As there was no exemption for educational institutions, as there had been in Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, WEAL launched a national campaign filing a class action suit against every college and university in the United States.
[11] It was their most successful campaign to reduce sexism,[8] as it allowed them to compile statistics on the level of discrimination in academia and press the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, (HEW) to enforce the executive orders.
[12][13] WEAL established a tax-exempt fund which supported lawsuits and monitored implementation and enforcement of Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, dealing with academic discrimination in pay and tenure.
[15] Those who remained with WEAL, filed a sex-discrimination case in 1973, Frontiero v. Richardson to secure military benefits for the spouse of a female officer.
[16] In 1977, they won a court order in Adams v. Califano, requiring HEW and the Department of Labor to enforce federal law and hire adequate staff to clear the pending cases of sex-discrimination.