WASHINGTON -- Phyllis Schlafly, a staunch opponent of the Equal Rights Amendment, told Congress today a possible plan to eliminate Social Security benefits for dependent wives and widows is 'a radical feminist proposal.'
'It would be a tragic mistake for Congress ever to adopt any public or tax policy which encourages mothers to assign child care to others and enter the labor force,' Mrs. Schlafly told the House subcommittee on Social Security.
'The proposal to eliminate the wife's and widow's benefits should be identified as what it is,' she said, 'a radical feminist proposal to punish the woman who chooses to be a dependent wife so she can care for and nurture her own children.'
Rep. Jake Pickle, D-Texas, who chairs the subcommittee, seemed confused by her testimony and similar statements by five other women identifying themselves as 'housewives and mothers.'
'Congress has not made a recommendation' to eliminate wives' and widows' benefits, Pickle said. 'And I know of no legislation pending.'
Mrs. Schlafly explained it was a proposal contained in a Social Security administration publication two years ago, and some congressional witnesses a couple of weeks ago renewed the idea by proposing to eliminate the benefits.
Mrs. Schlafly this week moved her Eagle Forum to Washington to fight in Congress and the Supreme Court for other 'pro-family' causes.
Mrs. Schlafly, whose battle against ERA has made her the most visible woman of the political right, opened an office three blocks from the Capitol Thursday -- the first permanent base for her organization.
She operated out of her Alton, Ill., home while battling ERA passage in state legislatures around the country for the past few years.
'We think we've won the ERA issue and it's a glorious victory,' she said Thursday. Although the deadline for ratifying the ERA is not until June 30, 1982, Mrs. Schlafly said she does not see a single additional legislature approving it.
Thirty-five of the needed 38 states have approved the amendment, but none has approved it since January 1977, when Mrs. Schlafly's organization got to work.
One of the two major issues the Eagle Forum will now focus on is a Supreme Court case that seeks to have women declared eligible for the draft. The other is legislation that would repeal Social Security benefits paid to dependent wives and widows.
'We are going to make sure girls don't get drafted,' Mrs. Schlafly told reporters. If the Supreme Court rules it is discriminatory to draft men and not women, she will ask Congress to pass a law removing the draft from the jurisdiction of the federal courts.
Congress could then constitutionally pass a law providing for a male-only draft, she said.
Mrs. Schlafly charged that the 'libbers' -- as she refers to the National Organization for Women and other pro-ERA groups -- want dependent wives and widows benefits repealed because they want all women forced to go to work.
Mrs. Schlafly said she has contributed more to Social Security as a housewife than as a working woman because she has brought up six children who will pay Social Security taxes in the current or next generation.
'The dependent wife and mother -- who cares for her own children in her home -- performs the most socially necessary and useful role in our society,' she said in testimony prepared for presentation today to the House Ways and Means Committee.
Mrs. Schlafly said the Eagle Forum's budget is about $500,000 a year, including the several thousand dollars a month it will cost for the new Washington office with a staff of two women. It is largely financed, she said, through 50,000 subscriptions to 'The Phyllis Schlafly Report.'
