Schlafly Son Remembers ‘Sweetheart of The Silent Majority’

Conservative icon Phyllis Schlafly, 92, passed away on Monday just after 3:00 p.m. at her home in Ladue, Missouri surrounded by family. The”godmother the conservative movement” and “sweetheart of the silent majority,” Schlafly was instrumental in launching and shaping the modern day conservative movement. Schlafly was active in politics for more than one quarter of all American history and has been at the center of nearly every political battle since 1945. She is survived by her six children, sixteen grandchildren, and three great grandchildren. Below is tribute written by her son Andy Schlafly.

Once a century, history produces someone who changes an entire field forever, as Shakespeare did. With her unique blend of originality, hard work, humor, toughness, and perseverance, Phyllis Schlafly had an immense impact on politics that could last forever.

Nearly every meaningful social debate today is centered around a position that Phyllis Schlafly originally led on, from pro-life, to teaching your children at home, to the immigration and trade positions that became the centerpiece of Donald Trump’s campaign.

Phyllis carved a place for the conservative movement in the Republican Party with her bestselling work, A Choice Not an Echo (1964), and then established the permanency of the movement with STOP ERA beginning in the summer of 1972.
Phyllis has been the architect, the bricklayer, and the interior designer of the conservative movement. It does not exist where she has not worked to build it, as in Europe. There have been others, of course, but none as effective, none as inspirational, and none so consistently right on controversial issues. It is difficult to find a conservative who has disagreed with her on a major issue and still remained viable. That is not because she ever held a grudge (she didn’t), but because she has been right virtually every time, often years ahead of everyone else.

Phyllis did the impossible in stopping ERA in the 1970s, when only 32 out of the 635 in all of Congress had voted against it and the media and both parties promoted it enormously. She was the first to recognize the importance of social issues in politics, and she gave conservative values a powerful voice when no one else thought it possible. She single-handedly made “stay at home mom” an acceptable lifestyle for educated women, after feminists had demonized it in the late 60s and 70s. Phyllis’s unique “Homemaker of the Year” award, scorned by feminists when it began, is now being copied by mainstream civic groups.