Mike Collins: “Three-quarters of the States failed to ratify the equal rights amendment by the 1979 deadline set by Congress, yet House…”

“Three-quarters of the States failed to ratify the equal rights amendment by the 1979 deadline set by Congress, yet House Democrats are trying to retroactively revive the failed constitutional amendment. Congress does not have the power to do that. Congress set the deadline; it was passed; it did not get approved; and now there is an end run to go around that. The United States Supreme Court recognized this in 1982 when it stated that the issue was moot because the deadline for ERA ratification expired before the requisite number of States approved it. The next year, the Democratic leadership in the House of Representatives, acting on the same understanding, started the entire process of ERA approval over again. But that new ERA also failed to achieve the required two-thirds majority in the House on November 15, 1983. But today, in defiance of historical reality and the clear acceptance of the situation by all relevant participants in the original debate, the Democrats have brought forward a resolution that denies the obvious. Now, the proponents of this resolution want to convince their base that if both Houses of Congress pass this joint resolution, and it is signed into law, the 1972 ERA will become part of the Constitution just because the Democrats control the Virginia State legislature and that legislature passed the ERA this year.…”