Though women enjoy the same privileges as men under the 14^th Amendment to the United States Constitution, advocates seeking to downplay the natural differences between men and women continue to argue for an Equal Rights Amendment (ERA).  H. J. Res. 40, introduced by U.S. Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-New York) and titled, “Women’s Equality Amendment,” seeks to reinvigorate the harmful ERA effort to achieve radical gender neutrality.

• The ERA is redundant, considering that women already possess equal rights and protection under the 14^th Amendment and the Civil Rights Act of 1991.  The ERA is designed to advance a radical agenda aimed at dissolving the natural differences between men and women.  
  
  
• Passage of ERA opens the door to same-sex “marriage.”  In Maryland and Hawaii, states that have approved a state-level ERA, justices have ruled that prohibiting same-sex “marriage” violates the state ERA.  The Baltimore Circuit Court stated that, “The mere creation of a sex-based classification triggers application of the Equal Rights Amendment, under which distinctions drawn based on sex are suspect and subject to strict scrutiny.”  
  
  
• Federally funded abortions would become a reality under the ERA.  State courts (in states with a state ERA, such as New Mexico) have already shown a willingness to order that the state fund abortion-on-demand for women in Medicaid programs.  Thus, a federal ERA could funnel American tax dollars toward the destruction of human life.  
  
  
• Supreme Court decisions make it illegal to draft women into the military, noting commonsense differences between men and women and the inappropriateness of the draft for women.  The ERA would reverse this precedent and require the inclusion of women in the draft and in combat units. 
  
  
• The ERA would eliminate single-sex institutions.  Prisons, sororities and fraternities, single-sex schools, the Boy Scouts, Boys and Girl Clubs, and even sport programs would no longer be allowed to operate on the basis of gender.    
  
  
• Laws protecting women would be found unconstitutional under the ERA.  Laws that deal with statutory rape, rape and prostitution by nature distinguish between men and women.  Passage of the ERA would abolish the protections enjoyed by women under such laws.  
  
  
• In addition to the poisonous effect of an ERA, the very manner by which its supporters have pushed for the ERA is unprecedented.  Their questionable tactics raise serious legal questions.  The requisite number of states failed to ratify the ERA during the original designated period in the 1970s, and even if an ERA were to be approved during this session of Congress, the states would have to re-ratify it.   
  

For more information on the ERA, click here.