WEBVTT - Why is the Equal Rights Amendment still not ratified? 0:00:01.480 --> 0:00:04.280 Welcome to Stuff you Should Know, a production of I 0:00:04.360 --> 0:00:13.480 Heart Radio. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, 0:00:13.560 --> 0:00:15.960 and there's Charles to be Chuck Brian over there, and 0:00:16.040 --> 0:00:20.520 Jerry's over there. The three amigos equal in every single way, 0:00:20.520 --> 0:00:23.799 shape and form. Uh. And that makes this, of course 0:00:23.800 --> 0:00:27.280 stuff you should know, which is basically its own sovereign 0:00:27.360 --> 0:00:32.920 nation of equality. M yeah, oh yeah, man, come on 0:00:33.200 --> 0:00:36.680 me thought Jerry had more power than we did. Nope, 0:00:36.920 --> 0:00:43.040 not a drop more nor drop less. Nary you drop less? Charles, Yeah, 0:00:43.080 --> 0:00:44.640 I do too. It's a nice place to be, It's 0:00:44.680 --> 0:00:47.960 a nice state to live in, you know, mentally and 0:00:48.159 --> 0:00:52.360 physically agreed. I think here at the beginning, we're gonna 0:00:52.400 --> 0:00:55.080 do a rare We're not gonna read a listener mail, 0:00:55.240 --> 0:01:00.520 but a rare front loaded listener mail alert. We got 0:01:01.320 --> 0:01:03.800 um first of all. A couple of years ago, a 0:01:03.840 --> 0:01:08.320 woman named Graine Bailey suggested the topic of the Equal 0:01:08.400 --> 0:01:11.880 Rights Amendment uh, and at the time pointed out the 0:01:11.920 --> 0:01:16.640 difference between the words suffragette and suffragist. I clearly did 0:01:16.640 --> 0:01:18.880 not read that email close enough, because it took an 0:01:18.880 --> 0:01:23.840 email last week after one of us said suffragette in 0:01:23.920 --> 0:01:27.680 a in a recent episode. Uh, and a woman named 0:01:27.760 --> 0:01:31.919 Mary malan Oscars emailed and said, hey, by the way, 0:01:32.760 --> 0:01:34.840 look it up. I mean she wasn't mean, she was 0:01:34.920 --> 0:01:38.640 very nice. That sounded like I was being not too nice. 0:01:38.760 --> 0:01:40.840 She's very nice about it. She said, you know, look 0:01:40.840 --> 0:01:44.600 it up. There's a suffragette is sort of a disparaging 0:01:44.760 --> 0:01:49.480 term rather than suffragist, and it was tagged by you know, 0:01:49.600 --> 0:01:53.400 reporters in the early nineteen hundreds a thing and I 0:01:53.440 --> 0:01:56.920 think in Britain to mock people fighting for the women's 0:01:57.000 --> 0:01:59.840 right to vote. And I didn't know that until then. 0:02:00.280 --> 0:02:03.040 I'm glad to know, so thank you Mary. Once you 0:02:03.080 --> 0:02:06.000 hear that, it's it makes total sense, you know. Well, 0:02:06.040 --> 0:02:07.920 of course, I just I don't know. I never knew that. 0:02:07.960 --> 0:02:10.040 I never thought about it. I didn't either. This is 0:02:10.080 --> 0:02:12.560 how people learn stuff. I just assumed you were making 0:02:12.560 --> 0:02:15.200 a Bowie reference in the episode. I thought it was 0:02:15.240 --> 0:02:17.880 you that said I'm pretty sure with you, all right, 0:02:18.000 --> 0:02:23.280 Well either way, let's go with you. Okay, okay, we 0:02:23.360 --> 0:02:26.200 probably both did, or more more to the point, probably 0:02:26.320 --> 0:02:28.080 was me. But either way, that was a I think, 0:02:28.360 --> 0:02:30.560 hats off to you, buddy, for for coming up with 0:02:30.600 --> 0:02:35.040 that one. Well, I'll not say it again. You know what, Oh, 0:02:35.120 --> 0:02:37.360 you won't say it anymore? No, of course not. Okay, 0:02:37.360 --> 0:02:39.160 I thought you said, well, and i'll say it again. 