I have read accounts of wealthy people who experienced a life-changing event when they were exposed to the poor; not just the meager conditions but meeting the people themselves. Oscar Romero, Gerda Lerner and Alice Paul spoke of such an epiphany that lasted their lifetimes. It was a type of divine insight which transformed them forever.
For Miss Paul it was upon graduation from Swarthmore, 1906. She was 21 and on a fellowship in Lower Manhattan, working at 95 Rivington which was similar to the Chicago Settlement House, founded by Jane Addams. Rivington was the first stop for immigrants arriving from Ireland, Italy and Eastern Europe. Along with English and life skills, Miss Paul taught sewing, worked in a millinery factory and arrived at one singular conclusion: to be a successful, independent American, one must be assured Constitutional protections and rights. Without that, one would remain forever a second-class citizen. This was her North Star for all 92 years of her life.
Alice’s ToDo List:
TASK ONE: Get Women’s Suffrage as their votes would be required to establish equal rights under the law. August 18, 1920, the 36th state, Tennessee voted yes and August 26, 1920, the 19th Amendment was ratified and published.
TASK TWO: Write the Equal Rights Amendment. In three years, Miss Paul earned three law degrees, assembled a 13-woman committee to study all 36 states’ laws to ascertain what was needed. July 21, 1923, in Seneca Falls, NY, she presented the ERA to America.
TASK THREE: Submit the ERA to Congress to be sent out to the states for ratification and on January 27, 2020 the State of Virginia voted YES and thus meeting the requirement of a supermajority of states (38). Thirty-seven states have been published and the 38th is in the waiting room.
TODAY’s STATUS: 38 states ratified (2020) and 37 states have been published by the National Archivist (2018). August 2024, the American Bar Association unanimously resolved that the constitutional requirements have been met and the 28th Amendment is law, as of Jan 27, 2022.
This Month 46 Senators, 124 Congress members, 146 National Organizations have called for the publication of Virginia. Polled this Fall, the majority of Americans want the ERA. We are calling for Virginia’s ratification to be published and the 28th Amendment recognized as law.
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Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.
Zoe Nicholson ERA activist for over 50 years including the 1982 fast for 37 days for the ERA.
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