ERA Now?

Hell hath no fury...

Time is running out for the Equal Rights Amendment, which would guarantee legal equality for both sexes.

Only three more state legislatures must join the 35 that have already approved the measure for the ERA to achieve ratification by three-quarters of the states necessary to make it the 27th Amendment to the Constitution. But after a series of stunning defeats earlier this year, in Florida, Illinois, Nevada and North Carolina, pro-ERA forces have been in a race against the calendar: when Congress originally passed the ERA in 1972, it stipulated that the states must approve it within seven years, by March 22,1979.

Last week ERA proponents were heartened when the Justice Department notified Congress that the deadline may be extended by a new act of Congress.

Meanwhile, supporters think they have found a new weapon in their fight for ratification: an economic boycott.

The National Organization for Women (NOW) has urged other pro-ERA organizations not to hold conventions in the 15 states that have failed to ratify the amendment.-- Some 40 national political and professional groups--including the National Education Association, the National Lawyers Guild and the Democratic National Committee--have agreed to take part in the boycott, and targets are already feeling the pressure. Miami Beach authorities reckon that their city has already lost $9 million in forgone convention business as a result. For its part, NOW estimates the loss for New Orleans at $7 million; Chicago, $15 million; Las Vegas, $30 million; Atlanta, $12 million.' The boycott was born last February as the Nevada legislature was voting on the ERA. The California branches of NOW and of the League of Women Voters took out a small ad in the San Francisco Chronicle, urging weekend gamblers to stay away from Las Vegas, Lake Tahoe and other Nevada gambling spots. Recalls Jeane Bendorf, chairman of the chapter's political task force: "Nevada Governor Mike O'Callaghan called and screamed at us to stop any further ads. We realized we had hit a pressure point." At a meeting in February, the NOW national board set up an economic-sanctions committee.

One problem with the tactic is that most conventions are planned--and booked--far in advance, and the organizations are often locked into contracts with convention centers. The 54,000-member American Home Economics Association, for example, willingly canceled its plans for a 1980 convention in Las Vegas--but will still meet in New Orleans in 1978 and St. Louis in 1979. Both cities are in non-ERA states.

Another catch: cities threatened by the boycott say they would gladly pass the ERA--if only it were up to them. But by and large, they claim, it is more conservative, rural voters who have held up passage of the amendment.

Nonetheless, on the theory that all is fair in political warfare and that every little bit will help, the ERA proponents are pressing ahead with the boycott. They are now considering similar boycotts of individual tours and vacations in nonrati-fying states. Says optimistic NOW President Eleanor Smeal: "Resolutions are spreading through organizations like wildfire. It wouldn't be happening without tremendous support.'' -

* States that have not ratified: Alabama Arizona, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Nevada, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina Utah, Virginia. Idaho, Nebraska and Tennessee have voted to rescind approval.

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