0:02:39.240 --> 0:02:43.120 I think that's the opposite of what you were just saying, No, 0:02:43.560 --> 0:02:49.160 I won't. So we're talking today about the Equal Rights Amendment, which, 0:02:49.440 --> 0:02:56.560 um is it represents a really like discouragingly long swath 0:02:56.840 --> 0:03:01.240 of American history. Um. But if you set if you 0:03:01.280 --> 0:03:03.440 look at the whole thing just from a historian's eye 0:03:03.480 --> 0:03:07.480 or even an anthropologist side, it's really really interesting the 0:03:07.560 --> 0:03:10.680 history of this, the Equal Rights Amendment. If you kind 0:03:10.680 --> 0:03:16.040 of look at it much more subjectively and empathetic, empathically, empathetically, 0:03:16.800 --> 0:03:20.960 it's a lot harder to swallow, but it's still interesting. Nonetheless, 0:03:21.360 --> 0:03:25.679 And the yeah, so the Equal Rights Amendment is a 0:03:26.520 --> 0:03:30.760 constitutional amendment, a proposed constitutional amendment that would give women, 0:03:31.480 --> 0:03:35.640 um equal protection under the law to men that you 0:03:35.680 --> 0:03:39.160 could not discriminate you, No, you couldn't make a law 0:03:39.200 --> 0:03:42.600 that discriminated on the basis of sex. And I'll bet 0:03:42.640 --> 0:03:45.040 there's a lot of people out there chuck that say, well, 0:03:45.160 --> 0:03:48.360 that's already in the constitution, isn't it. Because there was 0:03:48.360 --> 0:03:52.320 a poll that the AP conducted into they found that 0:03:52.400 --> 0:03:57.520 about the people they they contacted thought that there was 0:03:57.560 --> 0:04:01.760 already equal protection for for women in the constitution. That's 0:04:01.800 --> 0:04:06.280 just not the case. But the same poll found of 0:04:06.360 --> 0:04:10.480 those respondents were in favor of enshrining that protection in 0:04:10.520 --> 0:04:13.200 the Constitution. So it's kind of weird that it's not 0:04:13.360 --> 0:04:16.000 in there. If people think it's already in there, and 0:04:16.040 --> 0:04:18.080 then when they find out it's not, they're in favor 0:04:18.160 --> 0:04:21.680 of it overwhelmingly. Yeah, and been we you know, we 0:04:21.760 --> 0:04:25.240 just happen to live in a country where pent of 0:04:25.320 --> 0:04:28.040 the American public could be in favor of certain legislation 0:04:28.839 --> 0:04:31.320 and it would you know, could very possibly fall on 0:04:31.360 --> 0:04:34.680 deaf ears when it comes to our politicians. Yeah, yes, 0:04:35.360 --> 0:04:39.080 because bipartisan support has been defined in recent times as 0:04:39.560 --> 0:04:43.520 you know, what the Houses of Congress agree to, not 0:04:43.680 --> 0:04:47.600 necessarily what the public agrees to, which is a different 0:04:47.760 --> 0:04:50.359 form of bipartisanship. And to me, if you ask me, 0:04:50.400 --> 0:04:53.280 the more important one, like if the if the public 0:04:53.360 --> 0:04:57.279 generally agrees on something, go with that. It seems like 0:04:57.320 --> 0:05:01.040 since they're elected representatives in on Christ they should kind 0:05:01.040 --> 0:05:04.920 of go with that. So h yes, I can't wait. 0:05:04.960 --> 0:05:06.520 It's gonna be there's gonna be a lot of big 0:05:06.600 --> 0:05:10.320 changes around here, everybody. Yes, it should we kind of 0:05:10.360 --> 0:05:13.640 go back to the beginnings. Yes we should, because it's 0:05:13.839 --> 0:05:15.479 you know, I associate the e r A with the 0:05:15.520 --> 0:05:17.960 seventies and the Ways Live movement, as we'll see. But 0:05:18.000 --> 0:05:21.080 it goes back a lot further than that. Yeah, it does. 0:05:21.160 --> 0:05:23.120 And it's it's crazy to think that since the early 0:05:23.200 --> 0:05:25.800 nineteen twenties they've been trying to get this enshrined in 0:05:25.839 --> 0:05:29.640 the constitution and it still isn't in the year one. 0:05:29.680 --> 0:05:32.599 But that is the case. Um. The first versions of 0:05:32.640 --> 0:05:35.320 the Equal Rights Amendment were written up in the early 0:05:35.320 --> 0:05:39.719 twenties by a suffragist UH named Alice Paul. Um. Some 0:05:39.800 --> 0:05:43.320 other women, notably one Crystal Eastman, also helped out a lot, 0:05:44.200 --> 0:05:47.200 and they also helped get the Nineteenth Amendment pass, which 0:05:47.240 --> 0:05:50.400 gave women the right to vote UH in nineteen twenty 0:05:50.480 --> 0:05:53.599 and they got together and said, UM, you know, I 0:05:53.600 --> 0:05:56.000 think the next step, obviously should be just to go 0:05:56.040 --> 0:05:58.800 ahead and put this in the constitution, that women have 