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On June 30, 1982, “STOP ERA” campaigners in the United States celebrated the expiration of the Equal Rights Amendment’s constitutional ratification, finally killing it 10 years after its 1972 passage in Congress.

Their sticking point was that the ERA’s ratification would have forced women into registration for the military draft, to which they were strongly opposed. In 1981, a Supreme Court decision (Rostker vs. Goldberg) had affirmed the constitutionality of the Selective Service System’s male-only registration policy on the grounds that the two sexes were “simply not similarly suited for purposes of a registration for a draft.”

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Culturally, much has changed in the meantime. Nobody has been conscripted into the U.S. military for 40 years, but since 2015, all military roles, including direct combat, have been open to women. However, while women have the right to choose combat, they are not obligated to register with the Selective Service, as men must at age 18 (eligibility for the draft ends at age 25), with serious penalties for failing to do so, such as fines, denial of federal student loans and even imprisonment.