‘The momentum is there’

History is being made this Women’s History Month.

The New York State Assembly passed an Equal Rights Amendment bill that provides for equal rights for women and men in the New York State Constitution, on March 13 by unanimous vote.

Assembly Member Rebecca Seawright (Upper East Side, Yorkville, and Roosevelt Island) sponsored the bill, which seeks to include the word “sex” into Section 11, Article 1 of the state Constitution that outlines the equality of rights based on race, color, creed or religion.

The state’s Constitution can be amended either through a constitutional convention or by a proposal in the legislature. Both methods are subject to voter approval and any proposal must be approved by two consecutive legislatures before being presented for voter approval. Now that the ERA has passed through the Assembly, it will be delivered to the Senate for consideration. If it passes there, the bill will go to a vote. Pending Senate and voter approval, New York will be the 24th state to ratify the ERA in its state constitution, Seawright noted.

“The momentum is there,” said Seawright, who acknowledged that the passing of this bill comes in the middle of Women’s History Month, as well as close to the 100th anniversary of the suffragist movement. Seawright’s ultimate hope is that the ERA will be ratified and put in the U.S. Constitution as well.

The Washington, D.C.-based ERA Coalition has endorsed the legislation. “As our society embraces the #MeToo movement, it is past time to see New York’s foundational legal document updated for the 21st century,” said the ERA Coalition’s president, Jessica Neuwirth, in a press release. “We thank Assemblywoman Seawright for being a champion for constitutional equality.”

On the national level, the ERA passed Congress in 1972 and Nevada was the 36th state to ratify it in March of 2017. By ratifying the ERA for the State of New York, Seawright hopes to give recognition and protection for women in the state as well as momentum to get the ERA passed federally.

“Women have waited more than 200 years for the equality promised to all men in the constitution,” said Seawright. “I think the timing could not be better.”