• ♦ - •
• ’V
*
*1
Tuesday, July 6.1982
THE OKLAHOMA DAILY. Norman. Oklahoma
page 4
/
Viewpoints
!</
Women to wage new fight
even tougher than last one
o
!•
. n « i
vk
Bobb/tt
Mt
sobran
■
by Berke Breathed
BLOOM COUNTY
N
M
I
I
by Garry Trudeau
DOONESBURY
----------------------------------------1
I
—>
7 $
(j
(
r
=il
WAR
73
W&S7 ROCKS.
C3
7
\
_*p
Letters policy
Daily staff
*./ *
J£
?
j
i'
J. <
7
MONIMLE
I
I
□a inffSB
glen &
shearer
Those feminists are correct
who blame the defeat of the
ERA on fear. But it was not
hysterical fear. It was the
rational fear that ERA would
give us more of what we have
already had too much of:
judicial imperialism.
Editor...............
Managing Editor .....
Asst Managing Editor
News Editor.........
Photography Editor
Editorial Adviser ....
Allison Cowan
......Gary Smith
Twila J. Smith
Robert Bilbrey
.......Alex Ngan
Charles T. House
SUCH...
* ‘Here and No w "by Max well Glen
and Cody Shearer is distributed by
Field Newspaper Syndicate.
UH..
HELLO.
JOANIE-
DOI
KNOUJ
you?
I
to favor the aggressive judiciary.
They lost not because they stood
for women’s rights, but because
they stood for other things too -
things they preferred not to admit.
They deserved to lose.
Joseph Sobran is a senior editor of
the National Review. His column is
distributed by the Los Angeles
Times Syndicate.
IF ONLY
WSSION CONTROL
WERE HERE NOW..
YOUR
LAUNDRY?
\
INCREDIBLE, HUH?
I DO MY0UN1
BETUEEN Mf&ONS
ba
gr<
inj
Isr
bl<
he
vit
is i
y&.ttsme.
WHO ARE YOU?
ONLY FROM n TUBE I'M
ROLANDHEDLEY. HL XT
route wondering what
I'M CONG IN A PUBLIC
LAUNDRO
1
GLENN
■»»
Yet, for all their
bravado, feminist leaders
may find that their new
campaign — electing women
to public office — will be no
easier than ratifying the
ERA.
IF ONLI
HUBERT KERE
HERE NOW...
1
Sat
var
pol
wh
an<
<
Le'
Wl
hei
W WAFT
W68XK5.
ouRm
/
YOU
LEAVE
with a
FRESH
CteN TO-
NIGHT ,
vu
NO.
I
/
I'M NOT
TALKING TO
YOU TODAY
AS OF RIGHT
NOW'
i
i
i
»
J
anpthcy
think we
KT GOOFY.
i
OOP l/HI
SYMBOL' ITS SYMBOLIC
YOU'RE NOT TALKING TO
ME TODAY BECAUSE I'M
AMAN1
INHAT ?
LEBANON?
YOU'RE SENDING
MB BACK TO
LEBANON?
HL THERE,
FELLOW
DRUDGE'
lr
E
t
LJf
/
XL
6*s
w
BUI
MAYBE (NE
SHOUP APDPT.
I
KS
i w?
7( W
0 OOP
T
.>Q,Q DOO
w
St
K0 0UOQ ■ ',<0
AB
onr wx vw.« • «x « >»>
A
YEAH, BUT
YOU KEEP
CDMNG8ACK
GO DO YOUR
LAUNDRY
/
WV
fl
Vy
I CANT BOSS I DON'T
HAVE ANY CLEAN CLOTHS.
I ONLY JUST GOT BACK
FROM SANTIAGO TH/S
V-'i'G M0RN1N6
WEAK WHEGOTMS
FROM HIS DW...
THIS NOSE IS A LONG
FAMILY TRAPFDON.
ANY aww?
I
I KNOW,
BUTTHEY
GET YOU
' OUT OF
MY HAIR
o
o
A
TERlOOKN A
LITRE W0RP1EP
-HERE.0RJ6.
0
R
I
Opinions expressed on the editorial pa;a sre those of
the signed author and do not necessarily reile,., the
views of the University of Oklahoma administration
The Publications Board assumes no responsibility for
financial obligations incurred on the behaU of The
Oklahoma Daily without authorization of the Director ot
Student Publications
Telephones—Editorial 325-3664; Editorial
Supervisor—325-4887; Business. Classified and Display
Advertising—325-2521
; FteTWORD SOUNDS Ute
J BEATING ..ND. DRUMMING.
DRUMS7. CYMBALS'.
SOUNDS LIKE
C \ CYMBAL'
&
IBM '
and white and picketing the con-
vention hall was one of the few
blemishes on party unity.
