Women's History Month

Floor Speech

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Ms. SPEIER. I thank the gentlewoman from New Jersey for bringing us together tonight to talk about one of the most fundamental issues facing women in this country. I would hope that we would do these Special Orders on a monthly basis or maybe even more frequently to kind of beat the drum about how important it is for us to address this issue.

Today we see everything we need to see to convince us of the need to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment and put women's equality into the Constitution. We have a pay gap that has not closed where women are making 79 cents for every dollar that men make. For African American women that is 63 cents, and for Latina women it is 54 cents for every dollar earned by a man.

In fact, women in this country have to work until April 15 of the following year--tax day, ironically--to make as much money as their male counterparts. We can't afford that. We can't afford that in a country that speaks of equality.

Meanwhile, we have a Congress and State legislators who are focused like a laser beam on attacking women's health. We just spent 5 hours today in a hearing of a special committee designed specifically to attack women's health. Since the start of 2016--merely 2 months ago, and for the last 2 months--there have been more than 201 anti-choice bills introduced in State legislatures across this country, efforts to undermine a woman's right to choose.

We have a Supreme Court seat at stake and issues of gender equality hanging in the balance. It is important to quote what the late Justice Scalia said about discrimination against women. He was a constitutional expert, an originalist, and he said the following:

``Certainly the Constitution does not require discrimination on the basis of sex. The only issue is whether it prohibits it. It doesn't.''

When I read that quotation by Justice Scalia--may he rest in peace--I had shivers up and down my spine because it was so direct. It was so clear. It makes the point that the Constitution of this country does not prohibit discrimination based on sex, even though the vast majority of Americans believe it is already in the Constitution.

Ninety-six percent of U.S. adults believe that male and female citizens should have equal rights, and 72 percent mistakenly believe it is already in the Constitution. As Justice Scalia pointed out, it is not.

So what does that mean?

That means that every single woman in this country can be subject to discrimination and not have a legal foot to stand on.

Probably one of the most obvious cases is the case of Peggy Young. Peggy Young worked for United Parcel Service for 10 years. She was a good worker, a hard worker. And then, lo and behold, she gets pregnant. She gets pregnant. She goes to her supervisor and she says: I am pregnant.

He says: Okay. Go to your doctor and find out what accommodations you will require.

She went to her doctor, and her doctor said: Well, you can do anything except you can't lift more than 10 pounds.

So she came back to her supervisor and said: I can do anything except I can't lift more than 10 pounds.

He said: Oh, my gosh, that is a terrible liability.

For all intents and purposes, she was fired from her job. She was told she will have to take a leave of absence, that she will not be paid, and that she would not be eligible for health benefits. So her entire pregnancy she had no prenatal care and no health insurance.

Now, what makes this story particularly insidious is that during that same timeframe, men at the United Parcel Service who had heart disease, heart attacks, had had a DUI, or had diabetes were asked to go to their doctors and find out what accommodations they should propose. Some of them came back with the exact same accommodation: that they could not lift more than 10 pounds.

What did United Parcel Service do? United Parcel Service accommodated them. That is profound discrimination.

But guess what. Peggy Young filed a lawsuit. It went all the way to the Supreme Court, and it got remanded. It got remanded in part because not only did she have to prove that there was discrimination, which clearly there was; she had to prove that it was intentional discrimination by United Parcel Service, and she couldn't prove that.

Now, in all the other forms of discrimination, whether it is based on race or religion, you only have to prove that there was discrimination, not that there was intentional acts of discrimination. So that is why it is so important that we get this in the Constitution.

We have a new generation of women who are more independent, more able to support themselves, and more politically empowered than ever. I just read an article that shows single women are now our most potent political force in this country. Single women--whether they are single never been married, single divorced, single separated, single--are our most potent electoral force. They deserve the right to full legal equality under our Constitution. How can this body, of all bodies, not recognize the importance of equality among men and women?

So I have introduced H.J. Res. 51. It is very simple.

The ERA was introduced first in 1923 by Alice Paul, and introduced every Congress since then, and then it was introduced and actually passed the House and passed the Senate. It then had to be ratified by three-quarters of the States. Unfortunately, when that was drafted, in the preamble they put a timeline. It was ratified by 35 States, but not 38. So it came back to Congress, and they amended the preamble and extended the length of time in which the ERA could be passed by other States. And then nothing happened.

What this resolution does--and it would only require a majority of the Members of this body to pass it--is basically use the precedent and take the preamble and the time deadline and just strike it.

There is no need for a deadline in a constitutional amendment. Most constitutional amendments have not been subject to a deadline. There is precedent that they were willing to change it as it relates to the ERA, and I say let's make it yet another precedent and just take the timeline out of it. That would give us the opportunity to get three more States to pass the ERA, to ratify it.

We already know in Virginia it has been passed by the senate, and we are waiting for action in the house. As my good friend from Florida said, in Florida they could pass it, conceivably, now.

So why not do what is fundamentally right? Why not do what is so simple? Twenty-four simple words, that is all the ERA is. It is on one page, and it is simply: ``Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.''

The time has come, Members, and I applaud my good colleague from New Jersey for bringing us together. We should do it again. I enjoy working with you on any number of issues.

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