Equal Rights Amendment North Carolina Alliance

It's Time to Write Women Into the Constitution!

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Audrey Muck

Thank you, Rosalynn Carter

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Rosalynn CarterWith her soft voice and steely will, Rosalynn Carter was an inspiration and a gentle goad to millions upon millions of girls and women around the world. When asked about events in her lifetime she most regretted, she said,

“My greatest disappointment in all the projects I worked on during the White House years was the failure of the Equal Rights Amendment to be ratified…Why all the controversy and why such difficulty in giving women the protection of the Constitution that should have been theirs long ago?”

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2023 Annual Meeting

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Equal Rights Amendment NC buttons

2023 ERA-NC Alliance Annual Meeting
Saturday, December 9
11 A.M. – Noon
Virtual meeting on Zoom

On behalf of the ERA-NC Alliance, we deeply thank you for your support of the ERA-NC Alliance.  We invite you to join us for the annual meeting on the status of the Equal Rights Amendment and Alliance activities in 2023, as well as elections of Directors for 2024-2025. [Read more…] about 2023 Annual Meeting

ACLU of NC joins the Alliance

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The ERA-NC Alliance is pleased to announce our latest lead organization partner, the ACLU of North Carolina!

Chantal Stevens, Executive Director of the ACLU of North CarolinaExecutive Director, Chantal Stevens, writes, “The ACLU of North Carolina is committed to equal rights for all, regardless of race, color, creed, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, age, disability, ancestry, or national origin. Joining with the Equal Rights Amendment NC Alliance is another way to affirm our commitment to advocating for gender equality and social justice. [Read more…] about ACLU of NC joins the Alliance

86-year perspective on the ERA

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Roberta MaddenAlliance co-founder and former president, Roberta Madden, wrote an excellent article for the new Carolina Public Press opinion blog, NC Talks, about her lifetime of advocacy for the Equal Rights Amendment.

“I often experienced sex discrimination in my experience of living in several different states over the past 86 years. In Louisiana, I couldn’t get a credit card in my own name, nor even a library card; and I was excluded from jury service. In Tennessee, I was paid 57%  of the wages earned by men for the same job. Despite some improvements in women’s status — we may now serve on juries, even get credit in our own names, and take home 83.7 cents for every dollar a man does — sex discrimination remains.  The recent reversal of women’s reproductive rights after decades of constitutional protection is a glaring example. Until the Equal Rights Amendment goes into the U.S. Constitution, women were not guaranteed equality under the law.”

Read the whole article here: 86-year perspective: Lingering sex discrimination and the need for equal rights amendment

 

NC Senators Vote Against ERA

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Really?
Tillis and Budd vote AGAINST equality for N.C. women

The question asked of our U.S. senators was simple: Should we vote to affirm that the Equal Rights Amendment is rightfully the 28th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution?

Yea, 51. Nay, 47. And two of those no votes were cast by our own Senators Thom Tillis and Ted Budd!

A whopping majority, 82% percent of Americans, believe the ERA should be law. And a recent Meredith College Poll specific to North Carolina found support for ERA has actually grown from 67.4 percent to 71.5 percent in the past five years. This pro-ERA conviction is true across party lines, in urban and rural settings, among men and women.

Do our senators actually believe in constitutional INequality as their votes suggest? The excuse for their non-support has been the arbitrary deadline included in the preamble to the ERA 51 years ago. It is a moot issue. Nowhere in our Constitution does it mention “deadlines.” This is a made-up, lazy excuse for denying women their fundamental and precious rights to full equality under the law.

We’re mad as hell. But the fight continues and a second vote is expected before this congressional session is over. We will skip over the demoralization we feel today and plot our campaign to turn our own senators into ERA supporters. When we fight and we’re right, we WIN.

WRITE, CALL OUR SENATORS AND TELL THEM HOW YOU FEEL!

See how all senators voted here:

https://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_votes/vote1181/vote_118_1_00099.htm

If you missed the Senate action, you can watch it for yourself on the ERA Coalition’s Facebook page. They also livestreamed the press conference they held afterwards, with excellent comments from Zakiya Thomas of the ERA Coalition, House Representatives Ayanna Pressley and Cori Bush, and Alyssa Milano.

Make Your Voice Heard

Please urge Tillis and Budd to support North Carolina women and SJR 4! 

Sen. Thom Tillis
113 Dirksen Senate Office Building
Washington D.C. 20510
(202) 224-6342
https://www.tillis.senate.gov

Sen. Ted Budd
B85 Russell Senate Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20510
(202) 224-3154
https://www.budd.senate.gov/contact/

UPDATE: U.S. Senate Vote at 12:30 p.m. Thursday

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The U.S. Senate IS set to affirm that the ERA is the 28th Amendment this Thursday

Floor speeches to begin at 6 p.m. TONIGHT on the Equal Rights Amendment’s rightful place in U.S. Constitution

It’s been:
• 175 years since the ERA was first proposed,
• 100 years since it was introduced in Congress,
• 50 years since Congress sent the Equal Rights Amendments to the states,
• 3 years since the final state necessary ratified,
• 1 year since the ERA went into effect.
And now finally. Finally.

