Abstracts Womens Studies

THE “UNEQUAL WRONGS AMENDMENT”: STATE COURT INTERPRETATIONS OF THE MARYLAND EQUAL RIGHTS AMENDMENT

by Shelly Justement

This thesis answers the question: How did Maryland state courts’ interpretations of the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) affect the amendment’s meaning? This thesis explores state courts’ interpretations of the amendment in seven cases involving child support, spousal abandonment, abortion, rape, women’s access to exclusively male clubs, and gay marriage between the years of 1972 and 2006. The state courts’ decisions regarding the Maryland ERA promoted legal equality without providing equity between men and women or heterosexual and homosexual couples. The state courts often interpreted the ERA in narrow ways that did not always benefit women’s rights, and indeed, this thesis demonstrates that the courts’ rulings in ERA cases did not produce material equality between men and women or queer and straight couples. The courts’ narrow interpretations of the ERA were reflected by the fact that the judges interpreted the words of the amendment literally without consideration of Marylanders’ socioeconomic realities; the judges limited the reach of the ERA to state actions, not the actions of private individuals or organizations; and the judges limited the application of the ERA to cases in which men and women were treated as separate classes. In examining the consistently narrow nature of the judicial interpretations of the ERA, this thesis acknowledges the limitations of the ERA for women’s as well as gay and lesbian rights in Maryland. While benefits to men did not inherently mean that the courts took rights away from women, the courts’ interpretations of the ERA ended up limiting women’s equity with men more often than promoting it.