FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
January 27, 2023
Contact: cwest@eracoalition.org

Washington, D.C. –– After a century of work, today, January 27, marks the one-year anniversary of the date the Equal Rights Amendment should have been added to the Constitution. To commemorate the day, ERA Coalition and Fund for Women’s Equality President and CEO Zakiya Thomas released the following statement:

“One year ago today, the Equal Rights Amendment should have been published as the 28th Amendment after meeting all requirements laid out in the U.S. Constitution. The ERA is already valid, despite not being published by the U.S. Archivist, and we will continue pursuing all avenues to push for full recognition. 

“Without the constitutional protections afforded by the ERA, it’s clear that opponents of equality will continue to perpetuate the second-class status of women and LGBTQ+ people in America by manipulating the levers of government. The need for sex equality is as fiercely urgent today as it was a century ago when we began the long struggle for the ERA. We can’t, and we won’t, give up the fight, because our rights depend on it.”

The ERA was passed by Congress in 1972, and Virginia became the 38th state to ratify the amendment in 2020, thus fulfilling all constitutional requirements set forth in Article V. January 27, 2022 ended a two-year waiting period for the Equal Right Amendment to go into effect after meeting all the constitutional requirements. The Attorneys General in two of the last three states to ratify the ERA, Nevada and Illinois, are suing the U.S. Archivist to force publication of the ERA to the U.S. Constitution.