The claim that under the 14th amendment of the constitution, which declares that no state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges and immunities of citizens of the U.S. assumes that the practice of law is one of the privileges and immunities of women as citizens to engage in any and every profession.
Civil law has recognized wide differences in the spheres and destinies of man and woman. Man is woman’s protector and defender. Timidity and delicacy belong to the female. The founders of the common law believed that a woman had no legal existence apart from her husband. Their destiny is to become wives and mothers.
Judgement affirmed
FACTS:
As part of the Michigan system for controlling the sale of liquor, bartenders are required to be licensed in all cities, but no female may be so licensed unless she be “the wife or daughter of the male owner” of a licensed liquor establishment.
The case is here on direct appeal from an order of the District Court, denying an injunction to restrain the enforcement of the Michigan law. The claim is that Michigan cannot forbid females generally from being barmaids and at the same time make an exception in favor of the wives and daughters of the owners of liquor establishments.
ISSUE:
WON the Equal Protection of the Laws Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment barred Michigan from making the classification the State has made between wives and daughters of owners of liquor places and wives and daughters of non-owners.
HELD: No.
RATIO:
(The Fourteenth Amendment did not tear history up by the roots, and the regulation of the liquor traffic is one of the oldest and most untrammeled of legislative powers.
Michigan could, beyond question, forbid all women from working behind a bar. This is so despite the vast changes in the social and legal position of women. The fact that women may now have achieved the virtues that men have long claimed as their prerogatives and now indulge in vices that men have long practiced, does not preclude the States from drawing a sharp line between the sexes, certainly, in such matters as the regulation of the liquor traffic.)
The Constitution does not require situations 'which are different in fact or opinion to be treated in law as though they were the same.' Since bartending by women may, in the allowable legislative judgment, give rise to moral and social problems against which it may devise preventive measures, the legislature need not go to the full length of prohibition if it believes that as to a defined group of females other factors are operating which either eliminate or reduce the moral and social problems otherwise calling for prohibition. Michigan evidently believes that the oversight assured through ownership of a bar by a barmaid's husband or father minimizes hazards that may confront a barmaid without such protecting oversight. This Court is certainly not in a position to gainsay such belief by the Michigan legislature. If it is entertainable, as we think it is, Michigan has not violated its duty to afford equal protection of its laws. We cannot cross-examine either actually or argumentatively the mind of Michigan legislators nor question their motives.
Nor is it unconstitutional for Michigan to withdraw from women the occupation of bartending because it allows women to serve as waitresses where liquor is dispensed.
The District Court has sufficiently indicated the reasons that may have influenced the legislature in allowing women to be waitresses in a liquor establishment over which a man's ownership provides control. Nothing need be added to what was said below as to the other grounds on which the Michigan law was assailed.
**What if it’s a female owner? Gender classification.
What is the basis of distinction?
Heigthened
Mr. Justice RUTLEDGE, with whom Mr. Justice DOUGLAS and Mr. Justice MURPHY join, dissenting.
The statute arbitrarily discriminates between male and female owners of liquor establishments. A male owner, although he himself is always absent from his bar, may employ his wife and daughter as barmaids. A female owner may neither work as a barmaid hereself nor employ her daughter in that position, even if a man is always present in the establishment to keep order. This inevitable result of the classification belies the assumption that the statute was motivated by a GOESART vs. CLEARY
legislative solicitude for the moral and physicial well-being of women who, but for the law, would be employed as barmaids. Since there could be no other conceivable justification for such discrimination against women owners of liquor establishments, the statute should be held invalid as a denial of equal protection.
Gudeldig, etc. v Aiello et al. 1974
California has administered a disability insurance system that pays benefits to persons in private employment who are temporarily unable to work because of disability not covered by workmen’s compensation for almost 30 years. This is funded from contributions deducted from the wages of participating employees. Such participation, which requires an employee to contribute one percent of his salary ($85 max. annually), is mandatory unless the employees are protected by voluntary private medical plans approved by the State. These contributions are placed in the Unemployment Compensation Disability Fund.
In the event a participant employee suffers a compensable disability, he can receive a “weekly benefit amount” to be paid on the eighth day of disability. If he is hospitalized, the payment would be on the 1st day of hospitalization and he can also get additional benefits of
$12 per day). Weekly benefit amounts for one disability are payable for 26weeks so long as the total amt paid doesn’t exceed one-half of the wages received during the base period while additional benefits are for a max of 20days.
The individual employee is insured against the risk of disability from a no. of mental or physical illness(es) and mental or physical injuries. It is not every disabling condition that triggers the obligation to pay benefits though. No benefits are paid for a single disability beyond 26 weeks or for a disability resulting from individual’s court commitment as a dipsomaniac, drug addict or sexual psychopath. 2626 of Unemployment Insurance Code also excludes disabilities resulting from pregnancy.
Gudelgig, the Director of the California Dept of Human Resources is responsible for the administration of this program. Aiello et al. became pregnant and suffered employment disability as a result of their pregnancies.
