Oregon daily emerald., April 20, 1973, Page 9, Image 9

property. Naturally, the ERA would
invalidate this arrangement and give
each spouse equal managerial control.
Forty-two states including Oregon
have some modified version of common
law ownership of property, in which
each spouse is allowed private
ownership and control of her or his
separate property, excepting
qualifications on the right to inherit.
Those states like Oregon who give
surviving husbands the same rights as
surviving wives will not be affected by
the ERA in this area. Those states
which still offer the wife protection not
given the husband will have to either
nullify their discriminatory laws or
extend their protection to mot.
Author of the 1964 campaign book for
Barry Goldwater, A Choice Not an
Echo, Phyllis Schlafly of Alton, 111., is
one of the mo6t important opponents of
the ERA. She has reportedly organized
opposition to the Amendment in 26
states.
One of the major reasons she gives
for opposing the ERA is that it will
“take away the right of a woman to be a
full-time wife and mother. A woman
would be obligated to go out and earn 50
per cent of her children’s support
because it would be unconstitutional to
oblige one sex to do something and not
the other.”
Virtually all the law review reports
consulted in preparation for this
analysis denied that the ERA would
have such an effect. The ERA would *
simply mean that responsibility in
marriage would be individually
^ determined, instead of assigned on the
basis of sex.
Titus hoped that passage of the ERA
would be an eventual impetus towards
a governmental subsidy of
houseworkers.
“One of the ways society has
discriminated against the female is in
determining that the work that she does
isn’t worth money,’’ he said. “So, this is
the major domestic implication of the
27th Amendment. Why aren’t women
paid for the work they do in the home?
Such a subsidy would stimulate the
economy.”
Divorce
Under the ERA, grounds far divorce
would be the same for men as theyare
for women. This is already the case in
Oregon.
The ERA would not eliminate
alimony, it would merely guarantee
that a divorced party’s needs be viewed
ntividuaiiy, instead of by sex. Again
the law in Oregon is already written in
these terms.
In child care, both husband and wife
would be equally responsible. Both
spouses would also receive equal
consideration in child custody awards,
at least tnder law (hidden prejudices of
judges would still, of course, be a
factor). This equal custody con
sideration and equal support respon
sibility demanded by the ERA would
necessitate no changes in Oregon’s
present statutes.
Employment—protective legislation
In 1970, on the U.S. House floor, arch
opponent of the ERA, Rep. Emmanuel
Celler, warned: “At one fell swoop this
Amendment would wipe out all those
protective laws that we, after arduous
toil, sought to put on the statute books.”
On the other hand, proponent and
prime-mover behind the ERA in the
House, Rep. Griffiths, questioned
whether legitimately beneficial
protections granted women should be
restricted to them.
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earn less than Black men with eight
years of education.
“More than half of all families
headed by Blade women are in poverty.
More than a quarter of all families
headed by White women are in poverty.
Less than a quarter of those families
headed by Black males are in poverty.
And seven per cent of those headed by
White males are in poverty.”
A recent report from President
Nixon’s Council of Economic Advisers
shows that this gap between the earn
ings of men and women has increased
between the years 1965 to 1969.
A California Supreme Court case,
SaU’er Inn, Inc. v. Kirby, 485 P2d 529
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“One of the ways society has discriminated against
the female is in determining that the work she does isn’t
worth money . . . Why aren’t women paid for the work
they do in the home? Such a subsidy would stimulate the
economy.’’
“Some people,” Griffiths said, “have
suggested to me that labor opposes the
ERA because they feel that through the
years protective legislation has been
built up to safeguard the health of
women. Some legislation was to
safeguard the health of women, but it
should have safeguarded the health of
men, also.”
Protective legislation comes in three
general categories: (1) Laws which
confer benefits' to women (such as
minimum wages, a meal or a rest
period, provision of chairs for rest
periods), (2) laws which exclude
women from certain jobs (like bar
tendering, mining, and, in Oregon,
wrestling), and (3) laws restricting
women’s employment under certain
conditions (such as at night, for more
than a certain number of hours, or in
jobs requiring the lifting of certain
weights.)
