WND EXCLUSIVE

NEXT MAJOR SUPREME COURT DECISION: 'SEX'

Most basic fact of humanity in serious dispute

In 2003, the U.S. Supreme Court legalized sodomy in a Texas case. 

In 2015, it created same-sex marriage in a ruling the chief justice described as unconnected to the Constitution.

Now, the court will address whether or not the term “sex” in the 1964 Title VII discrimination law includes the concept of “gender identity.”

If so, it could mean an end to girls athletics and gender-restricted restrooms, showers and dressing facilities.

And it would create conflicts with First Amendment rights, granting rights based on sexual orientation and “identity” that clash with the rights to exercise one’s faith and speak freely.

Liberty Counsel lawyers have filed friend-of-the-court briefs at the Supreme Court in three related cases that will be heard Oct. 8.

Title VII of the Civil Rights Act prohibits employers from discriminating on “race, color, religion, sex and national origin.”

“Two lower federal courts disagreed on whether the plain wording of the word ‘sex’ should include ‘sexual orientation.’ 

A third case ruled that the law should include ‘gender identity.’ 

To include either term would require the law to be re-written, which is the prerogative of the legislature,” Liberty Counsel argues.

In Bostock v. Clayton County, Georgia, a court ruled that “sex” in Title VII does not include “sexual orientation.” 

The opposite ruling was reached in Altitude Express v. Zarda.

In the Altitude case, a court ruled in favor of Don Zarda, who was let go after he told a female parachute jumper not to worry about being strapped to him because he was homosexual.

In the third case, R.G. & G.R. Harris Funeral Homes of Michigan fired a funeral director after he informed the private company he was going to start dressing as a woman and demanded to be treated as such.

The company decided that would infringe on the rights of the mourners.

Explained Liberty Counsel: 

“Title VII was enacted, in part, to protect women in the workforce from discrimination, and does not include claims based on ‘sexual orientation’ and ‘gender identity.’ 

The Supreme Court’s sex discrimination precedents recognize the common-sense reality that men and women are biologically distinct, with immutable characteristics that divide men and women into two, separately-identifiable groups.

“In 1964, the word ‘sex’ clearly meant male and female. 

Congress has repeatedly rejected multiple attempts to add ‘sexual orientation’ and ‘gender identity’ to the law. 

Adding ‘gender identity’ would undermine the intent and purpose of the law to protect women. 

Gender identity would eviscerate the law by allowing males to subjectively claim to be female.

“Even the American Psychological Association admits that gender identity is based on one’s ‘sense of being male, female, or something else’ rather than biology. 

To broadly interpret sex discrimination to include someone with the mental sense of being female, but who is in fact a biological male, does not advance the purposes of ensuring that women, as a class, and men, as a class, are afforded the same workplace opportunities.”

The brief spells out the constitutional implications.

“Interpreting ‘sex’ according to its common sense, medical, and legal meanings leaves the question for Congress whether to add ‘sexual orientation’ as a separate class. 

A significant policy question that Congress would need to address in making that determination is to properly weight the free speech and free exercise concerns implicated.”

The brief points out that “sex” and “sexual orientation” are far apart, medically and legally.

“The court should conclude that Title VII’s prohibition of sex discrimination does not include a prohibition against discrimination based on sexual orientation.”

After all, previous court decisions, the filing argued, have “repeatedly acknowledged the biological reality that men and women fall into two distinct groups.”

Even far-left members of the court have admitted as much, the brief points out.

“Nothing in this court’s prior Title VII jurisprudence suggests that one’s sexuality, sexual activity, or sexual preferences were what Congress intended to protect.”

Ruling against the traditional definition of “sex” would create chaos, the brief contends.

For example, a transgender schoolteacher was awarded $60,000 because co-workers failed to address him as “they.” 

A Wisconsin girl was awarded $800,000 when she sued her school district to be allowed to use the boys’ restroom.

The case also threatens the First Amendment conscience rights of medical professionals, counselors and business owners who have places of “public accommodation.”

Flower-shop owners, bakers, photographers and wedding-venue providers already have been forced to violate their sincerely held religious beliefs by providing services that affirm homosexuality.

Read more at https://www.wnd.com/2019/08/next-major-supreme-court-decision-the-s-word/#IOF6XIbDpyEYjkcR.99