0:05:58.920 --> 0:06:02.800 equal rights like men in all facets of life. It's 0:06:02.800 --> 0:06:06.640 worth pointing out here, UM that Um paul was a 0:06:06.720 --> 0:06:09.839 Quaker and a leader of the National Women's Party for 0:06:09.880 --> 0:06:12.599 like fifty years or something. Uh. And the reason I 0:06:12.640 --> 0:06:16.159 mentioned she was a Quaker because she actually named the 0:06:16.200 --> 0:06:21.080 amendment the Lucretia Mott Amendment, after another Quaker woman from 0:06:21.120 --> 0:06:24.720 the nineteenth century who was also a suffragists as well 0:06:24.760 --> 0:06:27.200 as an abolitionist. Yeah, if you peel back, you know, 0:06:27.320 --> 0:06:31.120 the layer of early twentieth century or nineteenth century progressive 0:06:31.160 --> 0:06:33.679 there's a about a percent chance they were a Quaker. 0:06:34.680 --> 0:06:37.880 All sorts of good stuff during It's pretty interesting. Yeah, 0:06:37.920 --> 0:06:39.840 it really is. We should do one on the Quakers 0:06:39.880 --> 0:06:42.440 for sure. Yeah. I have a friend who's a Quaker, 0:06:42.520 --> 0:06:46.040 and uh, she talks about Quaker meetings and Quaker weddings 0:06:46.040 --> 0:06:48.920 and stuff, and it all just seems so chill and peaceful. 0:06:49.440 --> 0:06:54.520 It's very appealing, right, Um. But so Lucretia Mott apparently 0:06:54.600 --> 0:06:58.240 was among what's considered the the beginning of the first 0:06:58.360 --> 0:07:02.800 wave of feminism. Where was you know, Um, not only 0:07:02.839 --> 0:07:04.480 do women need the right to vote? And this is 0:07:04.560 --> 0:07:07.280 like the eighteen thirties, eighteen forties, I think, because when 0:07:07.360 --> 0:07:10.760 she was really beginning to be active, Um, not only 0:07:10.800 --> 0:07:13.520 should women have the right to vote, but um, these 0:07:13.560 --> 0:07:17.880 people were also very frequently also abolitionists. Right, So when 0:07:18.360 --> 0:07:21.800 UM Congress started passing laws that protected the rights, that 0:07:22.000 --> 0:07:26.840 enshrined the rights of African Americans into the Constitution, into 0:07:26.880 --> 0:07:31.840 the law of the land, saying you cannot discriminate against 0:07:32.200 --> 0:07:36.160 people who based on their because their African Americans are 0:07:36.200 --> 0:07:39.640 based on their race. UM, women said, well, hey, just 0:07:39.960 --> 0:07:43.040 add sex in there, add sex, like, let's let's put 0:07:43.080 --> 0:07:47.640 that into the fourteenth Amendment. And UM, that didn't make it. 0:07:47.640 --> 0:07:50.400 It didn't make it into any of the amendments. And 0:07:50.480 --> 0:07:52.440 that was a I don't think it caused a rift 0:07:52.600 --> 0:07:54.520 or anything like that, but I think it was extremely 0:07:54.560 --> 0:07:58.280 disappointing to the suffragists who had also worked for abolition 0:07:58.320 --> 0:08:02.720 as well, that the two things couldn't go hand in hand. So, UM, 0:08:02.800 --> 0:08:07.400 African Americans started to gain civil rights decades before women did. 0:08:07.760 --> 0:08:10.680 Women gained the right to vote, UM, and women just 0:08:10.760 --> 0:08:13.600 kind of had to carry on. The suffragist movement continued 0:08:13.640 --> 0:08:18.360 on even after the abolitionist movement was successful. Yeah, and 0:08:18.400 --> 0:08:21.920 then nineteen three Alice Paul said, well, here's what we'll do, 0:08:22.600 --> 0:08:26.760 will reward this amendment that we've written. So it sounds 0:08:26.840 --> 0:08:30.840 more constitutional, I guess, And so it sounds a little 0:08:30.840 --> 0:08:34.200 more like the fourteenth Amendment, and the new version basically 0:08:34.240 --> 0:08:37.599 said equal rights. I'm sorry, equality of rights under the 0:08:37.679 --> 0:08:39.559 law shall not be denied or a bridge by the 0:08:39.679 --> 0:08:42.840 United States or by any state on account of sex. 0:08:43.840 --> 0:08:48.239 And you know, once again, this was proposed and um, 0:08:48.280 --> 0:08:51.480 you know for about thirty years in most sessions I 0:08:51.520 --> 0:08:54.480 think every session