National Woman’s Party Begins Radio Series on NBC
The National Woman’s Party, led by Alice Paul, on this day began a regular 15-minute radio program devoted to women’s issues on the NBC radio network. It is believed that this was the first-ever regular radio series devoted to women’s social and political issues.
The initial broadcast featured Mabel Vernon, Executive Secretary of the National Woman’s Party. She discussed the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA), which was written and introduced by Alice Paul on July 21, 1923.
Alice Paul and the NWP represented the radical wing of the women’s rights movement at that time. Paul had drafted and introduced the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA), an amendment to the Constitution which would have grated equality to women. It was vigorously opposed by most feminist leaders at the time because they feared it would wipe out protective legislation for women, on wages, hours, and working conditions.
The ERA was introduced repeatedly after 1923. In the 1950s it finally came to a vote in the Senate, but was never passed. Support for the ERA revived in the 1960s, with the birth of a new wave of feminism. Rep. Martha Griffiths (D-Michigan) finally forced the ERA out of committee on June 11, 1970 and it was sent to the states for ratification. It was ratified by over 30 states but then ran into a fierce anti-feminist campaign and was never ratified.
Read Paul’s biography: Jill Zahniser and Amelia Fry, Alice Paul: Claiming Power (2014)
And more: Mary Walton, A Woman’s Crusade: Alice Paul and the Battle for the Ballot (2010)
Read Paul’s Oral History interview: http://content.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/kt6f59n89c/
Learn more: Christine A. Lunardini, From Equal Suffrage to Equal Rights: Alice Paul and the National Woman’s Party, 1910–1928 (1986)