This clause of the 14th … Harlan went on to argue that because (1) "public conveyances on land and water" use the public highways, and (2) innkeepers engage in what is "a quasi-public employment", and (3) "places of public amusement" are licensed under the laws of the states, excluding blacks from using these services was an act sanctioned by the state. The Act provided that all persons born in the United States were citizens (contrary to the Supreme Court's 1857 decision in Dred Scott v. Sandford), and required that "citizens of every race and color ... [have] full and equal benefit of all laws and proceedings for the security of person and property, as is enjoyed by white citizens."[9]. Subsequently, many ex-Confederate states then adopted Black Codes following the war, with these laws severely restricting the rights of blacks to hold property, including real property (such as real estate), and many forms of personal property, and to form legally enforceable contracts. [78] That level of scrutiny was boosted to an intermediate level in Craig v. Boren (1976). The Equal Protection Clause is part of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. The meaning of the Equal Protection Clause has been the subject of much debate, and inspired the well-known phrase "Equal Justice Under Law". Pdf. 30, p. 695 (2008-2009). A classification having some reasonable basis does not offend against that clause merely … "[58] In Lawrence v. Texas (2003) the Supreme Court added: "Equality of treatment and the due process right to demand respect for conduct protected by the substantive guarantee of liberty are linked in important respects, and a decision on the latter point advances both interests"[59] 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. While Vinson was still Chief Justice, there had been a preliminary vote on the case at a conference of all nine justices. that the statute in question had its origin in the purpose, not so much to exclude white persons from railroad cars occupied by blacks, as to exclude colored people from coaches occupied by or assigned to white persons  ... [I]n view of the Constitution, in the eye of the law, there is in this country no superior, dominant, ruling class of citizens. It was the most influential of these men, John Bingham, who was the principal author and drafter of the Equal Protection Clause. [66], All of this is known as "tiered" scrutiny, and it has had many critics, including Justice Thurgood Marshall who argued for a "spectrum of standards in reviewing discrimination", instead of discrete tiers. In other words, persons similarly situated must be similarly treated. In the view of various liberal scholars, the election of Richard Nixon in 1968 meant that the executive branch was no longer behind the Court's constitutional commitments. This was a significant decision; freedom-of-choice plans had been very common responses to Brown. Harlan also relied on the fact that Section Two of the Fourteenth Amendment "expressly recognizes the States' power to deny 'or in any way' abridge the right of their inhabitants to vote for 'the members of the [state] Legislature. [36] In contrast, at that time African American men had full voting rights in five states. Citation22 Ill.404 U.S. 71, 92 S. Ct. 251, 30 L. Ed. At issue was the controversial recount in Florida in the aftermath of the 2000 presidential election. "Originalism and Loving v. Virginia", For a summary of the social, political and historical background to, For a skeptical evaluation of Harlan, see, For a comprehensive history of school desegregation from, Reynolds, Troy. We do not believe the Fourteenth Amendment was ever intended to prohibit this. In Shelley v. Kraemer (1948), the Court showed increased willingness to find racial discrimination illegal. Under this theory, equal protection jurisprudence has been applied to voting rights. [emphasis added]. Warren discouraged other justices, such as Robert H. Jackson, from publishing any concurring opinion; Jackson's draft, which emerged much later (in 1988), included this statement: "Constitutions are easier amended than social customs, and even the North never fully conformed its racial practices to its professions". The first truly landmark equal protection decision by the Supreme Court was Strauder v. West Virginia (1880). [41] The Court, speaking through Justice Henry B. However, in the 1976 case of Craig v. Boren, the Court added another tier of scrutiny, called "intermediate scrutiny", regarding gender discrimination. [89] On the other side, it is argued that the purpose of the Equal Protection Clause is to prevent the socio-political subordination of some groups by others, not to prevent classification; since this is so, non-invidious classifications, such as those used by affirmative action programs, should not be subjected to heightened scrutiny. Partly because of that enigmatic phrase, but mostly because of self-declared "massive resistance" in the South to the desegregation decision, integration did not begin in any significant way until the mid-1960s and then only to a small degree. The result was racially disparate, however, since the refusal supposedly prevented mostly African-Americans and Hispanics from moving in. [14] After the 13th amendment the South began to institute black codes which were restrictive laws seeking to keep Black Americans in a position of inferiority. [79], The Supreme Court has been disinclined to extend full "suspect classification" status (thus making a law that categorizes on that basis subject to greater judicial scrutiny) for groups other than racial minorities and religious groups. [77], In 1971, the U.S. Supreme Court decided Reed v. Reed, extending the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to protect women from sex discrimination, in situations where there is no rational basis for the discrimination. This is especially evident in the charter school system where parents of students can pick which schools their children attend based on the amenities provided by that school and the needs of the child. Many view it as the attempt to uphold the professed “all men are created equal” clause written in the Constitution. This page was last changed on 3 April 2019, at 16:12. The Fourteenth Amendment's Equal Protection Clause requires states to practice equal protection. [63], Whatever its precise origins, the basic idea of the modern approach is that more judicial scrutiny is triggered by purported discrimination that involves "fundamental rights" (such as the right to procreation), and similarly more judicial scrutiny is also triggered if the purported victim of discrimination has been targeted because he or she belongs to a "suspect classification" (such as a single racial group). In Lawrence v. Texas (2003), the Court struck down a Texas statute prohibiting homosexual sodomy on substantive due process grounds. It has inspired the well-known phrase "Equal Justice Under Law". Baker’s argument revolved around the Supremacy Clause. The Equal Protection Clause provides that no State shall deny “any person within its jurisdiction equal protection of the laws.” The Clause applies to both citizens and aliens alike. A principle included in the United states Congress proposed the Fourteenth Amendment officers to Stop anyone who they looks! 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