Three of the appellees’ disabilities are attributable to abnormal complications encountered during their pregnancies while Jaramillo experienced a normal pregnancy, which is the sole cause fo her disability.8 Gudelgig applied 2626 of UIC to preclude the payment of benefits to appellees. Thus, the appellees were ruled ineligible for disability benefits and are now suing to enjoin its enforcement and are challenging the constitutionality of such provision.
Because of the Rentzer v Calif Unemployment Insurance Appeals Board and the revised administrative guidelines that resulted from it, three of the appellees whose disabilities were attributable to causes other than normal pregnancy and delivery, 8 See meaning of disability as defined in 2626 of
Unemployment Insurance Code, page 2488 of case.
became entitled to benefits under the program and their claims have since then been paid.
Issue : WON the California disability insurance program invidiously discriminates against Jaramillo and others similarly situated by not paying insurance benefits for disability that accompanies normal pregnancy and childbirth.
\Underlying Issue: WON the Equal Protection Clause requires such policies to be sacrificed in order to finance the payment of benefits to those whose disability is attributable to normal pregnancies.
No.
California intended to establish this benefit system as an insurance program to function in accordance with insurance concepts. It never drew on general state revenues to finance disability or hospital benefits. The one-percent contribution bears a close and substantial relationship to the level of benefits payable and to the disability risks insured under the program. Over the years, California has been committed to not increasing the contribution rate above the one-percent level. It has sought to provide the broadest possible disability protection that would be affordable by even those with low-incomes.
To order the State to pay benefits for disability accompanying normal pregnancy and delivery is to order them to make reasonable changes in the contribution rate, the max benefits allowable and other variables affecting the solvency of the program. These variables represent a policy determination by the State.
California doesn’t discriminate with respect to persons or groups which are eligible for disability insurance protection under the program. The classification challenged in this case relates to the asserted
“underinclusiveness” of the set of risks that the State has selected to insure. The State has not chosen to insure all risks of employment disability and this decision is reflected in the level of annual contributions exacted from participating employees. Plus, there is no evidence that the selection of risks insured worked to discriminate against any definable group or class from the program.
The Court has held previously that, consistent with the Equal Protection Clause, “a State may take one step at a time, addressing itself to the phase of the problem which seems acute to the legislative mind…The legislature may select one phase of field and apply a remedy there, neglecting others.” Particularly with respect to social welfare programs, so long as the line drawn by the State is rationally supportable, the Courts will not interpose their judgement as to the appropriate stopping point.
With respect to how a change of the variables would result in a more comprehensive program, the Court expressed that such would inevitably require state subsidy or some other measure. The Court held that the State has a legitimate interest in maintaining the self-supporting nature of its insurance program and in distributing the available resources in such a way to keep benefit payments at an adequate level for disabilities covered. Also it has legitimate concern in maintaining the contribution rate at a level that won’t unduly burden participating employees. Moreover, it said that here is nothing in the Consti that requires the State to subordinate or compromise its legitimate interests GEDULDIG vs. AIELLO
solely to create a more comprehensive social insurance program that it already has.
Brennan’s dissent:
Despite the Code’s broad goals and scope of coverage, compensation is denied for disabilities suffered in connection with a “normal pregnancy” – disabilities suffered only by women. By singling out for less favorable treatment a gender-linked disability peculiar to women, the State has created a double standard for disability compensation. One set of rules is applied to females while another to males. This is sex discrimination. Where the State employs legislative classifications with reference to gender-linked disability risks, “the Court is not free to sustain the statute on ground that iot rationally promotes legitimate govtl interests; rather such classifications can be sustained only when the State bears the burden of demonstrating that the challenged legislation serves overriding or compelling interests that cannot be achieved by more carefully tailored legislative classification or by the use of feasible, less drastic means.”
July 1, 1982
JUSTICE O'CONNOR FACTS:
In 1884, the Mississippi Legislature created the Mississippi Industrial Institute and College for the Education of White Girls of the State of Mississippi, now the oldest state-supported all-female college in the United States. The school, known today as Mississippi University for Women (MUW), has from its inception limited its enrollment to women.
In 1971, MUW established a School of Nursing, initially offering a 2-year associate degree. Three years later, the school instituted a 4-year baccalaureate program in nursing and today also offers a graduate program. The School of Nursing has its own faculty and administrative officers and establishes its own criteria for admission.
Respondent, Joe Hogan, is a registered nurse but does not hold a baccalaureate degree in nursing. Since 1974, he has worked as a nursing supervisor in a medical center in Columbus, the city in which MUW is located. In 1979, Hogan applied for admission to the MUW School of Nursing's baccalaureate program. Although he was otherwise qualified, he was denied admission to the School of Nursing solely because of his sex.
Hogan filed an action in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Mississippi, claiming the single-sex admissions policy of MUW's School of Nursing violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Hogan sought injunctive and declaratory relief, as well as compensatory damages.
