Further to the recent discussion of applied legal history, I see that Patricia Seith has posted "Congressional Power to Effect Sex Equality" on ssrn. Cribbing now from her abstract:
From its passage
by Congress in 1972 to its ratification failure in 1982, the Equal Rights
Amendment (“ERA”) pivotally shaped sex equality discourse. While historians and
legal scholars have examined and analyzed its demise, its failure has been
deemed inconsequential for constitutional doctrine—conventional wisdom submits
that a “de facto ERA” was achieved through judicial action. This Article argues
that this dominant narrative has obscured the other half of the equation—the
role of Congress in implementing the “de facto ERA.” Through original archival
and legislative research, this Article offers a new account of congressional
action aimed at entrenching the substantive guarantees of the sex equality
principle. This Article introduces the Economic Equity Act to the sex equality
narrative.
Originally conceived as enforcement legislation for the ERA,
this Article shows how congressional lawmakers used the omnibus Economic Equity
Act for over a decade to articulate and advance their substantive vision of
equality for women. Lawmakers introduced successive versions of the Act from
1981 to 1996, passing over thirty enactments. This Article argues that through
the provisions of the Economic Equity Act, the women’s movement, lawmakers, and
their constituents staked claims to the emerging meaning of sex equality and the
terms of women’s economic citizenship—a critical chapter that has been written
out of the histories of sex equality.
This Article argues that this
account rewrites our history of sex equality in three important ways. First,
this Article contends that the Economic Equity Act constituted a decisive
turning point in congressional activity—away from legislation effecting
“equality in theory” through facial prohibitions on sex discrimination, to
legislation aimed at achieving substantive equality or “equality in fact.”
Second, this account redresses a fundamental gap in the sex equality literature
by showing how lawmakers advanced the Economic Equity Act in an effort to revise
New Deal-era federal law and policy premised on the norm of the male breadwinner
and female homemaker. Finally, this Article reveals the Economic Equity Act as a
foundational chapter for understanding the historical and contemporary role of
Congress in effecting sex equality. At stake for lawmakers advancing the
Economic Equity Act were the terms on which the benefits and privileges of
economic citizenship under federal law would be conferred in the wake of the
societal changes precipitated by the modern women’s movement.
The article is appearing shortly in the Harvard Journal of Gender and Law.
Here's something that I find particularly exciting; the journal is holding a panel discussion around the article this Thursday in Cambridge, featuring Congresswoman Elizabeth Holtzman and Congresswoman Patricia Schroeder, as well as Alice Kessler-Harris of Columbia's history department, Stephen Ansolabehere of Harvard's government department, Serena Mayeri of the University of Pennsylvania Law School, Patricia Seith of Stanford Law School, and Suzanne Kahn of Columbia's history department. This sounds like it'll be a fabulous discussion. I'm very sorry that I can't make it to Camrbridge for the discussion, but I think it's great that the journal is bridging history, the academy, and contemporary politics in this way and I hope that more journals reach out beyond the printed page to hold these kinds of discussions. The discussion is this Thursday 3:30 to 6:30 in Wasserstein, Room 2012. More details are here.
Update: As of March 5, a link to video of the symposium is here. This link may pull the video up directly. I hope to have a few more comments on this after I've had a chance to watch it.
Comments