of Congress, every single one, and didn't 0:08:54.480 --> 0:08:57.960 get a lot of support. Um. And you know, it's 0:08:57.960 --> 0:09:01.079 not to say that all men in politics were against it, 0:09:01.120 --> 0:09:05.680 but it certainly was not their legislative priority, clearly. And 0:09:05.920 --> 0:09:08.920 if you have a run from n to nineteen seventy 0:09:08.960 --> 0:09:11.920 with only ten women serving in the Senate, never more 0:09:12.000 --> 0:09:14.280 than two at a time, then the writings on the 0:09:14.320 --> 0:09:16.800 wall that the e r A is is not just 0:09:16.840 --> 0:09:18.760 it's just not going to be a top priority. I know. 0:09:18.880 --> 0:09:20.680 But that's sad writing, you know what I mean, Like 0:09:20.720 --> 0:09:23.840 the fact that there weren't women, uh in Congress. It 0:09:23.880 --> 0:09:26.480 certainly doesn't let men off the hook like they can't 0:09:26.520 --> 0:09:30.160 do they can't pass this, can't possibly take up legislation 0:09:30.240 --> 0:09:33.160 that guarantees the equal rights to women because we're moon 0:09:33.280 --> 0:09:37.000 you know, like that's that's very bothersome. But there's something 0:09:37.040 --> 0:09:42.920 else in there, chuck. So from nineteen twenty three when 0:09:42.920 --> 0:09:46.400 Alice Paul first introduced that, all the way through to 0:09:46.559 --> 0:09:50.400 nine seventy, it was taken up in every session of 0:09:50.440 --> 0:09:53.320 Congress and it failed. And one of the things that 0:09:53.400 --> 0:09:55.800 stuck out to me was that there was a guy 0:09:55.880 --> 0:10:00.720 who um oversaw the House I think the House Judiciary Committee, um, 0:10:00.720 --> 0:10:04.400 and he was a Democrat from New York and he 0:10:04.840 --> 0:10:08.200 put the kai bosh on it. Emmanuel Seller. Yeah, so 0:10:08.400 --> 0:10:10.199 he put the kai bosh on. He would not let 0:10:10.200 --> 0:10:12.440 it get to a vote. And I was like, why 0:10:12.520 --> 0:10:14.280 this guy was a Democrat in New York, what was 0:10:14.360 --> 0:10:18.200 his problem? And it turns out that the opposition to 0:10:18.240 --> 0:10:21.560 the e r A, which is now very clearly amongst 0:10:21.880 --> 0:10:25.200 like it's liberals are for it, Progressives are for it, 0:10:25.480 --> 0:10:28.880 Conservatives are typically against it. Um. It used to be 0:10:28.920 --> 0:10:32.600 flip flopped where the liberals, especially New Deal liberals like 0:10:32.679 --> 0:10:37.800 Eleanor Roosevelt, were against the Equal Rights Amendment and conservatives 0:10:37.840 --> 0:10:41.719 like Eisenhower conservatives were typically in favor of it. In 0:10:41.880 --> 0:10:45.160 that bizarre yeah it is. I mean Roosevelt, she had 0:10:45.200 --> 0:10:47.559 her reasons. She wasn't just like, oh, I don't think 0:10:47.559 --> 0:10:50.880 women should have rights. I think she said, you know, 0:10:51.160 --> 0:10:55.240 she thought it would undermine workplace protections. Um. She was 0:10:55.280 --> 0:10:59.040 a part of Kennedy's commission. She chaired the commission, the 0:10:59.040 --> 0:11:02.240 President's Commission on the Status of Women, which I think 0:11:02.240 --> 0:11:05.600 the result was released posthuous posthumously that said it wasn't 0:11:05.880 --> 0:11:10.000 the ra A wasn't necessary, and she she kind of 0:11:10.000 --> 0:11:11.840 came around a little bit. She never gave a full 0:11:11.840 --> 0:11:14.920 throated endorsement, but she kind of stopped talking out against it. 0:11:14.960 --> 0:11:17.600 I think at a certain point she used to debate 0:11:17.720 --> 0:11:20.880 Alice Paul like publicly. They would, you know, have back 0:11:20.880 --> 0:11:23.679 and forth debates over you know, whether the e r 0:11:23.760 --> 0:11:26.160 A was needed and how helpful it was going to be. So, 0:11:26.440 --> 0:11:28.559 I mean, you don't like I I know that um 0:11:28.559 --> 0:11:34.000 Eleanor Roosevelt is frequently criticized as not uh out right 0:11:34.360 --> 0:11:37.480 feminist enough in a lot of ways, but she also 0:11:37.840 --> 0:11:40.000 clearly seems to have been a feminist in her own 