Ruth Bader Ginsburg says deadline to ratify Equal Rights Amendment has expired: 'I'd like it to star

[Jose Garcia]

Source: CNN

(CNN)Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a long-time supporter of the Equal Rights Amendment, suggested Monday night that the deadline to ratify the measure as a constitutional amendment has expired and that the decades long effort must start anew.

"I would like to see a new beginning," Ginsburg told an audience at Georgetown University Law Center.

"I'd like it to start over," she added.

Ginsburg was responding to a question from the moderator of the event, Judge M. Margaret McKeown of the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, who asked whether there would ever be an Equal Rights Amendment on the federal level.

Read more: https://www.cnn.com/2020/02/10/politics/ruth-bader-ginsburg-equal-rights-amendment/index.html

[Control-Z]

1. So would I, RBG.

I too would "like it to start over".

[Croney]

2. Maybe with a Democratic House, Senate, and Presidency,

the important things will be put first again.

[Jose Garcia]

15. The President has no formal roll in amending the Constitution

[not_the_one]

18. But he does have a powerful podium (to me bully pulpit is a double negative...).

The New Rules suggest that old rules no longer matter. After all, we no longer have the rule of law. The laws we do have no longer apply to everyone, only to those who must be controlled, like truth tellers and patriots.

Besides.....

No telling how the the new Dem President could influence the people, who influence the legislatures, who would get it done.

Apparently the American public can be lead around by the nose. "But I've heard it so often it MUST be the truth", barks the nose leash gang...

Or, if you continually and repeatedly use your influence to positively affect the process for a positive outcome for equality, it may just happen.

Ya never know.

[Blues Heron]

3. I thought there was no deadline

Plus, deadlines don't "expire" they "pass" When was the deadline if it's passed already? Why didn't it make the news as it ticked closer and closer?

[pazzyanne]

4. Here's an article on the ERA -

https://www.cnn.com/2020/01/08/politics/equal-rights-amendment-justice-department-opinion/index.html

Thanks, Phyllis Schlafly.

[Blues Heron]

6. What's the gist - CNN is not compatible w my computer

Does it say when the alleged deadline was?

[FBaggins]

7. The deadline was originally 1979

Congress later extended it to 1982

The court was considering whether Congress could extend the deadline (and/or set one in the first place), and whether ratifying states could rescind that act, when the later deadline expired and the issue was moot.

[Blues Heron]

8. OK thanks

Is it actually in the constitution?

[FBaggins]

9. It isn't

By one view, the last state necessary for ratification (VA) did so a few weeks ago. My understanding is that some state AGs were suing to have it be recognized... but the executive branch had declared that the expired deadline kept that from occurring.

While the legal issues seem clear enough... I'm surprised that RBG would make such a statement (implying that the lawsuit isn't going anywhere).

[Blues Heron]

11. me too

Doesn't bode well for passage w/out her.

[brooklynite]

12. The Constitution doesn't specify a duration for ratification...

...but the specific ERA Bill passed by the House and Senate incorporated one.

[Blues Heron]

13. Thanks brooklynite

[Jose Garcia]

17. And the 1982 extension may have been invalid

[FBaggins]

19. Right

IIRC, that's where things stood when the supposed extension ran out in 1982. A lower court had ruled that Congress didn't have the power to extend the deadline and SCOTUS determined that the issue was moot since the supposed extension had passed by the time they heard the appeal.

It's presumably even less likely to be valid to "extend" a long-expired deadline than it is to extend one that had yet to expire.

[pazzyanne]

10. The ERA was passed by Congress in l972.

The window set was seven years, or 1979. That window was extended to 1982. However states have continued to pass, and in some cases rescind, all the way to 2019. Every year since 1982, bills have been introduced to remove the deadline without that happening. Recently, I believe in December, 2019, Alabama, South Dakota, and Louisiana filed a Federal Lawsuit to prevent the ERA from being added to the 4th amendment. (How sad is that?)

[Blues Heron]

14. Thanks pazzyanne

[Polybius]

20. The expiration dates got plenty of news when they passed

The original expiration date was March 22, 1979. Before the time was up, it was extended again to June 30, 1982. They were unable to extend again, but it was all over the news in '82. I'm old, I remember.

[FailureToCommunicate]

5. Virginia just became the final needed ratifying state. I thought the ERA was on it's

way, save for the stupid legal challenges from Republican states of course.

[LongtimeAZDem]

16. The deadline for ratification was in 1979, attempts to extend that are disputed, and would

end up in the Supreme Court.

Given that Justice Ginsberg herself thinks the deadline has expired, those attempts are unlikely to prevail.

[ripcord]

21. Justice Ginsberg also mentioned the fact that several states have recinded their ratification

"So if you count a latecomer on the plus side how can you disregard states that said, 'We’ve changed our minds?'"