Supreme Court to decide if anti-discrimination employment laws protect on basis of orientation

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: Washington Post

The Supreme Court on Monday added what could be landmark issues to its docket for next term: whether federal anti-discrimination laws protect on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity.

The court accepted three cases for the term that begins October. They include a transgender funeral home director who won her case after being fired; a gay skydiving instructor who successfully challenged his dismissal; and a social worker who was unsuccessful in convincing a court that he was unlawfully terminated because of his sexual orientation. The cases shared a common theme: Whether Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which forbids discrimination on the basis of sex, is broad enough to encompass discrimination based on gender identity or sexual orientation.

Some states protect gay and transgender workers, but federal courts have split on whether federal law provides protection.

Few would venture that Congress had transgender and gay Americans in mind decades ago when prohibiting discrimination on the basis of sex. But the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and some courts have said that the language is broad. The Obama administration thought so, the Trump administration has taken the opposite stance.

Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/courts_law/supreme-court-to-decide-if-anti-discrimination-employment-laws-protect-on-basis-of-sexual-orientation-and-gender-identity/2019/04/22/175fca02-6503-11e9-a1b6-b29b90efa879_story.html

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Full title: Supreme Court to decide if anti-discrimination employment laws protect on basis of sexual orientation, gender identity

Original article -

By Washington Post Staff
April 22 at 9:50 AM

The court accepted three cases for the term that begins next October. They include a transgender funeral home director who won her case after being fired; a gay skydiving instructor who successfully challenged his dismissal and a social worker who was unsuccessful in convincing a court that he was unlawfully terminated because of his sexual orientation.

The cases shared a common theme: whether Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which forbids discrimination on the basis of sex, is broad enough to encompass discrimination based on gender identity or sexual orientation.

This is a developing story. It will be updated.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/politics/wp/2019/04/22/supreme-court-to-decide-if-anti-discrimination-employment-laws-protect-on-basis-of-sexual-orientation-gender-identity/?utm_term=.d38d864d67d4

[onecaliberal]

1. Are you fucking kidding me?

[mahatmakanejeeves]

2. Adding a link to Robert Barnes' Twitter account:

BREAKING: Supreme Court to decide if anti-discrimination employment laws protect on basis of sexual orientation and gender identity

Link to tweet

[BumRushDaShow]

3. Thank you and good Monday morning!

[mahatmakanejeeves]

5. Yeah, good morning. What's so good about it, I don't know. More:

From the article:

The cases are Bostock v. Clayton County; Altitude Express Inc. v. Zarda and R.G. and G.R. Harris Funeral Homes v. EEOC.

Court to take up LGBT rights in the workplace
By Amy Howe on Apr 22, 2019 at 10:35 am

The Supreme Court announced today that it will weigh in next term on whether federal employment discrimination laws protect LGBT employees. After considering a trio of cases — two claiming discrimination based on sexual orientation and the third claiming discrimination based on transgender status — at 11 consecutive conferences, the justices agreed to review them. Until today, the cases slated for oral argument next term had been relatively low-profile, but this morning’s announcement means that the justices will have what will almost certainly be blockbuster cases on their docket next fall, with rulings to follow during the 2020 presidential campaign.

In Altitude Express v. Zarda, the justices will decide whether federal laws banning employment discrimination protect gay and lesbian employees. The petition for review was filed by a New York skydiving company, now known as Altitude Express. After the company fired Donald Zarda, who worked as an instructor for the company, Zarda went to federal court, where he contended that he was terminated because he was gay – a violation of (among other things) Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which bars discrimination “because of sex.”

The trial court threw out Zarda’s Title VII claim, reasoning that Title VII does not allow claims alleging discrimination based on sexual orientation. But the full U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit reversed that holding, concluding that Title VII does apply to discrimination based on sexual orientation because such discrimination “is a subset of sex discrimination.”

Altitude Express took its case to the Supreme Court last year, asking the justices to weigh in. In 2017, the justices had denied review of a similar case, filed by a woman who alleged that she had been harassed and passed over for a promotion at her job as a hospital security officer in Georgia because she was a lesbian. However, that case came to the court in a somewhat unusual posture: Neither the hospital nor the individual employees named in the lawsuit had participated in the proceedings in the lower courts, and they had told the Supreme Court that they would continue to stay out of the case even if review were granted, which may have made the justices wary about reviewing the case on the merits.

{snip}

This post was originally published at Howe on the Court.

Recommended Citation: Amy Howe, Court to take up LGBT rights in the workplace, SCOTUSblog (Apr. 22, 2019, 10:35 AM), https://www.scotusblog.com/2019/04/court-to-take-up-lgbt-rights-in-the-workplace/

SCOTUSblog Retweeted

In R.G. & G.R. Harris Funeral Homes v EEOC, #SCOTUS will decide specifically whether federal employment discrimination laws bar discrimination against transgender people based on (1) status as transgender people; or (2) sex stereotyping

Link to tweet

[BumRushDaShow]

6. Well you know how Mondays can be!

Whatever they come up with would be "landmark" and it was only a matter of time before this had to be decided. It all goes back to the Constitution and "equality".

[FBaggins]

4. Likely to be bad news

Don't know if we would have won with Kennedy, but Kavanaugh is no Kennedy.

[Demsrule86]

7. You can bet this court will not find for LGBTQ.

[LenaBaby61]

9. You can bet this court will not find for LGBTQ.

THIS 👆🏻👆🏻👆🏻

[Guy Whitey Corngood]

8. Aw fuck! here we go. nt

[Politicub]

10. Here we go

This will prove once and for all whether the Civil Rights Act of 1964 should be amended to include Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity or not.

[JudyM]

11. It's long overdue. Let's hope we have the votes... somehow.

[NYC Liberal]

12. Fortunately this isn't a constitutional issue.

If SCOTUS rules badly, then we just need to make sure we win in 2020 and amend the law.

[BumRushDaShow]

13. If it wasn't a "Constitutional issue" then the SCOTUS would have refused to hear it at all

because the SCOTUS only rules on cases that relate directly to the Constitution. And in this case, Section. 1 of the 14th Amendment could be applied.

Amendment XIV

Section 1.

All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside. No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/amendmentxiv

And in these cases looking at Title VII, "sex" should be considered synonymous with "gender" and doesn't explicitly mention which "gender", which is why the 19th Amendment also used the generic term "sex" -

Amendment XIX

The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.

Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/amendmentxix

I.e., if someone who is LGBTQA can "vote" regardless of "sex" ("gender" ), then why would this be any different (other than any negative biases some SCOTUS members might have)?

[Maxheader]

14. Pity we have to define anti-discrimination laws..

Somewhere I thought there were words to the affect we are all created equals and have
the rights of everyone else...

on edit...whoops, see this has already been addressed....^^^^

[BumRushDaShow]

15. Exactly!