Political Quotes

“Mr. President, I am glad today to stand with my colleague to support S.J. Res. 4, affirming the validity of the Equal Rights Amendment. We have heard from Senator Cardin and Senator Murkowski why it is so important for Congress to pass this resolution and enshrine protections against sex-based discrimination in our Constitution. The ERA would bolster efforts to ensure equality in the fields of workforce and pay, pregnancy discrimination, sexual harassment and violence, reproductive autonomy, and protections for LGBTQ individuals. Although we have indeed made strides in each of these areas, we know how fragile these gains can be without the durability of a constitutional amendment. Take, for example, the current Supreme Court's approach to the Constitution. As the Dobbs decision makes clear, a majority of the current Court believes that the meaning of equality under the equal protection clause was frozen in 1868 when the 14th Amendment was ratified. Well, in the hundred years after 1868, the Supreme Court has adopted and permitted all sorts of State laws that excluded women from jury service, that excluded women from admission to the bar as lawyers, that excluded women even from employment as bartenders, and allowed all of those laws under the 14th Amendment. This business now of the Supreme Court, looking back at history and tradition, is a backward look to bad history and regrettable tradition.…”