ERA That Could Overturn Every Pro-Life State Law Nationwide Ratified in Another State

LifeNews ^ | May 31, 2018 | Micaiah Bilger

[ebb tide]

The Illinois legislature ratified a dangerous constitutional amendment Wednesday that could overturn every pro-life law in the United States.

According to supporters, the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) would amend the U.S. Constitution to guarantee equal rights for all citizens no matter what their sex is. However, pro-life advocates and conservatives long have warned that abortion activists would use the amendment to destroy the limited protections that America provides to unborn babies.

Illinois became the 37^th state to ratify the ERA on Wednesday after a state House vote of 72-45, the AP reports. If just one more state passes the amendment, it could be added to the U.S. Constitution.

“The ERA as written, and as contained in SJRCA 4, would be the most pro-abortion legislation ever adopted by any American legislature,” said Father Frank Pavone, national director of Priests for Life. “Cloaked in language of equality, it would, in fact, remove all state and federal regulations and safeguards regarding abortion. It is this indisputable fact that, once publicized, stopped ratification of the ERA in its tracks in the last century.”

Modest, common-sense laws such as parental consent for minors could be overturned if the amendment is added to the Constitution, as could the gruesome partial-birth abortion method, Pavone said.

“These restrictions, overwhelmingly supported by the American public, would be deemed discriminatory on the basis of sex under the ERA,” he continued. “It’s no coincidence that every organization that supports abortion in the United States also supports ratification of the ERA.”

There is a possibility the ERA would fail, even if a 38^th state ratifies it.

The Chicago Tribune reports:

As has been the case for decades, the legislative debate over the Equal Rights Amendment was fraught with controversy. Opponents largely contended the measure was aimed at ensuring an expansion of abortion rights for women. Supporters said it was needed to give women equal standing in the nation’s founding document.

Opponents also contended the measure may be moot, since its original 1982 ratification deadline has long since expired. Supporters argued, however, that the 1992 ratification of the 1789 “Madison Amendment,” preventing midterm changes in congressional pay, makes the ERA a legally viable change to the Constitution.

State Rep. Peter Breen of Lombard, an abortion rights opponent, called the measure “an alleged constitutional amendment” and warned it would be adopting an “illegal act.” But Breen also contended supporters “have no other thing they want to do” than expand abortion rights.

Meanwhile, pro-abortion lawmakers rejoiced at the ratification Wednesday.

“I am appalled and embarrassed that the state of Illinois has not done this earlier,” said state Rep. Stephanie Kifowit, a Democrat. “I am proud to be on this side of history and I am proud to support not only all the women that this will help, that this will send a message to, but I am also here to be a role model for my daughter.”

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Racism also came into the discussion. The AP reports:

… many Republicans remained quiet, instead yielding their time to their black colleagues on the other side of the aisle who expressed concerns that the fight for women’s rights has largely been championed by white women, many of whom did not consider black women their equal.

“When the women finally got their right to vote, black women did not get our rights,” said Rep. Mary Flowers, a Chicago Democrat. “You want to say something (the ERA language) written in 1923 is going to protect me?”

Other Democrats, many of whom are also black, stressed that ratifying the Equal Rights Amendment is more important than ever in the era of President Donald Trump.

Former National Right to Life Legislative Director Douglas Johnson previously talked with LifeNews.com about the ERA when the Arkansas state legislature defeated an attempt to ratify it in 2007.

He said the sweeping language of the 1972 ERA would be used as a legal weapon against virtually all laws that regulate abortion.

“In other states, major national pro-ERA organizations have argued that laws limiting tax-funded abortions or requiring parental consent for minors’ abortions violate ERAs,” Johnson explained.

Should the ERA be adopted, it would invalidate the federal Hyde Amendment, which prohibits taxpayer funding of abortions in Medicaid, and all state restrictions prohibiting tax-funded abortions. Likewise, it would nullify any federal or state restrictions on partial-birth abortions or third-trimester abortions (since these are sought “only by women”).

Johnson said laws that allow government-supported medical facilities and personnel — including religiously affiliated hospitals — to refuse to participate in abortions likely would be in jeopardy as well.

[ebb tide]

Full title:

Equal Rights Amendment That Could Overturn Every Pro-Life State Law Nationwide Ratified in Another State

[Secret Agent Man]

This had a clear and explicit deadline to get votes.

It failed.

This is the equivalent of Hillary in amendment form.