Issue
WON the state statute which prevented men from enrolling in MUW violate the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment
Holding
Yes The Court held that the state did not provide an
"exceedingly persuasive justification" for the gender-based distinction. The state's argument, that the policy constituted educational affirmative action for women, was "unpersuasive" since women traditionally have not lacked opportunities to enter nursing.
Ratio
We begin our analysis aided by several firmly established principles. Because the challenged policy expressly discriminates among applicants on the basis of gender, it is subject to scrutiny under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. That this statutory policy discriminates against males rather than against females does not exempt it from scrutiny or reduce the standard of review. Our decisions also establish that the party seeking to uphold a statute that classifies individuals on the basis of their gender must carry the burden of showing an
"exceedingly persuasive justification" for the classification. The burden is met only by showing at least that the classification serves "important governmental objectives and that the discriminatory means employed" are "substantially related to the achievement of those objectives."
Care must be taken in ascertaining whether the statutory objective itself reflects archaic and stereotypic notions. Thus, if the statutory objective is to exclude or
"protect" members of one gender because they are presumed to suffer from an inherent handicap or to be innately inferior, the objective itself is illegitimate.
If the State's objective is legitimate and important, we next determine whether the requisite direct, substantial relationship between objective and means is present.
The purpose of requiring that close relationship is to assure that the validity of a classification is determined through reasoned analysis rather than through the mechanical application of traditional, often inaccurate, assumptions about the proper roles of men and women.
The State's primary justification for maintaining the single-sex admissions policy of MUW's School of Nursing is that it compensates for discrimination against women and, therefore, constitutes educational affirmative action. As applied to the School of Nursing, we find the State's argument unpersuasive.
In limited circumstances, a gender-based classification favoring one sex can be justified if it intentionally and directly assists members of the sex that is disproportionately burdened. However, we consistently have emphasized that "the mere recitation of a benign, compensatory purpose is not an automatic shield which protects against any inquiry into the actual purposes underlying a statutory scheme."
It is readily apparent that a State can evoke a compensatory purpose to justify an otherwise discriminatory classification only if members of the gender benefited by the classification actually suffer a disadvantage related to the classification. Mississippi has made no showing that women lacked opportunities to obtain training in the field of nursing or to attain positions of leadership in that field when the MUW School of Nursing opened its door or that women currently are deprived of such MISSISSIPPI UNIV. SCHOOL for WOMEN vs.
opportunities. In fact, in 1970, the year before the School of Nursing's first class enrolled, women earned 94 percent of the nursing baccalaureate degrees conferred in Mississippi and 98.6 percent of the degrees earned nationwide. As one would expect, the labor force reflects the same predominance of women in nursing.
Rather than compensate for discriminatory barriers faced by women, MUW's policy of excluding males from admission to the School of Nursing tends to perpetuate the stereotyped view of nursing as an exclusively woman's job. By assuring that Mississippi allots more openings in its state-supported nursing schools to women than it does to men, MUW's admissions policy lends credibility to the old view that women, not men, should become nurses, and makes the assumption that nursing is a field for women a self-fulfilling prophecy. Thus, we conclude that, although the State recited a "benign, compensatory purpose," it failed to establish that the alleged objective is the actual purpose underlying the discriminatory classification.
Thus, considering both the asserted interest and the relationship between the interest and the methods used by the State, we conclude that the State has fallen far short of establishing the
"exceedingly persuasive justification" needed to sustain the gender-based classification.
Accordingly, we hold that MUW's policy of denying males the right to enroll for credit in its School of Nursing violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
JUSTICE POWELL, with whom JUSTICE REHNQUIST joins, dissenting.
.
Of the State's 8 universities and 16 junior colleges, all except MUW are coeducational. At least two other Mississippi universities would have provided respondent with the nursing curriculum that he wishes to pursue. No other male has joined in his complaint.
Nor is respondent significantly disadvantaged by MUW's all-female tradition. His constitutional complaint is based upon a single asserted harm: that he must travel to attend the state-supported nursing schools that concededly are available to him. The Court characterizes this injury as one of "inconvenience."
The arguable but recognized benefits of single-sex colleges must also be considered. They provide an element of diversity, and [an environment in which women] generally, speak up more in their classes, hold more positions of leadership on campus, and have more role models and mentors among women teachers and administrators."
The issue in this case is whether a State transgresses the Constitution when it seeks to accommodate the legitimate personal preferences of those desiring the advantages of an all-women's college. In my view, the Court errs seriously by assuming that the equal protection standard generally applicable to sex discrimination is appropriate here. That standard was designed to free women from "archaic and overbroad generalizations . . . ." In no previous case have we applied it to invalidate state efforts to expand women's choices. Nor are there prior sex discrimination decisions by this Court in which
a male plaintiff, as in this case, had the choice of an equal benefit.
By applying heightened equal protection analysis to this case, the Court frustrates the liberating spirit of the Equal Protection Clause. It prohibits the States from providing women with an opportunity to choose the type of university they prefer.
FACTS:
• Petitioner, then a 17 ½ yr old male, was charged
• Petitioner, then a 17 ½ yr old male, was charged