Understanding the ERA
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Kelly Steffen
Vinton-Shellsburg High School
Summer 2009
Women of Protest: Photographs
from the Records of the National
Woman’s Party, Manuscript
Division,
Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.
This lesson plan is designed to be a part of a unit on Women’s Suffrage or Civil Rights. Students should have some background on Women’s Suffrage. Once suffrage was achieved, some women felt that the Constitution was lacking an amendment showing equality between the sexes. In 1923, Alice Paul proposed the first Equal Rights Amendment. Although this amendment has not been fully ratified, it has been on the Congressional schedule every year since 1923. The purpose of this lesson is to allow students the opportunity to read the ERA, listen to the opposing sides, and demonstrate for or against the ERA depending on their own rationale.
Overview/ Materials/Historical Background/LOC Resources/Standards/ Procedures/Evaluation/Rubric/Handouts/Extension
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Objectives |
Students will: · Analyze primary source photographs · Interpret the Equal Rights Amendment · Understand two opposing viewpoints on the ERA · Draw a conclusion regarding the ERA |
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Recommended time frame |
2 days |
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Grade level |
9–12 |
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Curriculum fit |
American History |
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Computer with LCD projector Poster board for picket signs Markers Handouts from NARA (Photo Analysis and Sound Recording Analysis worksheets) |
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NCSS
Standards Back to Navigation Bar |
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*Culture-a,b,d,f/Time, Continuity, & Change-b,c/Individual Development & Identity-c,g,h/Power, Authority, and Governance-a,b,c,d |
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DAY ONE: ·
Warm-up:
In the front of the room, show the following three questions:
*Once students have written their responses, you could have them
pair-share or begin a large group discussion of their answers.
*In addition to the fact-gathering from the worksheet, ask students why
Paul might be at Anthony’s grave. The second photo (see primary resource sheet–3rd image) should now be
projected and students should again fill out the NARA photo analysis
worksheet.
*Pro-ERA: Smith and Pryor
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKVd0VE23Cc&feature=related *Anti-ERA: Phyllis Schlafy from Arkansas
DAY TWO Ø Students will now take their knowledge and
apply it to a real-life demonstration. Ø Instructions for demonstration: 1. Divide class into 3 groups: reporters,
anti-Era demonstrators, and pro-Era demonstrators. 2. Inform the two groups of demonstrators that
they are going to make picket signs to use in a protest in front of the White
House. Each participant should design
their own phrase/symbolism for their sign. 3. The reporter group is to formulate
questions to ask the demonstrators.
Advise the reporter group that they are to design questions to “get
the scoop” from both sides and report back to the public. 4. Once you have given each group ample time
to prepare, find a place to protest. I
think in front of the administration’s office would be ideal. 5. Remind students to play their roles. 6. As the teacher, it is up to you how long
you would like the role-playing to play out. 7.
Once
finished, the teacher can decide to now debrief or have students move into
other roles (switch protestors with reporters). |
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Items that could be subjectively evaluated: 1. NARA photo and sound-recording analysis worksheets. 2. Homework summaries 3. Role-playing activities |
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*If time allows and a teacher wanted to add more depth, a debate would be a great extension. There are two websites that allow students to research either pro- or anti-ERA viewpoints. The websites are:
*Have students write a persuasive essay arguing their point of view. *Have students design a survey and gather and analyze data regarding ERA. |
Historical
Background according to:
www.equalrightsamendment.org
Victory for Woman Suffrage
The new century saw a profound change in the lives of women as they joined the workforce in increasing numbers, led the movement for progressive social reform, and finally generated enough mass power to win the vote. Carrie Chapman Catt and the National American Woman Suffrage Association were a mainstream lobbying force of millions at every level of government. Alice Paul and the National Woman’s Party were a small, radical group that not only lobbied but conducted marches, political boycotts, picketing of the White House, and civil disobedience. As a result, they were attacked, arrested, imprisoned, and force-fed. But the country’s conscience was stirred, and support for women’s suffrage grew.
The 19th Amendment affirming women’s right to vote steamrolled out of Congress in 1919, getting more than half the ratifications it needed in the first year. Then it ran into stiff opposition from states’-rights advocates, the liquor lobby, business interests against higher wages for women, and a number of women themselves, who believed claims that the amendment would threaten the family and require more of them than they felt their sex was capable of.