In the City of Brotherly Love.
Eleanor S meal’s National
; SOHH
' ALMN-
DROMAT.
RDLUE.
/Tlk
NOWVY PENGUINS
HAE NO NATURAL F6AR
OF WW... fT MU5T HM
B6EN TERRIBLY
CONFUSING...
J
Av
YOU REALIZE, OF COURSE
THIS UIU MAKE FOUR
COMBAT ASSIGNMENTS
IN AS MANY MONTHS
...A FON AGO IN THE
SOUTH ATLANTIC..
5OW/I5 ,
SHOOTING ATWU7
raise the articulate and poised New
Yorker’s name when cataloging
vice-presidential possibilities.
« » »
Sen Gary Hart(D-Colo.),oneof
several prospective 1984 presiden-
tial candidates, at least made a stab
at the issues last weekend Hart
hosted an “issues forum” for in-
YOUSENDMETD
U1ARZ0NESTD
GETMEOUTOF
YOURHAIRZ
Organization for Women (NOW)
was warning complacent
Democratic delegates that they had
no monopoly on women voters.
Despite their past support for the
Equal Rights Amendment (ERA),
NOW charged. Democrats deserv-
ed as much credit for “losing”
ER \ as their Republican counter-
parts. “We weren’t born
Democrats. Republicans or yester-
day,” read mans signs outside the
hall
Yet, for all their bravado,
feminist leaders may find that their
new campaign electing women to
public office — will be no easier
than ratifying the ERA. NOW’s
stunning ablility to deliver large,
color-coordinated crowds may not
translate into equally impressive
voter turnouts.
Of course, the 10-year-old battle
for the ER X has politicized an ex-
traordinary number of women. So,
too. in that period, has the eye-
opening experience of 9-to-5 work.
Xnd while not every American
woman admires the tactics of
groups such as NOW, many agree
with us views on pay equity, abor-
tion and other issues.
But widespread public support
for the ERA (73 percent last month,
according to pollster Lou Harris)
may have spoiled feminist leaders.
Like the nuclear-weapons freeze,
the ER X is a simple idea that has
elicited emotional throngs. Electing
candidates, however, is much less
awe-inspiring, doesn't guarantee
change and requires harder work.
Moreover, the switch from issues
to political races may prompt many
ERA activists to yield to a smaller
vanguard of political operatives.
W hilea more streamlined organiza-
tion might result, the shift would
probably alienate many in the cur-
rent cadre.
All of this points up to the most
poignant moment of Smeal’s "last
stand" on Saturday when, halfway
through the muggy afternoon,
many marchers switched from
chanting “We want justice” to
“Wewant power.”
* * •
Meanwhile, if anyone was
fighting for women’s rights inside
the mid-term conference hall, it was
Rep. Geraldine Ferraro (D-N.Y.)
And increasingly, party regulars
Ellen Goodmans would support it,
as they support nearly everything
that comes into vogue. And if the
Equal Rights Amendment had been
passed, they would probably in-
voke it to sanction the right of
homosexuals, like everyone else, to
marry.
Put another way, the First
Amendment would never have
passed if its authors had known
that it would eventually be used to
circumscribe the freedom of wor-
ship and to license pornography.
The Fourth Amendment would
never have passed if its authors had
foreseen the rights that would later
be read into it. The same is true of
the Fifth, Sixth, Eighth, and Ninth
Amendments. (Terrible things have
happened to the Ninth Amend-
ment. For one thing, it is never
read Has theSupremeCourt bann-
ed its use in public schools?) The
Fourteenth Amendment would
never have passed if its authors
could have guessed that everything
from racial busing to abortion
would be read into it. Some people
regard those two causes as equally
"progressive.” The point is that the
authors of the amendment, for bet-
ter or worse, intended neither.
In short, the framers of the Con-
stitution would have been very,
very careful if they had foreseen the
modern judiciary .
The wording of the Equal Rights
Amendment is innocent itself:
"The equality of rights under the
law shall not be denied or abridged
by the United States or by any state
on account of sex.” Construed as
sensible people would construe it,
this would create no problems.
Sensible people, unfortunately,
tend not to wind up on the Supreme
Court of the United States.
Brilliant people do; compassionate
people do; honest people do;
courageous people do; but not, for
some reason, sensible people.
There has grown up around the
Court an oracular mystique, a no-
tion that nine old men (or eight old
men and one lady of a certain age)
possess a special expertise that
enables them to resolve constitu-
tional brain-teasers beyond the
power of us lesser mortals. It is not
unfair to liken this superstitious
veneration of the court to the awe in
which psychiatrists were once held
as recently, say, as two weeks
ago.
But the Constitution is a lucid
document, the product of men of
the Enlightenment who believed in
reason and universalism. They had
no idea they were tying a Gordian
knot for future generations.