[Secret Agent Man]

Further since when have any liberal socialists allowed laws or amendments they dont like to be enacted past expired, explicit deadlines to ratify?

Never.

Case closed.

[mkleesma]

Correct me if I’m wrong, but didn’t Amendment die back in the late 70’s?

[ealgeone]

This had a clear and explicit deadline to get votes.

I thought the time for ratification had passed. But I wouldn't hold my breath on this in light of how SCOTUS has voted on some key issues in the past couple of years.

[stars & stripes forever]

[Correct me if I’m wrong, but didn’t Amendment die back in the late 70’s?]

The Amendment deadline was illegally extended to assure ratification in Illinois. The case went to the Supreme Court, but by the time it got there, the deadline had passed.

Those with common sense know it is a dead Amendment, but nowadays anything goes in the judiciary.

[Bubba_Leroy]

The Madison Amendment had no deadline for ratification. The ERA specifically did.

Plus the ERA proponents like to ignore all of the states that ratified and then revoked their ratification before the deadline ran.

[Leaning Right]

>This had a clear and explicit deadline to get votes. <

Correct. The proposed amendment expired back in 1979. And its time extension is clearly unconstitutional. If Congress wants to give the EPA another run, it must pass a new proposed amendment by a 2/3 majority vote. Congress cannot legally do what it did, modify an amendment by a simple majority vote.

The big question is whether or not the Supreme Court will see it that way.

[SecondAmendment]

Liberals don’t quit until the are “room temperature”, and even then they still manage to make it to the voting booth ...

[shanover]

Lovely, “equal rights” for women to murder those who will never have any rights. I am sure this will open it up to all of the freaks and “identifiers”. Good job Feminist idiots.

[Publius]

The ERA died on June 1, 1979. The attempt by Congress to add another 3 years to the 7 year ratification window was stopped by a federal district court because Congress used the wrong method of extension. The Supreme Court refused to hear the appeal.

This is just virtue signaling.

When the Archivist of the United States receives the ratification letter sent by the Secretary of State of Illinois, he will send it back with a cover letter explaining that ratification window for this amendment closed 39 years ago.

[KarlInOhio]

Even if it did pass, how would it prohibit abortion laws? Neither men nor women would be allowed to have them - and in this era of gender definition insanity you need to outlaw "men" from having abortions too.

[Nifster]

The time limit ran out for that amendment. Does not matter what the lefties in Illinois do

[dirtymac]

Just pass a pro life law that state no man or woman can get an abortion. There! All are treated equally

[Maudeen]

Illinois. . . a third rate state.

[Impy]

There’s no chance the courts will nix the deadline, will they?

[Hugin]

Hate to say it, but this sounds like a scare attempt by pro-life organizers to gin up donations. It’s dead Jim.

[AuH2ORepublican]

Given that the language of the amendment specified that it needed to be ratified within 7 years, the amendment failed in 1979 under its own terms. When Congress gave the amendment three more years, it was of doubtful constitutionality (if Congress wanted to resubmit the amendment, state ratifications should have started from zero and states that ratified before 1983 should have been made to reratify it), but in any event the second bite at the apple expired in 1982 and the proposed amendment died at such time. The 27th Amendment precedent is inapposite, given that such amendment did not have language setting a time limit for its ratification by 3/4 of the states.

[lastchance]

If both sides are arguing it would change abortion laws then they must also believe it would eliminate all laws regarding pregnancy and child birth. On what basis? The amendment does not mean that a law that can only apply to women such as restrictions on abortion must be scuttled. For the simple reason that such a law cannot apply to men because they don’t get pregnant. It is not possible to apply a test of equality to such a law.

It is like arguing government funding for prostate cancer can no longer be provided because women don’t get prostate
cancer. Or that men can no longer be charged with certain classifications of sexual assault because women can’t commit that kind of sexual assault. It’s the biology, stoopid.

If the claim is that women now under the law have a constitutional right to not be pregnant, ever. Then it could be argued that methods of sterilization or contraception must enjoy equal status under the law. But if they are claiming women as mothers have the right to end a pregnancy then they must argue that men as fathers have that right too and therefore can demand a wife or girlfriend or even a casual encounter have an abortion against her will.

I think it is any empty gesture to pass the amendment and oppose it mainly because “sex” no longer is applied to mean biological sex but has come to include sexual orientation and “gender” identity.

[Buckeye McFrog]

Those with common sense know it is a dead Amendment, but nowadays anything goes in the judiciary.

Yup. Would not surprise me at all if it "survives as a tax".