As the amendment approached the necessary ratification by three-quarters of the states, the threat of rescission surfaced. Finally the battle narrowed down to a six-week seesaw struggle in Tennessee. The fate of the 19th Amendment was decided by a single vote, that of 24-year-old legislator Harry Burn, who switched from “no” to “yes” in response to a letter from his mother saying, “Hurrah, and vote for suffrage!” The Secretary of State in Washington, D.C. issued the 19th Amendment’s proclamation immediately, before breakfast on August 26, 1920, in order to head off any final obstructionism.
Thus mainstream and militant suffragists together finally won the first, and still the only, specific written guarantee of women’s equal rights in the Constitution – the 19th Amendment, which declared, “The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.” It had been 72 years from Seneca Falls to victory, and ironically, the most controversial resolution had been written into law first. But many laws and practices in the workplace and in society still perpetuated men’s status as privileged and women’s status as second-class citizens.
The Equal Rights Amendment
Freedom from legal sex discrimination, Alice Paul believed, required an Equal Rights Amendment that affirmed the equal application of the Constitution to all citizens. In 1923, in Seneca Falls for the celebration of the 75th anniversary of the 1848 Woman’s Rights Convention, she introduced the “Lucretia Mott Amendment,” which read: “Men and women shall have equal rights throughout the United States and every place subject to its jurisdiction.” The amendment was introduced in every session of Congress until it passed in reworded form in 1972.
Although the National Woman’s Party and professional women such as Amelia Earhart supported the amendment, reformers who had worked for protective labor laws that treated women differently from men were afraid that the ERA would wipe out the progress they had made.
In the early 1940s, the Republican Party and then the Democratic Party added support of the Equal Rights Amendment to their platforms. Alice Paul rewrote the ERA in 1943 to what is now called the “Alice Paul Amendment,” reflecting the 15th and the 19th Amendments: “Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.” But the labor movement was still committed to protective workplace laws, and social conservatives considered equal rights for women a threat to the existing power structure.
In the 1960s, over a century after the fight to end slavery fostered the first wave of the women’s rights movement, the civil rights battles of the time provided an impetus for the second wave. Women organized to demand their birthright as citizens and persons, and the Equal Rights Amendment rather than the right to vote became the central symbol of the struggle.
Finally, organized labor and an increasingly large number of mainstream groups joined the call for the ERA, and politicians reacted to the power of organized women’s voices in a way they had not done since the battle for the vote.
The Equal Rights Amendment passed the U.S. Senate and then the House of Representatives, and on March 22, 1972, the proposed 27th Amendment to the Constitution was sent to the states for ratification. But as it had done for every amendment since the 18th (Prohibition), with the exception of the 19th Amendment, Congress placed a seven-year deadline on the ratification process. This time limit was placed not in the words of the ERA itself, but in the proposed clause.
Like the 19th Amendment before it, the ERA barreled out of Congress, getting 22 of the necessary 38 state ratifications in the first year. But the pace slowed as opposition began to organize—only eight ratifications in 1973, three in 1974, one in 1975, and none in 1976.
Primary
Resources from the Library of Congress
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Image |
Description |
Citation |
URL |
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No image- |
ERA Resolution |
LOC-Thomas-Congressional Records Collections |
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Warriors. Agnes
Lester, Marjorie Follette, Emily Knight, Elizabeth Van
Sickle, Carol Lester, prominent young girls of Seneca Falls, as warriors in
the Drama depicting the Progress of Woman to be given at the reception at
Seneca Falls, N.Y., on July 20, in honor of the officers and members of the
National Woman’s party in connection with their seventy-fifth anniversary
Equal Rights celebration. |
Women of Protest: Photographs from the Records of the National Woman’s Party, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. |
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Summary: Photograph of Anita Pollitzer (L,
standing) and Alice Paul (R, kneeling) at the grave of Susan B. Anthony. |
Women of Protest: Photographs from the Records of the National Woman’s Party, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. |
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Summary: Photograph of fourteen suffragists in overcoats on picket
line, holding suffrage banners in front of the White House. One banner reads:
“Mr. President How Long Must Women Wait For Liberty?” White House visible in
background. |
Women of Protest: Photographs from the Records of the National Woman’s Party, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. |
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Handout 1-
Handout 2-Document Analysis Worksheet
link:
http://www.archives.gov/education/lessons/worksheets/photo_analysis_worksheet.pdf
Handout 3-Sound Recording Analysis
worksheet link:
http://www.archives.gov/education/lessons/worksheets/sound_recording_analysis_worksheet.pdf