0:11:40.040 --> 0:11:43.160 way for sure. Yeah, and we should point out to that. 0:11:43.200 --> 0:11:46.920 Emmanuel Seller in ninety two, in a very big upset, 0:11:47.080 --> 0:11:51.040 lost uh to a woman, an attorney named Elizabeth Holtzman, 0:11:51.880 --> 0:11:55.760 largely due to his opposition to the era A. So yeah. Okay. 0:11:55.760 --> 0:11:59.280 So so finally, by the early seventies, you're getting more 0:11:59.280 --> 0:12:01.480 and more women who are starting to show up in 0:12:01.480 --> 0:12:06.120 in Congress, um, like Bella as Bug and Shirley Chisholm, 0:12:06.520 --> 0:12:09.200 and they basically said, like, this is our priority. We're 0:12:09.200 --> 0:12:12.040 going to get this. This equal Rights Amendment finally passed 0:12:12.040 --> 0:12:15.520 through Congress. And I don't know if it just happened 0:12:15.520 --> 0:12:19.280 to be like an era of kind of bipartisan sentiment 0:12:19.920 --> 0:12:24.720 um or what the deal was, but everybody finally came 0:12:24.760 --> 0:12:28.040 together and that thing got passed. Like if a piece 0:12:28.080 --> 0:12:31.160 of legislation has ever gotten passed, it was this one 0:12:31.280 --> 0:12:35.000 in a bipartisan manner. Yeah. And you know what, Uh, 0:12:35.400 --> 0:12:37.760 we'll get to how that passed. But a really big 0:12:37.800 --> 0:12:40.240 reason is because it started becoming a big deal in 0:12:40.280 --> 0:12:43.439 the media with this second wave, like you mentioned of 0:12:44.120 --> 0:12:47.600 the women's lib movement, and in no small part by 0:12:47.679 --> 0:12:50.880 a woman named Betty for Dan who wrote a book 0:12:50.920 --> 0:12:55.480 called The Feminine Mystique that in nine sold a million copies. 0:12:56.320 --> 0:12:59.439 And it's if she probably gets a at least a 0:12:59.480 --> 0:13:03.720 short following her own she was really interesting. Um. The 0:13:03.760 --> 0:13:06.840 reason she wrote this book is because she did a 0:13:06.880 --> 0:13:11.080 survey for a college reunion for her former classmates, learned 0:13:11.120 --> 0:13:14.160 that many of her former female classmates were not super 0:13:14.160 --> 0:13:17.760 happy about being homemakers and not being able to work, 0:13:18.360 --> 0:13:21.679 and center down a research rabbit hole on This kind 0:13:21.720 --> 0:13:23.959 of became her passion project because she wanted to write 0:13:24.000 --> 0:13:26.640 a magazine article, like a really in depth win. No 0:13:26.640 --> 0:13:29.040 one wanted it, so she ended up publishing it as 0:13:29.080 --> 0:13:32.320 a book called The Feminine Mystique, which kind of rocked 0:13:32.360 --> 0:13:36.600 the world of America in the early early to mid sixties. Yeah, 0:13:36.640 --> 0:13:38.920 because like in this book, she's basically saying, like this 0:13:38.960 --> 0:13:41.880 whole this whole thing, we're all we're all going along 0:13:41.880 --> 0:13:46.120 with this idea that the most the highest ideal a 0:13:46.160 --> 0:13:49.120 woman can aspire to is to be the best wife 0:13:49.160 --> 0:13:52.000 and mother she possibly can be, and that that's her identity. 0:13:52.040 --> 0:13:54.480 It is as someone's wife, as someone's mother, that she 0:13:54.559 --> 0:13:58.160 doesn't have her own identity that's independent of all of that. 0:13:58.160 --> 0:14:02.000 That is a crushing a way to live for a 0:14:02.000 --> 0:14:04.480 lot of women, not all women, as we'll see, but 0:14:04.600 --> 0:14:07.080 a lot of women. And she spoke up for a 0:14:07.120 --> 0:14:10.240 lot of them. Um, And I believe that this was 0:14:10.360 --> 0:14:12.960 kind of it was already kind of out there in 0:14:13.040 --> 0:14:15.480 pieces like people were talking about this, but Betty fre 0:14:15.559 --> 0:14:17.680 Dan like put it all together and put it on 0:14:17.720 --> 0:14:20.720 the map and got everyone talking. From what I've ever seen, 0:14:20.800 --> 0:14:25.360 like almost single handedly started the second wave of feminism. Yeah, 0:14:25.400 --> 0:14:28.040 and she put a pin in this little mini series. 