Ordinary Equality x Womanica: Martha Wright Griffiths

Ordinary Equality

Wonder Media Network LLC

News, Suffrage, Politics, History, Women's Rights, Society & Culture, Reproductive Rights, Equal Rights, Era, Abortion, Equal Rights Amendment

4 • 614 Ratings

🗓️ 21 March 2022

⏱️ 15 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

This week on the Ordinary Equality x Womanica crossover season, we're talking about "the Mother of the Equal Rights Amendment."

Listen in as Kate Kelly shares the story of Martha Wright Griffiths (1912-203) -- told, in part, in Martha's own words.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Hi, I'm Kate Kelly, and this is Ordinary Equality.
0:05.0	You must remember that when the Constitution was written, that women were regarded as property.
0:15.7	The struggle for an Equal Rights Amendment traces back to 1923 when feminist Alice Paul wrote the words that
0:22.3	became ERA. Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or bridged by the United States
0:29.3	or any state on account of sex. So as we want today, remember, forward together, backward, never. If you could change one thing about the Constitution,
0:41.1	what would it be? I would add an equal rights amendment.
0:47.6	Today, the House of Representatives cleared a hurdle to make the Equal Rights Amendment, the 28th
0:56.1	Amendment to the Constitution. The House voted to remove a deadline for states to ratify the amendment,
1:00.7	which would guarantee women the same legal rights as men.
1:08.1	Today we're talking about the mother of the ERA. In 1979, as her decades-long political career was
1:15.6	finally winding down, Martha sat down with interviewers from the U.S. Association of former
1:21.0	members of Congress. She ended up recording 165 pages of oral history. So in this episode, we're going to let Martha Wright
1:30.8	Griffiths tell her own story. When Martha Edna Wright was born, on January 29, 1912, American
1:39.7	women couldn't vote. When she was eight years old, the 19th Amendment was ratified, granting women's
1:45.7	suffrage to some, though certainly not all. Martha's family didn't have much. Her mother
1:51.4	Luella believed the education was the path forward for an independent woman.
1:56.3	When I was out of school in 1930, my father said to me, there is not money enough for you to go to school.
2:02.6	There is only money enough for one, and your brother will have to be educated.
2:07.3	Sons are always educated. And when he had gone away, my mother said, and in this family, so will
2:14.0	a daughter, because you are not going to marry and find then that husbands don't come with the guarantee that they will live forever.
2:21.7	Throughout Martha's childhood, Luella worked extra jobs, saving for her daughter's future.
2:26.8	She was a substitute rural mail carrier.
	...

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