Mark Hatfield was a senator from Oregon and Charles Percy represented Illinois. An earlier version of this article said they were senators from Illinois and Ohio, respectively.

Phyllis Schlafly, who died this week, will remembered in history books for defeating the Equal Rights Amendment in the late 1970s. But her importance rests on more than a defeat of feminism: She gave Republicans and conservatives a sorely needed victory at a time when many predicted the demise of the party itself and with it conservatism.

When Schlafly organized the Stop ERA movement, the left appeared ascendant. Following Watergate, only 18% of the electorate considered themselves Republicans. In the 1974 midterm elections, Democrats took 49 seats from Republicans in the House, putting them pass the three-quarters mark necessary to overturn any presidential veto. Moreover, many of the new members of Congress—the so-called Watergate Babies—were on the left. Conservatism seemed to be a lost cause, and conservatives a minority within a minority party.

In the post-Vietnam War and post-Watergate period, Democrats, often joined by moderate Republicans, cut military spending, restricted intelligence gathering and pressed forward on arms-reduction treaties with the Soviet Union. On the domestic front, the left aggressively supported extending reproductive rights, made possible by the legalization of abortion in Roe vs. Wade (1973), as well as feminism, gay rights, and affirmative action. Republicans held the White House with the moderate Gerald R. Ford, but in 1976 they lost even this when Jimmy Carter won the presidency.

The ERA fight came at a good point in Schlafly’s political fortunes. In 1967, she failed in her bid to win the presidency of the National Federation of Republican Women (NFRW). The six-month contest between Gladys O’Donnell and Schlafly had spilled over into the Republican Party. Schlafly accused the Republican Establishment, represented by George H.W. Bush and George Romney (Mitt Romney’s father). Sen. Charles Percy of Illinois, Sen. Howard Baker of Tennessee, and Sen. Mark Hatfield of Oregon of secretly working against her.

“ Schlafly became the symbol of rightwing extremism to feminists and a hero to the Religious Right. ”

Schlafly made her campaign into a contest over the soul of the Republican Party. And when the votes at the NFRW national convention were counted, she had lost. She charged that voting machines had been rigged. Whether they were or not, it was clear the Republican Establishment, reacting to the Goldwater loss in 1964, didn't want a right-winger like Schlafly heading the largest Republican woman’s organization in the country.

Schlafly declared the need for a new organization of conservative women reflecting, as she put it, “a strong pro-American viewpoint, and advocate morality in government, constitutional government, a strong, national defense and free enterprise.” She proclaimed that her intention “to rebuild an army of dedicated women wearing eagles in the symbol of American freedom.” Thus the Eagle Forum was born, a national organization of conservative activist women.

The Eagle Forum was still little known when Schlafly entered into the ERA fight in 1972, spurred by a small group of activists who wanted her involvement. The broadly worded amendment had sailed through Congress with bipartisan support and was quickly ratified by many states. The ERA appeared to face little opposition, aside from Sen. Sam Erwin of North Carolina, a few unions such as the Ladies Garment Workers Union, and a few right-wing women, some who saw the amendment as part of a globalist plot for one-world government.

Schlafly unified and expanded this opposition to stop ratification of the amendment three states shy of the 38 states needed. She became the symbol of rightwing extremism to feminists and a hero to the Religious Right. In giving conservatives their first victory in years, she showed Republican Party strategists how to tap into this new constituency of religious voters

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The mobilization of religious voters helped carry Republicans into the White House under Ronald Reagan and the two Bush presidencies. An uneasy coalition within the party had been created by fusing fiscal conservatives and cultural warriors, suburban and rural voters, the Sunbelt and the Midwest, and party elites with the angry grassroots. This fragile coalition was shattered in the last decade by an economic downturn, fears of uncontrolled borders, presidential and bureaucratic overreach, perceived military failure in the Middle East, jihadist terrorism, and rapid and confusing social and cultural changes.

Once again, the 92-year-old Schlafly, now ill, caught the winds of political change as she endorsed Donald Trump for president. He tapped into her old base through his call for “Making America Great Again” and securing the nation’s borders. Trump’s nomination as the Republican Party’s candidate for president marked Schlafly’s final victory. She will be remembered as an activist who was not afraid to fight the tides of history.

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Donald T. Critchlow is a professor of history at Arizona State University and author of “Phyllis Schlafly and Grassroots Conservatism and Future Right: Forging a New Republican Majority.”