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Washington - At a rally on Capitol Hill, Sen. Robert Menendez (D-NJ) and Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-NY) today marked the 40th Anniversary of the original passage of the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) with renewed calls for support of the measure, which they introduced in the current Congress.

"I'm honored to stand today in support of the Equal Rights Amendment," said Sen. Menendez "As a Senator from New Jersey, home of Alice Paul -- who drafted the original amendment - I'm proud to carry on New Jersey's tradition of being the home base of America's struggle for equal rights for women. As we recognize the 40th anniversary of the ERA, we find ourselves having to re-fight old battles, trying to keep those on the far right from turning back the clock on half-a-century of progress on women's rights. Now more than ever we can't give up the fight, we have to continue working to bring full equality for women under the US constitution."

"It is true that women have made great progress in the past 40 years, but now, in the 21st century, we see that progress can all too easily be rolled back," Maloney said. "Laws can change, courts can reverse themselves and create new precedent. The only way for women to achieve permanent equality in the U.S. is to write it into the constitution. Women have indeed come a long way since 1972, but our nation must go on record that women are fully equal in the eyes of the law."

The ERA is a constitutional amendment which would prohibit denying or abridging equal rights under law by the United States or any state on account of sex. A few of the ways this critical amendment would guarantee the equal rights of men and women is by:

• Clarifying the legal status of sex discrimination for the courts, by making sex a suspect category subject to strict judicial scrutiny, as race, religion, and national origin currently are.

• Guaranteeing equal footing for women in the legal systems of all 50 states.

• Ensuring that government programs and federal resources benefit men and women equally.

CAPTION: Senator Menendez (D-NJ) calls for constitutional protection for women on 40th Anniversary of original passage of the Equal Rights Amendment.

Background

The ERA was first introduced in 1923 as the "Lucretia Mott Amendment" at the celebration of the 75th Anniversary of the 1848 Seneca Falls "Declaration of Sentiments," considered the founding of the women's rights movement in the U.S. After Congressional passage in 1972, 35 states ratified the amendment, falling just three states short of the 38 necessary for ratification.

For more information on the ERA, click here.

Current House Cosponsors (185): Ackerman, Andrews, Baca, Baldwin, Bass, Becerra, Berkley, Berman, Biggert, Bishop, Bishop, Blumenauer, Bordallo, Boswell, Brady, Braley, Brown, Butterfield, Capps, Capuano, Cardoza, Carnahan, Carson, Castor, Christensen, Chu, Cicilline, Clarke (H), Clarke (Y), Clay, Cleaver, Clyburn, Cohen, Connolly, Conyers, Cooper, Costa, Costello, Courtney, Crowley, Cuellar, Cummings, Davis (D), Davis (S), DeFazio, DeGette, DeLauro, Deutch, Dicks, Dingell, Doggett, Doyle, Edwards, Ellison, Engel, Eshoo, Farr, Fattah, Filner, Frank, Frelinghuysen, Fudge, Garamendi, Gonzalez, Green (A), Green (G), Grijalva, Gutierrez, Hahn, Hanabusa, Hanna, Hastings, Heinrich, Higgins, Himes, Hinchey, Hinojosa, Hirono, Hochul, Holt, Honda, Hoyer, Inslee, Israel, Jackson (L), Jackson (J), Johnson (E), Johnson (H), Kaptur, Keating, Kildee, Kind, Kucinich, Langevin, Larsen, Larson, Lee, Levin, Lewis, Loebsack, Lofgren, Lowey, Lujan, Lummis, Lynch, Markey, Matsui, McCarthy, McCollum, McDermott, McGovern, McNerney, Meeks, Michaud, Miller (B), Miller (G), Moore, Moran, Murphy, Nadler, Napolitano, Neal, Olver, Pallone, Pascrell, Pastor, Payne, Perlmutter, Peters, Peterson, Pingree, Polis, Price, Quigley, Rangel, Reyes, Richardson, Richmond, Rothman, Roybal-Allard, Ruppersberger, Rush, Ryan, Sanchez (Linda), Sanchez (Loretta), Sarbanes, Schakowsky, Schiff, Schrader, Schwartz, Scott, Serrano, Sewell, Sherman, Sires, Slaughter, Smith, Speier, Stark, Sutton, Thompson (B), Thompson (M), Tierney, Tonko, Towns, Tsongas, Van Hollen, Wasserman Schultz, Waters, Watt, Waxman, Welch, Wilson, Woolsey, Yarmuth, Dent, Chandler, Hoyer, LoBiondo, Pierluisi Norton, Sablan, Lummis, Neal, Hanna, Waters,Velazquez

View the original New York Times story on ERA's passage from March 22, 1972 at this link or beginning on page 3 of this release.

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