From February 13, 1980: Virginia had taken up the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) across several legislative sessions in the 1970s, where it failed every time. The closest the amendment came to ratification in the Commonwealth was during the 1980 legislative session when then-Lt. Governor Charles Robb was expected to break a tie in the Senate in favor of the ERA. But Republican Senator John Chichester of Fredericksburg used a parliamentary maneuver to abstain from voting, preventing a full 40-member vote. Under Senate rules at the time, an absolute majority of the Senate -- or at least 21 votes -- was required for approval of a Constitutional amendment. "So those favoring passage of the ERA wound up in the ironic position of needing one more vote against their cause to give them the victory they sought," The Washington Post reported at the time. The amendment went down in defeat, and two years later the ERA supposedly expired without Virginia's ratification. Forty years later, a very different General Assembly makes history, becoming the 38th and final state needed for ratification in the U.S. Constitution. But more legal hurdles remain.

WVEC