The U.S. Senate votes Thursday to affirm that, yes, they agree that the Equal Rights Amendment is the enshrined 28th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. Be there for this historic moment.

The ERA Coalition will live-stream the Senate floor speeches on Wednesday and the vote and press conference on Thursday, so tune into the Coalition on Facebook, YouTube and Twitter to watch.

Times are estimates and subject to change based on Senate schedules:
• Wednesday, 6 p.m. ET — Speeches on the Senate floor
• Thursday, 12:30 p.m. ET — Vote on Senate Joint Resolution 4
• Thursday, 3 p.m. ET — Press conference

Make Your Voice Heard

Please urge Tillis and Budd to support Senate Joint Resolution 4! 

Sen. Thom Tillis
113 Dirksen Senate Office Building
Washington D.C. 20510
(202) 224-6342
https://www.tillis.senate.gov

Sen. Ted Budd
B85 Russell Senate Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20510
(202) 224-3154
https://www.budd.senate.gov/share-your-opinion/

Action Alert: Sign4ERA Petition

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This year marks the 100th anniversary of the year Alice Paul first introduced the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) in Seneca Falls seeking to codify the prohibition of sex-based discrimination in the United States Constitution. For a century lawmakers, activists and grassroots organizers have been fighting to pass the ERA and we have never been closer. While the ERA has fulfilled all Article Five requirements, the last hurdle is removing an arbitrary deadline placed upon its ratification when it successfully passed Congress in 1972.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer plans to bring the ERA up for a vote on the Senate floor this week.

A petition drive, Sign4ERA, just launched today to raise the groundswell of support we need to push the ERA over this last hurdle.

Sign the ERA Petition

Please sign the petition, and call in your friends and family to sign, too!

The more signatures, the better – it will show that equality of rights under the law is the will of the American people. The ERA is the most permanent protection possible, safe from the whims of anti-choice, anti-women, anti-equality courts and politicians. Only the ERA will provide the constitutional basis to stop the attacks on abortion and birth control. The ERA would enable passage of stronger laws for survivors of gender-based violence to hold their abusers accountable. And the ERA is essential for achieving economic equality for women.

In the days ahead we’ll keep you posted with progress reports, action alerts and other steps you can take to put the ERA in the Constitution. But right now:

Sign the ERA Petition

We don’t have a moment to lose. Now is the time we must count on each other. Now is the time to act.

Bills Introduced at NCGA to Ratify ERA

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ERA, that crazy notion of women’s equality,
is officially 100 years old 

Raleigh — Alice Paul and Crystal Eastman wrote the Equal Rights Amendment a century ago: “Equal rights, under the law, shall not be denied or abridged, by the United States or by any State on account of sex.”

The requisite 38 states have ratified the ERA but you will not find North Carolina on that list.

Yet.

Today, on International Women’s Day, Rep. Julie von Haefen and Sen. Natalie Murdock held a press conference announcing two new bills that will put North Carolina firmly on record as supporters of equal rights under the law for all its citizens.

Visit the ERA-NC Alliance YouTube channel or  Facebook page
to watch the press conference.

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Poll Shows NC Supports ERA!

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A brand-new Meredith Poll of North Carolinians shows the continuing and overwhelming support for equal protection under the law regardless of sex. The results were released on Monday, March 6. Meredith Poll Director, David McLennan, will be present at a press conference Wednesday, March 8, at the NC General Assembly to discuss the results and take questions from the press.

Visit the Meredith Poll website to read the full poll report. The press conference will be streamed live on the ERA-NC Alliance Facebook page.

Responses to the Poll show an increasing majority of North Carolina voters support the passage of the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA). The poll was conducted in partnership with ERA-NC Alliance.

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Press Release: New NC Ratification Bill

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For immediate release

ERA, that crazy notion of women’s equality,
is officially 100 years old 

Raleigh — Alice Paul and Crystal Eastman wrote the Equal Rights Amendment a century ago: “Equal rights, under the law, shall not be denied or abridged, by the United States or by any State on account of sex.”

The requisite 38 states have ratified the ERA but you will not find North Carolina on that list.

Yet.

At 10 a.m. on March 8, International Women’s Day, Rep. Julie von Haefen and Sen. Natalie Murdock will hold a press conference announcing two new bills that will put North Carolina firmly on record as supporters of equal rights under the law for all its citizens. The press conference will be held at the N.C. General Assembly, 16 W. Jones St., Raleigh.

Tens of millions of Americans have assumed that the land of “liberty and justice for all” naturally included women. It does not.

[Read more…] about Press Release: New NC Ratification Bill