RICHMOND — The Virginia Senate voted Tuesday to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, a step 40 years in the making to recognize women as equal citizens.
Congress passed the constitutional amendment in 1972, but the requisite 38 states never approved it. Originally, 35 states voted to ratify the amendment, though some have since withdrawn their support.
The Virginia Senate moved to make Virginia the 36th state to approve the amendment, with some Republicans joining Democrats to send the resolution to the House.
“What kind of messages are we sending the children of Virginia when we are saying in 2012 we are still opposed to the Equal Rights Amendment?” said Sen. Yvonne Miller, D-Norfolk.
Republicans retorted that the amendment is unnecessary because the commonwealth and society already view women as equal to men and bars discrimination based on gender.
“Women have excelled to unheralded heights in the absence of this,” said Senate Majority Leader Tommy Norment, R-James City.
That’s a shortsighted view, Democrats countered.
“It seems to me there are people here who would like to repeal the whole 20th century,” said Senate Minority Leader Dick Saslaw, D-Fairfax.
