The US Employment Non-Discrimination Act (or ENDA) has gone to Washington, again, this time incarnated as H.R. 2015: the Employment Non-Discrimination Act of 2007. It reached the the House Health, Employment, Labor, and Pensions Subcommittee in September, and was slated to go to the floor for a vote last week. Monday night Speaker Pelosi's office announced a decision to delay the bill as the authors revisit recent revisions that stripped the bill of gender identity protections. Pelosi announced “After discussions with congressional leaders and organizations supporting passage of ENDA, we have agreed to schedule mark-up of the bill in the Committee on Education and Labor later this month, followed by a vote in the full House."
While the bill will be vetoed and there aren't enough votes to override the veto, if adopted the bill would bring US workers unprecedented protections from discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity.
- Read a policy memo (PDF) about the new version of ENDA, written by the Association of Senior Human Resource Executives (from May 2007)
- Read an update on the bill's status by the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force: on the formation of United ENDA, a coalition to protect the inclusion of gender identity in the bill (from Oct. 3, 2007).
A version of this ENDA has been reintroduced into US Congress regularly since 1974, when it was first introduced by Ed Koch and Bella Abzug. The current version was introduced by Rep. Barney Frank in April 2007.
The recent move by Barney Frank to dis-include gender identity from this bill was the subject of local outrage, including a recent vigil at Speaker Pelosi's office in San Francisco, as well as protests from labor organizers.
Comments
My older sister knew when she was 15 that women earned less than men; I found out when I was 12, and my niece today is 9 and knows this too. Discrimination is a constant battle that, despite still being there, is improving. I wonder, if ENDA has not passed in more than 30 years: is it really a good bill and why do we need it? Haven't important gains against discrimination been made without it?
Depends on your frame of reference. I believe it is "threat" of full equality that is a driver for gradual progress. If the ENDA is not repeatly reintroduced, do you think that society would take it upon themselves to create progress? History suggest that it is not the case.
From looking at the policy memo, this bill is not about working on the "85 cents on the dollar" problem. Here the issue is more about whether or not you can say that the reason that you are firing someone is because they are becoming transgender, or you found out they are gay. In fact, it specifically says it does not include "statistical discrimination". The question this raises for me is whether the social learning will come before or after the law in a case like this. Plenty of people in the Bay area know a transgender person, but I would bet the whole concept is still a bit foreign to a lot of people in this country.
Yes, while states are passing gender ID and sexual orientation anti-discrimination laws, I don't see the Fed adopting any such protections in my lifetime, to be perfectly honest. Not while the religious right has DC eating out of its hand.