0:14:28.400 --> 0:14:31.080 She was played by Tracy Ullman UH in a mini 0:14:31.120 --> 0:14:34.360 series last year called Mrs America that we're going to 0:14:34.400 --> 0:14:37.640 get to a little more in depth than a second Yeah. So, um, 0:14:37.800 --> 0:14:40.440 Betty fre Dan publishes the feminine mystique, like you said, 0:14:40.480 --> 0:14:44.000 just totally rocked everybody's world for for better or worse 0:14:44.080 --> 0:14:48.240 depending on your ideas about what the feminine mystique was about. 0:14:48.320 --> 0:14:51.520 And saying, um, but yeah, like you're saying, like that 0:14:51.600 --> 0:14:57.480 really laid the groundwork to this bipartisan um passing in 0:14:57.680 --> 0:15:02.920 Congress of UH Equal Rights Amendment in nineteen seventy two, 0:15:02.960 --> 0:15:06.600 I believe, right, Yeah, so it passes in a big way. 0:15:06.640 --> 0:15:09.440 I think you said ninety three p Ninety three point 0:15:09.480 --> 0:15:12.200 four in the House, ninety one point three in the Senate, 0:15:12.320 --> 0:15:14.120 but which I can't wrap my head around that. How 0:15:14.120 --> 0:15:17.320 did one third of a senator is that that senator 0:15:17.400 --> 0:15:23.840 cross section of New Hampshire, Oklahoma and Michigan. Uh, here's 0:15:23.840 --> 0:15:26.360 the deal, though. If you want something and shrined in 0:15:26.400 --> 0:15:29.520 the constitution, that's a big deal in this country. They 0:15:29.520 --> 0:15:33.360 don't do it willy nilly, nor should they um. But 0:15:33.480 --> 0:15:35.760 you need not only like once it passes that it's 0:15:35.800 --> 0:15:38.680 not automatic, then the state legislatures have to ratify it 0:15:39.280 --> 0:15:43.080 by a two thirds margin, which means at least thirty 0:15:43.120 --> 0:15:47.680 eight states have to ratify it. Um. And the e 0:15:47.840 --> 0:15:50.000 r A had a stipulation that said, if that isn't 0:15:50.040 --> 0:15:53.400 done in seven years, then you gotta go back to 0:15:53.440 --> 0:15:55.840 the drawing board. And that was that was not in 0:15:55.920 --> 0:15:58.320 the actual e r A. That was not in the 0:15:58.360 --> 0:16:01.480 constitutional amendment. That was past and that's going to become 0:16:01.600 --> 0:16:05.920 very important later. But it was in the legislation where 0:16:06.080 --> 0:16:08.880 that e r A the amendment was sent to the 0:16:08.960 --> 0:16:13.760 states for ratification, it said do this in seven years. Right, Okay, 0:16:13.880 --> 0:16:16.600 that's that's just like that little slight distinction makes a 0:16:16.640 --> 0:16:18.880 big difference down the road. Oh yeah, I mean the 0:16:19.160 --> 0:16:21.440 r people pushing for the e r A certainly would 0:16:21.600 --> 0:16:24.520 not have wanted an expiration date. No, And there's as 0:16:24.560 --> 0:16:27.120 far as I could tell that they haven't ever attached 0:16:27.120 --> 0:16:30.080 an expiration date to an amendment to be ratified before 0:16:30.200 --> 0:16:33.920 it was just and it was also an arbitrary period 0:16:33.960 --> 0:16:37.320 of time too, So just just chew on that, put 0:16:37.440 --> 0:16:39.480 put that wadded up piece of gum in the back 0:16:39.520 --> 0:16:41.880 of your cheek and save it for later. I wonder 0:16:42.040 --> 0:16:44.600 in the debate if they were like, well, I mean, 0:16:44.680 --> 0:16:52.880 how many years? Seven seven sounds good? Pour the Scotch. Uh. 0:16:53.000 --> 0:16:57.600 So within one year, um, thirty of the thirty eight 0:16:57.640 --> 0:17:01.600 states needed ratified it, which was super fast, and everyone 0:17:01.720 --> 0:17:04.000 was like, you know, proponents like this is great, man, 0:17:04.040 --> 0:17:06.320 it looks like this thing is gonna sail right into 0:17:06.320 --> 0:17:10.480 the constitution. Uh. And then a woman popped up named 0:17:10.520 --> 0:17:14.400 Phillis schlafe Lee and we're gonna take a break here 0:17:14.960 --> 0:17:42.000 and we'll talk about Phillis right after this. And I guess, 0:17:42.000 --> 0:17:44.840 depending on where your views are, Chuck, we should have 0:17:45.400 --> 0:17:49.720 introduced Phillis chef Lee with the the Darth Vader theme 0:17:49.760 --> 0:17:55.400 song when she made first makes her appear, Dune Dune, Dune, Dune. 0:17:56.320 --> 0:18:00.560 It's exactly right. Did you watch any of these interviews 0:18:00.560 --> 0:18:03.960 and debates, Yes, dude, you could. It's really interesting. If 0:18:04.000 --> 0:18:07.800 you have your wits about you, you could despise everything 0:18:07.880 --> 0:18:10.720 that ever came out of Philish Lafeley's mouth. It's very 0:18:10.840 --> 0:18:15.240 very easy to do. Um. She equates gay people, which 0:18:15.600 --> 0:18:18.359 I guess in the fashion of the time she calls homosexuals. 