A fun legal video, for a change.
8 Likes
A friend of mine who used to be high up in the DHS highlighted an amicus brief for the tariff case ruling at the ITC. It’s really well done. It’s late but I’ll post some highlights when I get a chance. The brief is from Prof. Michael McConnell from Stanford Law, John Brew, Daniel Cannistra, and Weronika Burkowski.
11 Likes
The plaintiff, Marlean Ames, alleges her employer, the Ohio Department of Youth Services, denied her a promotion and later demoted her, in both cases selecting gay candidates instead who were less qualified. Her supervisor at the time was also gay.
Ames had worked for the Department for more than 15 years and received sterling performance reviews.
I guess if the facts bear out this version of the story, I would support her. But anytime folks claim “reverse discrimination,” my bullshit detector goes off. That said, no group can be said to be without assholes, and the LGBTQ community is no exception. I hope there will be more details coming.
13 Likes
Keep in mind that SCOTUS has simply said that the case can move forward. They have not ruled in her favor on the merits. They’ve just said, basically, that if what she is alleging is true, then that would violate Title VII. So the case has been remanded back to the lower court.
16 Likes
Right? And given the heavily conservative bias of the current SCOTUS, mine is buzzing all the more loudly.
11 Likes
Huh, this one could be a problem
Unanimous decision. Help me understand?
11 Likes
That’s a weird one. A church is a church. An employer is an employer. When a church is an employer, it should have to act as an employer with regard to employment laws, even though it is a church, or stop being an employer.
Then again, I would remove a church’s tax-exempt status the moment it gave off a whiff of taking any kind of political action or started operating as a business. Religion should not be allowed to act as a front for other, non-tax-exempt activities.
16 Likes
The reasoning from the Court was that the government shouldn’t be in the business of deciding what is and isn’t a religious organization. Wisconsin was trying to argue that only proselytizing entities should be considered churches for the purposes of the tax exemption in question. Catholic Charities was saying that they are a religious organization and should qualify. SCOTUS said the state shouldn’t be in the business of deciding which types of religious organization qualify, and I’m inclined to agree with them. I mean . . . not all churches proselytize. That’s a pretty limiting definition. By that definition, the UUA wouldn’t qualify. I think SCOTUS made the right call here. The problem is the exemption existing in the first place, and that exemption, I assume, was created by statute. I agree with @DukeTrout. If you’re employing people, you should be subject to the same restrictions as any employer, with a few exceptions (I think it’s totally appropriate to allow a Baptist church to only hire pastors who are Baptist, for example). They already get an income tax break. Why should they not have to pay unemployment insurance tax? But that’s a legislative issue, not a judicial one. Write your Congresscritter.
12 Likes
Yep. I would go so far as to say hiring clergy of the religion would fall under qualifications, like having an FAA license is a qualification for a pilot.
On the unemployment insurance, I would worry that it would fall too easily under separate but equal, but to the detriment of the church employees. But that wasn’t the question in front of the court. Too bad Jackson didn’t pull a Scalia and bring it up in her opinion.
8 Likes
Yeah that’s one way to look at it. Religious organizations have long been exempt from anti-discrimination laws, specifically with regards to discrimination on the basis of religion and sex, for ministerial staff.
7 Likes
This. From what I can tell, this was the right call but a call that really shouldn’t need to be made.
Government shouldn’t be picking and chosing which religions are religious enough. But our governments should also stop favoring religions with these carve outs. I doubt there is a carve out for non-religious charities. Being a religious organization is nothing special and they shouldn’t get special treatment.
Like @DukeTrout and @danimagoo said, if a religious entity employs, they should pay for everything any other employer does and be subject to the same laws. They don’t wanna do that? Don’t employ people and keep it all volunteer based.
They should also have to pay taxes unless they qualify as a non-profit in the same exact way every non-religious non-profit does.
10 Likes
15 Likes
The high court’s 6-3 conservative majority has had plenty of chances to weigh in against these wrong-house raids. But for decades, the court has rejected several claims against law enforcement officers, making it more difficult to bring cases like this one.
On Thursday, it took a different course. Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote the opinion for the unanimous court.
Interesting. Not certain how to interpret it, but interesting.
18 Likes
Wow. That’s pleasantly surprising. I gotta read that opinion later.
13 Likes
Here’s another one that makes me wonder what is going on.
That’s because courts in that part of the country require plaintiffs in lawsuits against schools to show officials used “bad faith or gross misjudgment,” a higher legal standard than most disability discrimination claims.
The district also argued that all claims over accommodations for people with disabilities should be held to the same higher standard — a potentially major switch that would have been a “five-alarm fire” for the disability rights community, the girl’s lawyers said.
Weird…
16 Likes
This country has done a lot of bad things over the years. But it has also done a lot of really good things, and one of the best things this country has done in my lifetime is the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act. I’m happy the Court decided against weakening it. Conservatives have been predicting the end times as a result of the ADA since it was first proposed, and none of their fears have come true. The same will happen here. Other schools in other parts of the country have adapted to provide accommodations to students like her, and this one will as well.
ETA: This issue is very personal to me. I grew up with a disability. When I was in primary and secondary school, the ADA had not yet been enacted. Schools were not required to provide accommodations. Mine did anyway. Because they felt it was the right thing to do. As a result, I got to go to school. And at times, school came to me, in the hospital and in my home. I ended up a National Merit Scholar, went to college, got a BS, then an MS, and recently a JD. None of that would have been possible without my primary and secondary public schools making accommodations. Everyone should have that same opportunity, and the fact that some people don’t feel that way really pisses me off.
21 Likes
12 Likes
The passage of the ADA in 1990 also shows how much this country has changed, for the worse, since then. That bill passed with a lot of bipartisan support. Big Business opposed it, but most Republicans in Congress still voted for it. It passed the House with 377 votes, and the Senate with 91 votes. George H. W. Bush also supported it, and proudly signed it into law.
19 Likes
Anyone, anywhere, anytime can become disabled, whether permanently or merely temporarily.
Even a billionaire can break a leg on a ski slope and find their home difficult to navigate.
Only a total idiot would not understand that.
18 Likes