendment provided for the full political, civil, and social equality of women—then how in hell are you against the ERA? How can you possibly think that women don’t already have equal rights because of your limited, originalist interpretation of the Constitution, but also don’t think the Constitution should be changed to right this clear wrong that your interpretation has created?
Unless, at core, you don’t think women should have equal rights at all.
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