suspect classification immutable

• The Equal Protection Clause and Immutability: The Characteristics of Suspect Classifications

Although perhaps an effort to exhaustively list all suspect classifications is Sisyphean, there is value in attempting to describe why some classifications trigger heightened scrutiny while others do not, thereby providing a principled basis for the Court's equal protection decisions that is worthy of public support.8 Following this introduction, Part II of this Article describes a theory of equal protection jurisprudence premised upon what I have described as a limited immutability theory of suspect classification.9 After considering the classic antisubordination principle first elucidated by Professor Fiss,10 Part II applies a Rawlsian perspective to Equal Protection analysis in developing my view that classifications are suspect when based upon a limited set of immutable characteri...

• University of Memphis Law Review, The
• Vol. 40 Nbr. 3, April 2010

• Gay On Trial

For decades, groups like the ACLU and Lambda have taken an incremental approach to fighting for gay rights in court, concentrating on establishing legal precedents and popular support in states before going federal. Perry v. Schwarzenegger indeed asks the "ultimate question" of whether gays have a federal right to marry, but because the case is alleging that Prop. 8 violated the equal-protection clause of the U.S. Constitution, the federal court decision will have implications for gay Americans in nearly every arena of public life, from housing to parenting to military service.

... because gay Americans constitute a "suspect class," a group of people- such as racial minoriti... been established as a suspect classification, the Supreme Court has not previously considered w... that are well-defined and possess an "immutable" trait; share a history of discrimination; and are...

• American Prospect, The
• Vol. 20 Nbr. 10, December 2009

• John Eulitt and Belinda Eulitt, as Parents and Next Friends of Cathleen N. Eulitt, Et Al., Plaintiffs, Appellants, v. State of Maine, Department of Education, Et Al., Defendants, Appellees., 386 F.3d 344 (1st Cir. 2004)

... is neither a straightjacket nor an immutable rule," Carpenters Local Union No. 26 v. U.S. Fid. ... to apply to the challenged classification a standard of scrutiny stricter than the tradition... program at issue there was not inherently suspect simply because "there [was] no doubt that the Stat...

• Federal Circuits

• Maryland Court of Appeals Case Summaries: October 1, 2007

Criminal Procedure Waiver of counsel

... 46, and does not otherwise implicate a suspect or quasi- suspect class, the marriage statute is s... the statute draws an impermissible classification on the basis of sex, in violation of Article 46 of... identifying homosexuality as an immutable characteristic, and in light of the other indicia ...

• The Daily Record (Baltimore)
• November 14, 2007

• Fourteenth Amendment. Section 1: Privileges and immunities of citizenchip, due process and equal protection

... by the Court was the following classification prepared by Chief Justice Taft. "(1) Those [busin.... [A] Commission's order does not become suspect by reason of the fact that it is challenged. It is... as a class, nor was it based on an immutable characteristic possessed by a "discrete and insula...

• Constitution of the United States (Annotated)

• Tracey v. Hedgepeth, as the Next Friend To Ansche Hedgepeth, Appellant, v. Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority, Et Al., Appellees., 386 F.3d 1148 (D.C. Cir. 2004)

... 156, because it found that age is not a suspect class, id. at 152-53, and that there is no fundame...Strict scrutiny demands that classifications be narrowly targeted to serve compelling state int...: a history of discrimination, immutable characteristics, and political disenfranchisement....

• Federal Circuits

• Vieth v. Jubelirer, 541 U.S. 267 (2004)

... sorting permissible districting classifications from impermissible ones. Politics is a different m... presence of a rare and constitutionally suspect motive as to invalidate it is quite different from...Political affiliation is not an immutable characteristic, but may shift from one election to...

• U.S. Supreme Court

• Three concepts of dignity in constitutional law.

... the same and being free of racial classifications. Equal protection jurisprudence, like that of sexu...But if, as I suspect, dignity cannot be extricated, in part because of ... than as a member of a group based on immutable characteristics such as race or gender. Racial equ...

• Notre Dame Law Review
• Vol. 86 Nbr. 1, February 2011

• All in the Family: Examining Louisiana's Faulty Birth Order-Based Discrimination

Parents should not have favorite children.1 However, the Louisiana Legislature forces parents to play favorites when a parent owes child support to multiple families.2 In multiple family situations, the obligor3 owes one child support order to the “first family” and another child support order to the “second family,” and, if applicable, to other subsequent families.4 Regrettably, Louisiana has chosen the worst available method to calculate child support for multiple families.

• Louisiana Law Review
• Nbr. 73-1, July 2012

• Cleburne v. Cleburne Living Center, Inc., 473 U.S. 432 (1985)

... that mental retardation is a "quasi-suspect" classification; that, under the applicable "heigh... power, and their condition was immutable. The court considered heightened scrutiny to be pa...

• U.S. Supreme Court