On the recordFebruary 13, 2020
It is an honor to be able to stand in this hallowed Hall and address some things that have occurred that are worthy of attention. Of course, there was applause in the gallery today on the passage of trying to restart the ERA. It is an amendment to the Constitution, and it was started back in the seventies. The amendment to the Constitution had a deadline as part of the amendment. The amendment did not get the required 38 states. The time lapsed. There was, as I recall, an attempt to extend the time, but some States that had been in favor of the ERA backed off. {time} 1145 So it is very clear to anyone who pays attention to the Constitution that, when an amendment to the Constitution by its own wording has a time deadline and that deadline is passed, then that amendment has not been ratified, is not part of the Constitution, and any efforts to change the amendment itself, including the deadline for ratification, would require beginning again. There is no more iconic liberal judge on the Supreme Court, not in history, than the former head, as I recall, of the American Civil Liberties Union. She was there back when the American Civil Liberties Union cared deeply about civil liberties and even took on some clients and some causes of people that most of us thought were not worthy of a lot of attention. But they were so committed to civil liberties back in those days, they were more concerned about civil liberties than they were the client. That was in the old days.…