0:18:18.400 --> 0:18:21.440 She calls them perverts. Says that they should not have 0:18:21.600 --> 0:18:25.320 any rights afforded to married men and women. They shouldn't 0:18:25.359 --> 0:18:30.080 be able to adopt children. She says, really despicable. I 0:18:30.119 --> 0:18:32.760 didn't hear that one. She says a lot of very 0:18:32.800 --> 0:18:37.720 despicable stuff. Um, and her whole viewpoint is despicable to 0:18:37.800 --> 0:18:42.560 a lot of people. But there are very few people 0:18:42.920 --> 0:18:47.760 walking around out there who have the poise and self 0:18:47.800 --> 0:18:52.800 possession to go into the lions den and speak for 0:18:52.880 --> 0:18:57.879 whatever she was convinced of was right. Um, that's you. 0:18:58.119 --> 0:19:00.720 She has to be credited to at least that degree. 0:19:01.040 --> 0:19:04.320 No matter what you think about her mind, she was 0:19:04.520 --> 0:19:06.480 she had a lot of poise, I guess you could say. 0:19:06.480 --> 0:19:08.919 And it's really kind of something to watch because I 0:19:08.920 --> 0:19:11.680 saw this one. Did you see the the Good Morning 0:19:11.720 --> 0:19:15.440 American debate from nine seventy between her and for Dan Yeah? Man, 0:19:15.600 --> 0:19:18.600 And it's like it's really clear what a skilled debater 0:19:18.880 --> 0:19:23.600 she was and how rattled she could get somebody. Yeah. Uh, 0:19:23.760 --> 0:19:25.800 I mean she clearly. I felt bad for for Dan. 0:19:25.920 --> 0:19:28.119 She was doing a good job, but she was she 0:19:28.200 --> 0:19:30.720 was getting piste off and you could tell that she 0:19:30.840 --> 0:19:33.560 just liked to get under people's skin while she just 0:19:33.600 --> 0:19:37.880 remained perfectly, you know, erect in her seat with perfect posture. 0:19:38.600 --> 0:19:41.359 And uh, that Mrs. America series, which it was on 0:19:41.359 --> 0:19:43.199 our list and I'm gonna bump it back up to 0:19:43.280 --> 0:19:46.200 next in line now to watch. But she was played, 0:19:46.680 --> 0:19:50.119 um really really well judging from just the the accent 0:19:50.160 --> 0:19:53.920 and the mannerisms by Cate Blanchett. It can do no wrong. Yeah, 0:19:53.960 --> 0:19:56.960 I want to see that series too, um, but yes, 0:19:57.040 --> 0:19:59.520 she so. If you see those two debating, it's like 0:19:59.600 --> 0:20:03.760 a st in contrast, where Philis chaff Lee she Laughlely 0:20:04.359 --> 0:20:07.679 is um basically sitting there at tea time at the 0:20:07.680 --> 0:20:10.960 country club before the polo match. And Betty fre Dan, 0:20:11.359 --> 0:20:13.800 if you put like a beret in sunglasses on a 0:20:13.840 --> 0:20:16.320 French cigarette in her mouth, she's like sitting at the 0:20:16.359 --> 0:20:19.199 beating at cafe, like listening to a poetry jam or 0:20:19.240 --> 0:20:23.879 something like this. Just these two totally contrasting personalities. Be 0:20:24.000 --> 0:20:26.520 A Cheffly debated her under the table, and it's not 0:20:26.560 --> 0:20:30.000 like Betty fre Dan was was an intellectual slouch by 0:20:30.119 --> 0:20:36.080 any measure. But it's just Philish Laughly could rattle anybody. Anybody, 0:20:36.119 --> 0:20:39.800 she could rattle Santa Claus. I'm just gonna say it. Yeah, 0:20:39.840 --> 0:20:42.040 I mean, she kind of made herself out to be 0:20:42.119 --> 0:20:45.400 just this homemaker. Um. She would enter when she introduced 0:20:45.400 --> 0:20:48.040 herself at engagement, she would thank her husband for letting 0:20:48.080 --> 0:20:50.920 