Advocates of the ERA say the
essential problem with protective
legislation is that it views women as a
class, which is unfair to the many
women who do not fit the female
stereotype that the laws are designed to
protect.
What kind of protection, say ad
vocates, prevents a 180-pound, five
foot, 10-inch tall woman from lifting 25
pounds, and assumes a 130-pound five
foot, four-inch man can lift 100 pounds?
And what kind of protection is it which
(1971), went further than the Supreme
Court has been willing to go in
guaranteeing equal employment rights.
The California Court held that “Laws
which disable women from full par
ticipation in the political, business and
economic arenas are often charac
terised as ‘protective’ and beneficial.
“These same laws applied to racial or
ethnic minorities would readily be
recognized as invidious and im
permissible. The pedestal upon which
women have often been placed has too
often, upon closer inspection, been
revealed as a cage.’’
Whether the pedestal of protective
legislation is a cage or a saving fortress
is now largely an academic question.
There is real irony in the position of
those, such as the AFL-CIO, which
oppose the ERA because it would in
validate protective legislation.
Citing Title VII of the 1964 Civil
Rights Act, the courts have struck down
many laws which are merely restric
tive of women and have extended to
men statutes which are beneficial.
Ratification of the ERA would be a
hearty confirmation of the direction in
which the courts are now moving. It
would also prevent any backsliding into
sex-based qualifying restrictions.
Privacy
Because of the fundamental principle
behind the ERA (the law must deal with
“At one fell swoop this Amendment would wipe out
all those protective laws that we, after arduous toil,
sought to put on the statute books.”
insists women have chairs during rest
periods (required in 45 states) and
provide no child-bearing and
pregnancy complication benefits under
company temporary disability in
surance? (Only New Jersey and Rhode
Island require these benefits.)
Provisions which seem purely ad
vantageous to women often work
against them, probably contrary to the
good faith intentions of the early 20th
Century drafters of these laws.
In a series on the ERA in the Seattle
Post-Intelligencer, reporter Susan
Paynter cited the case of a woman in
Oregon who was denied a job as a press
operator. The job went to a man with
less experience because the union
contract required that women be
allowed two 10-minute rest breaks.
Finally, advocates of the ERA ask
how all this protection has served to
advance the position of the ever in
creasing number of women who are in
the work force.
President Nixon’s Task Force,
relying on figures provided by the
Bureau of the Census and the Bureau of
Labor Statistics, reported that “sex
bias takes a greater economic toll than
racial bias.”
“The median earnings of White
men,” the report continued, “employed
year-round, full-time are 17,396, of
Black men $4,777, of White women
$4,279 and of Black women, $3,194.
“Women with some college education
the unique characteristics of in
dividuals and not with a classification
based on sex), some people seem to be
afraid that men and women are soon to
be sharing public restrooms and un
dressing together in barracks and
public beach houses.
A petition drawn up by the Com
mittee for the Preservation of
Womanhood warned that the ERA
“would wipe out women’s - right to
privacy,” in just these most private
areas.
When asked if the ERA might involve
this kind of integration, Aldave sighed
and answered, “The question is
ridiculous. The courts have clearly
interpreted a constitutional right of
privacy.
“They aren’t going to sanction this
parade of horribles,” Aldave said. “It
won’t even get to the viewing stand.
Anyone who brings this question up is
using the worst sort of scare tactics.”
Sen. Birch Bayh, an ERA supporter,
agreed that the Amendment would not
violate a person’s right to privacy,
which he said would extend into
“military barracks and restrooms."
The Constitution does not actually
guarantee a ‘Tight of privacy” on its
face, though the Court has clearly in
terpreted such a right in the penumbra,
or shadow, of the first, third, fourth,
fifth, ninth and 14th Amendments.
In Griswold v. State of Connecticut,
381 U S. 478 (1886), the Court held that a
Connecticut law forbidding the use of