“The Woman’s Movement Has Discovered a New Enemy—the Mormon Church”

Abstract

This chapter talks about the woman's movement that considered the Mormon church as a new enemy because of the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA). It illustrates the Church of Latter-day Saints of Jesus Christ's sudden and successful political mobilization against the ERA ratification that caught the country by surprise. It examines how ERA proponents reacted to and interacted with the Mormon church during the ERA ratification process, which elucidates the power of the church's political influence in the last quarter of the twentieth century. The chapter discusses how the Mormon church's successful mobilization pushed ERA supporters, specifically the National Organization for Women (NOW), to wholly reconceptualize parts of their own mobilization. It recounts the clear success of the anti-ERA Mormon counterforce due to their ability to reach people on the local level.