What is the ERA Coalition?

In this current Congressional session, Congresswomen Ayanna Pressley and Jennifer McClellan, two dynamic and impactful Black women leaders, are our ERA Champions in the House of Representatives. Together they co-chair the Congressional Caucus on the Equal Rights Amendment, bringing renewed energy, excitement, and attention to the ERA. Congresswoman Pressley introduced a resolution affirming the validity of the Equal Rights Amendment as ratified, and Senators Murkowski and Hirono introduced a matching resolution in the Senate.

In 2019 and 2020, we successfully supported the work of Congresswoman Jackie Speier to see the House resolution brought to the floor for passage. In 2023, we worked with Senate Judiciary Committee staff to hold their first hearing on the ERA in nearly 40 years. And soon after that hearing, Senate Majority Leader Schumer held a cloture vote on the resolution to end debate and bring it up for a full vote in the Senate; while we didn’t reach the undemocratic 60 vote threshold to go to the Senate floor, we did reach a bipartisan majority.

We do the work of building support for the Equal Rights Amendment in the House and Senate on a daily basis, seeking co-sponsors for legislation and opportunities to move the process forward.

We are the ERA Coalition and Fund for Women’s Equality (ERA Coalition Forward); a movement of movements. We convene a diverse coalition of 300 partner organizations across the country, representing 80 million people. 

From gender, racial, economic and reproductive justice to labor and LGBTQ+ rights, partners represent interconnected, intergenerational, and intersectional organizations all united under one banner: to advance equality. We’re coming together to use the ERA to build a foundation for equal treatment under the law.

Our Legal Task Force has produced a legal brief titled The Equal Rights Amendment: Advocacy, Litigation, and the 38th State, the blueprint for winning the ERA beyond ratification by the 38th state. Comprising the country’s top constitutional lawyers, our Legal Task Force has the experience and strength to lead us forward as we champion the ERA movement.

The ERA Coalition’s research has driven the conversation about the ERA in recent years, showing that 94% of those surveyed believe in constitutional equality for women. But nearly 80% mistakenly believe that women are already included in the Constitution. That number is changing because of our outreach and education work.

Through our newly redesigned website, bimonthly newsletters, frequent opinion pieces and interviews, public events, and a very engaging social media presence, we are educating the American people about the urgent need for constitutional equality and mobilizing efforts across the country to finish the work that was started in 1923 when the ERA was first introduced in Congress.

As we work toward publication of the Equal Rights Amendment, we are also conducting research and tracking candidates’ positions on equality issues for national and state elections to better educate voters on where their candidates stand on gender equality. Our work includes building state-level support for constitutional equality by introducing state resolutions recognizing the validity of the ERA, and supporting the audit state statutes to identify laws and statutes that still rely on gendered language.