One of the Ten Most Important People in the History of St. Louis

The Equal Rights Amendment looked certain to be passed by the U.S. Senate until Phyllis Schlafly stepped onto the national scene.

The amendment, which had already been approved in 1972 by the House of Representatives, would have guaranteed that women would have rights equal to men under the law.

Schlafly saw the proposed amendment as a threat to the traditional concept of the family and thought it would upend the special privileges that women enjoyed, said Emma Waters, senior policy analyst at the Center for Technology and the Human Person at the conservative-leaning Heritage Foundation.

“Without any institutional support or any formal office, she managed to rally an entire movement of women that basically single-handedly defeated the Equal Rights Amendment despite massive institutional and political support for the amendment,” Waters said.

At the time, Schlafly took heat over the fact that she was promoting the ideal of women as homemakers and housewives while she was personally the leader of a movement, a political organizer, a politician, a best-selling author, a public speaker and the holder of a law degree at a time when very few women were lawyers.

“Her legacy is that she embodied the spirit of an America-First vision that truly puts freedom, faith and family as the cornerstone of our society. She was a stalwart defender of all three. She stands as an example of what it looks like when one woman puts her mind to an impossible mission and is able to rally entire generations of women around a cause.”