her come there. But when you kind of peek behind 0:20:50.960 --> 0:20:53.919 the curtain, she had a master's in political science, she 0:20:54.000 --> 0:20:57.439 had a law degree. She ran for Congress when she 0:20:57.520 --> 0:21:01.960 was twenty seven years old and lost. And she was um, 0:21:02.000 --> 0:21:06.600 sort of pre nineteen eighties, a big part in at 0:21:06.600 --> 0:21:08.240 the very least, I don't even think they called it 0:21:08.280 --> 0:21:10.840 the Christian Right at the time, that kind of organizing 0:21:10.840 --> 0:21:13.480 what would later become the Christian Right movement. Yeah, you 0:21:13.520 --> 0:21:16.399 can make a really good case that Philish laughy um 0:21:16.600 --> 0:21:21.840 laid the groundwork for the current Republican Party in every 0:21:21.880 --> 0:21:26.760 way from from Reagan onward to today. Um and and yeah, 0:21:26.840 --> 0:21:29.520 she basically said like, I'm just a housewife from St. Louis, 0:21:29.560 --> 0:21:32.679 proud housewife, wife and mother of six from St. Louis. 0:21:33.200 --> 0:21:36.640 Um And in a lot of ways she was like 0:21:36.960 --> 0:21:40.320 she made reference to law school during her debate to 0:21:40.400 --> 0:21:44.359 Betty for Dan and she sounded like she was in 0:21:44.480 --> 0:21:49.240 law school then, so it seems like she was just 0:21:49.520 --> 0:21:52.320 a woman who said, I don't agree with this, and 0:21:52.359 --> 0:21:54.360 I'm going to put a stop to it, and stood 0:21:54.840 --> 0:22:00.119 in front of this unstoppable title wave and stopped it. 0:22:00.720 --> 0:22:05.160 She stopped it. She stopped the E r A from 0:22:05.200 --> 0:22:09.439 being ratified by the states right at the eleventh and 0:22:09.480 --> 0:22:13.720 a half hour before it was ever passed and ratified 0:22:13.760 --> 0:22:15.600 by the thirty eight states. You said they got thirty 0:22:15.640 --> 0:22:18.679 states in the first year. By seven they were up 0:22:18.680 --> 0:22:21.760 the thirty five states. They just needed three more, three 0:22:21.800 --> 0:22:24.560 more states, and the whole thing was going to become 0:22:24.560 --> 0:22:27.000 the law of the Lane. And Philish Slafely got in 0:22:27.080 --> 0:22:30.840 the way of that almost single handedly at first. Yeah, 0:22:30.880 --> 0:22:33.920 and you know she launched her her group was called 0:22:33.960 --> 0:22:38.280 stop e r A, which you know, we obsess about acronyms. 0:22:38.320 --> 0:22:40.240 It's sort of annoying when the first letter of an 0:22:40.280 --> 0:22:44.040 acronym is the actual acronym. But stop ere A stood first, 0:22:44.040 --> 0:22:47.919 stop taking our privileges. And her argument, you know, she 0:22:48.080 --> 0:22:51.119 was like, and she used this to her advantage in 0:22:51.160 --> 0:22:54.120 those debates, like see how angry these feminists are She's 0:22:54.160 --> 0:22:57.679 she kind of coin that term. I think about the 0:22:57.760 --> 0:23:00.320 angry women's Live movement. These angry feminists, they us want 0:23:00.800 --> 0:23:04.359 they wanted to throw down everything that makes us a 0:23:04.359 --> 0:23:07.360 female and everything that makes us women, and they want 0:23:07.359 --> 0:23:10.480 to just set fire to it. And before you know what, 0:23:10.560 --> 0:23:11.960 women are going to be able to be drafted in 0:23:12.000 --> 0:23:15.200 the armed forces. Never happened. Uh, you know, they're they're 0:23:15.240 --> 0:23:17.520 not going to be separate bathrooms or locker rooms anymore 0:23:17.560 --> 0:23:20.480 from this point on. Not true. That started to happen 0:23:20.520 --> 0:23:24.280 more in recent years, wrapped up same sex marriage. I 0:23:24.280 --> 0:23:26.640 mean we'll we'll get to that. How she kind of 0:23:27.200 --> 0:23:31.840 co opted gay rights and um, reproductive rights into all 0:23:31.880 --> 0:23:36.120 this just to sort of coalesce that movement. Uh, and said, 0:23:36.200 --> 0:23:37.720 you know, women are going to lose their right to 0:23:37.720 --> 0:23:41.359 alimony and child support. Never happened. And just the life 0:23:41.359 --> 0:23:43.160