It has become the cliche to say
that the Constitution is a “living
document.” Functionally, this
means it should be regarded as a
blank check for an elite corps of in-
terpreters armed with special in-
IF0N13 JACK
AND BOBBY
WKE WERE NON
By JOSEPH SOBRAN
The Equal Rights Amendment is
finally dead, and the mourners are
wailing, hysterically, that it was
killed by hysteria
The columnist Ellen Goodman
says its defeat was the work of
“people who linked the ER A with
every evil from unisex toilets to
homosexual marriages.” But it is
rather a safe bet that if homosexual
marriage came into vogue, the
(T'5 W RELAT1U&5.
D£Y UV£ IN THE FALWANP5.
ANP THEY iUERE THERE-fOR
’HOSE WU FEW (MEEX5
l^ooo t^|0 ~> ooo:^e|f
w
• V/
By MAXWELL GLEN
andCODYSHEARER
Philadelphia — For the
Democrats participating in the
"love-in" here last weekend, the
sight of 300 women clad in green
terested delegates at a Hilton hotel
discotheque Few delegates actually
came to hear writer James Fallows
ton defense issues), Leslie Nulty of
the Machinists Union (on the
economy ), and Harvard University
lecturers Daniel Yergin (on energy)
and Robert Reich ton industrial
development) Nonetheless, Hart's
disco-Democrats received plenty of
press attention.
• • •
Despite Ronald Reagan’s ex-
traordinary low performance
rating in the Gallup Poll,
Democratic party pollsters are urg-
ing their candidates to avoid per-
sonal attacks on the president.
Stick to the issues, particularly cuts
in social programs, they’re advisng.
Meanwhile, Republicans con-
tinue to blame the nation’s
economic woes on the Carter ad-
ministration. ‘Tis better to concen-
trate on the past and ignore the pre-
sent, parts pollsters seem to agree.
« • «
Five weeks ago, outgoing
Secretary of Slate Alexander Haig
a native Philadelphian — asked
an old friend at the Pentagon if
he’d like to work for him at the
Slate Department. The friend
declined. According to one source
close to Haig’s would-be adviser,
the secretary wanted someone to
help him prepare fr a possible 1984
presidential bid.
•   * t
DNC Chairman Charles
Manati’s first chance to preside
over a mid-term plenary session
won him only mixed reviews.
Manatt repeatedly told delegates to
pipe down. Suggested one witness:
“What kind of conference did you
expect from a guy w ho rose through
the ranks of the Young
Democrats?"
iW i
OH
NEU. I
GUE55
THAT
EWMIN5 WHAT'5
IT. IT'S
- Wi
z
i I
«IT
axmiNG
TV"<W I__
J
YOU'RE NOT? OOHYNOT7
rpwJ IS IT SOMETHING I DID7
SOMETHING IDIDNT DO7
'HEY C'MON. GIVE
(    \ ME A HINT..
AT
iwupie
1DfKMCT
... ______ IHeHCNOKOf
™ ,»» (MlROCKS'
Fear cause of ERA death
sight into what the nation needs.
That was not at all what its framers
had in mind.
They would very likely have torn
up the Bill of Rights if they had any
idea what tortured logic would one
day be used to turn those 10 articles
into a mandate for the liberal agen-
da.
Those feminists are correct who
blame the defeat of the ERA on
fear. But it was not hysterical fear.
It was the rational fear that ERA
would give us more of what we have
already had too much of: judicial
imperialism.
There is no rational reason why
rational feminists should not share
that rational fear, unless they ac-
tually like ' way the courts have
behaved. LA backers, un-
fortuately, have seemed very much
0ooq , 1?^) J
another embar -
rassing remark
AB0UTMYIZXX5.
it @
IT'S
WAR.
tJtU/IINUHI YW-'                                _ / KUUQ-KUUV3. /
Uu yA
-ci -
The Oklahoma Daily encourages the open ex-
change of ideas, opinions and concerns among
members of the university community The staff of
the Daily may not agree with the expressions, but
it dedicates the letters section to the freedom of
that exchange
Letters to the editor should concentrate on
issues, not personalities, be typed double space;
be signed by the writer and/or writers; include a
telephone number; and be delivered in person to
the editor of the Daily at 126 Copeland Hall
OU students must include hometown,
classification and OU I D number
Anonymous letters will not be published
The Daily editor reserves the right to edit and
condense letters according to space limitations
and the editor’s judgments Great care will be
taken to insure that the message in the letter is
not altered
GOON. SAY (T.
YER ABOUT TO MAKE I GME55
YOU GOT THAT
NOSE FROM
YOUR SAP
HUH?
100 BAD
r—V ABOUTERA
Iff
n T \
j Remedy.;