Presidentish Joe Biden declares the Equal Rights Amendment is now in effect as the 28th Amendment to the Constitution.
I guess he forgot that the President doesn’t have that power. He has also chosen to ignore the fact that it failed to be ratified before the the 1982 deadline, or in this case he’s commuted the ERA’s deadline, yet another power the President doesn’t have. While he thinks Virginia’s ratification of the ERA in 2020 as the 38th state makes the ERA a legitimate amendment, it comes decades too late. It also ignores the fact that five states that had originally ratified the ERA ‘de-ratified’ it some years later.
The key point is whether the ERA, which was passed by Congress in 1972 and was sent to the states for ratification, has amassed the 38 states needed.As another part of one of the linked posts states, “Presidents don’t get to overrule the courts, nor do they get to declare what is and is not in the Constitution.” Of course that doesn’t mean that President John Gill...er...Joe Biden wouldn’t try to do just that. It isn’t like he’s all that cogent these days.
Just 35 had ratified the amendment by 1979, which was the deadline set by Congress. Capitol Hill then approved a three-year extension of the deadline, but that came and went with no new ratifications.
In 2017, Nevada belatedly voted for approval, followed by Illinois in 2018 and Virginia in 2020. ERA backers said that was enough to cross the finish line.
But that argument was rejected by federal courts that ruled the deadline had passed.
Mr. Biden’s Justice Department has also ruled that the deadlines are valid and the post-deadline ratifications cannot be counted.
And then there’s the Law of Unintended Consequences coming into play that I believe would lead to chaos and overloaded courts as a lot of existing laws would either need to be changed or repealed by Congress and state legislatures or courts declaring those laws unconstitutional under the ERA. As I commented elsewhere:
If [an Equal Rights Amendment] were to be ratified I can see all of the lawsuits lining up to dismantle all kinds of laws that would then be unconstitutional, but it won't be the ones proponents think they'll be.The list of laws that would need to be changed, rescinded, or declared unconstitutional would be lengthy.
One of the first ones right off the top of my head will be about the Draft. Women would now be required to register for the Draft just like men...or the law mandating registering for the Draft would have to be either rescinded or declared unconstitutional due to its discriminatory nature.
I would expect all kinds of discrimination lawsuits to be filed against Family Courts because of the inherent bias against men in the laws administered in those courts. Family law would need to be rewritten.
What about all of the VAWA (Violence Against Women Act) legislation? It would be void because it discriminates in favor of women.
One set of laws and court precedents that would need to change would be those involving divorces, and more specifically child custody decisions. Right now custody decisions heavily favor women even though there are numerous studies showing that joint custody tends to be better for the children. When fathers are removed from regular and constant presence in the lives of children, the children don’t do as well in life. Those laws and court precedents would need to overturned and 50-50 custody would need to be the default. Of course I would expect some women to fight tooth and nail to prevent such changes as it takes away their advantage over their ex-husbands. (It also means that any child support they might get would be minimized, if not eliminated altogether.)
Fortunately all of this is theoretical as the ERA is not part of the constitution. Though some laws should be changed regardless of the existence of the ERA as they do discriminate against men.