My Mother Deborah Blackburn (Documentary Photo #56y3y): I can remember thinking the protests were silly. We were living in Lewiston, and Matthew was four years old. The news coverage of the women collapsing was funny. At least, everybody was laughing. |
The fact that Cecil resigned as Governor isnt that special. However, it marks the occasion when the Idaho legislature rescinded their 1972 ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment. I suppose the void left by a departing Democratic governor made the Republican Senate feel it was time to clean a little house. Local supporters of the ERA staged a protest on the steps of the capital that was supposed to culminate in a candlelight march up Table Rock. The organizers didnt fully reckon the distance however, and it became something of an endurance test as ladies dropped like shot deer. The last of the protesters, a tough group of younger women, stopped three quarters of the way up on the future site. They sang solidarity songs and decided, with respect to their feminist heritage, to burn their bras. Luckily, no one had matches because several counties had been declared federal disaster areas due to drought. Evidence at the site: one bra, circa 1977 (J.C. Penny's, 36B). It's unknown if the bra is related to the protest march since the site was also a popular make-out point. |
Chairperson of the Idaho Chapter of NOW Joanne Stonebreaker (Documentary Photo #ww12j): The 1977 reversal of the ERA was the most serious blow to the women's movement in the west. I think it fair to say that we have never recovered. |