HOW HAS THE COURT ADDRESSED CONGRESSIONALLY APPROVED DISCRIMINATION?
An additional exception to the usual rule of strict scrutiny for alienage classifications is where the discrimination is a result of federal law.
The Supreme Court has ruled that the federal government’s plenary power to control immigration requires judicial deference and that therefore only rational basis review is used if Congress has created the alienage classification if it is the result of a presidential order.
In Mathews v. Diaz, 426 U.S. 67 (1976), the court expressed “the relationship between the US and our alien visitors has been committed to the political branches of the federal government. In consequence, the decision in these matters may implicate our relation with foreign powers, and since a wide variety of classifications must be defined in the light of changing political and economic circumstances, such decisions are frequently of a character more appropriate to either the legislature or the executive than to the Judiciary.”
Thus, the court thus drew a distinction between alienage classifications imposed the federal government and those created by state and local governments.
The court held that strict scrutiny is used for the latter, but the Court said that the federal law was upheld because it was not “wholly irrational” and served the “legitimate” interests of the federal government in preserving the fiscal integrity of the program.
In Hamptom v. Mow Sun Wong, 426 U.S. 88 (1976), the court defined and articulated a distinction between decisions by the congress or the president and those by federal administrative agencies. The court concluded that rational basis review is used only for the former; adopted by way of a federal law or a presidential order
The court reasoned “[i]t would be justified by the national interest in providing an incentive for aliens to become naturalized, or possibly even as providing the President with an expendable token for treaty negotiating purposes.”
HOW HAS THE COURT ADDRESSED UNDOCUMENTED ALIENS AND EQUAL PROTECTION RIGHTS?
In Plyler v. Doe, 457 U.S. 202 (1982), the court questioned whether, consistent with the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, Texas may deny to undocumented school-age children the fee public education that it provides to children who are citizens of the United States or legally admitted aliens.
The court discussed the equal protection clause implicated a “person” rather than a citizen.
Paradoxically, by depriving the children of any disfavored group of an education, we foreclose the means by which that group might raise the level of esteem in which the majority held.
Moreover, the court stated that undocumented aliens cannot be treated as a suspect class because their presence in this country in violation of federal law is not a “constitutional irrelevancy.” In addition, the court reasoned that education is not a fundamental right and a state does not need to justify by a compelling necessity every variation in the manner in which education is provided to its population.
Furthermore, the court discussed that if the State is to deny a discrete group of innocent children the fee public education that it offers to other children residing within its borders, that denial must be justified by a showing that it furthers some substantial state interest.
HOW HAS THE COURT ADDRESSED DISCRIMINATION AGAINST NON-MARITAL CHILDREN?
The court applied intermediate scrutiny in evaluating laws that discriminate against non-marital children.
HOW HAS THE COURT ADDRESSED FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS UNDER DUE PROCESS AND EQUAL PROTECTION?
The court held that the government’s action must be necessary to achieve a compelling purpose.
The court ruled that heightened scrutiny requires the government to meet strict scrutiny
Generally, under due process or equal protection rights, the courts have held that strict scrutiny is used when a right is deemed fundamental.
The court ruled that the major difference between due process and equal protection as the basis for protecting fundamental rights is in how the constitutional arguments are phrased.
The court discussed if the right is safeguarded under due process, equal protection, and whether the government’s discrimination as to who can exercise the right is justified by a sufficient purpose.
HOW HAS THE COURT ADDRESSED NINTH AMENDMENT?
The court relied upon the ninth amendment to justify invalidating a law prohibiting use of contraceptives.
Generally, the court viewed the ninth amendment is not seen as the source of rights.
The court discussed that the ninth amendment is used to provide a textual justification for the court to protect non-textual rights, such as the right to privacy.
In specific, the court discussed that the originalists take the position that fundamental rights are limited to those liberties explicitly stated in the text or clearly intended by the framers.
In contrast, the court stated that non-originalists consider that it is permissible for the court to protect fundamental rights not enumerated in the U.S. Constitution or intended by its drafters.
HOW HAS THE COURT ADDRESSED CONSTITUTIONAL PROTECTION FOR FAMILY AUTONOMY?
In Loving v. Virginia, 388 U.S. 1 (1967), the court questioned whether a statutory scheme adopted by the state of Virginia to prevent marriages violated the right to marry.
The court discussed Virginia’s ban on interracial marriages whereas the Lovings plead guilty to the charge and sentenced to one year in jail.
These statutes also deprive the Lovings of liberty without due process of law in violation of the Due Process Clause of Fourteenth Amendment.
In Zablocki v. Redhail, 434 U.S. 374 (1978), the court discussed the issue of constitutionality of a Wisconsin statute, Sec. 245.10, which provides that members of a certain class of Wisconsin residents may not marry, within the State or elsewhere, without first obtaining a court order granting permission to marry.
Here, the appellee was unable to enter into a lawful marriage in Wisconsin. In addition, the marriage application was denied on the sole ground that the appellee had not obtained a court order granting him permission to marry.
The court ruled that the statutory classification created by sec. 245.10 thus cannot be justified by the interests advanced in support of it.
Justice Stewart, concurring, stated that the court held the unwarranted encroachment upon a constitutionally protected freedom to marry.
Moreover, the court held that a state law requiring the payment of filing fees and court costs to receive a divorce violated indigent individuals’ due process rights.
In Califano v. Jobst (1977) and Bowen v. Owens (1986) reflect the principle that a right is not violated unless there has been a direct and substantial interference
In Michael H. v. Gerald D., 491 U.S. 110 (1989), the court discussed custody rights of a child’s natural father.
Here, the court showed a 98.07% probability that Michael was Victoria’s father.
The court ruled that Victoria has a liberty interest in maintaining a filial relationship with her natural father.
Justice Brennan, Marshall, Blackmun Dissenting
X
FLUIDITY OF TIME
Time moves as graceful as a soaring dove, but is still as a dreaming corpse.
Time can be torn like tears from a widows eyes, or can be mended by forgiven mistakes
Time can be as bright as the first time the sun rose, or as dark as Satan’s heart during revelation
Time can be lost like a burning candle in the night
Time can be found in the room opened by the rotational door
Time is a river that is always full
Time is a song of infinite lust
Time is a child chasing shifting clouds
SECTION J
HOW HAS THE COURT ADDRESSED THE RIGHT TO KEEP THE FAMILY TOGETHER?
In Moore v. City of East Cleveland, Ohio (1977), the court held that the right to keep the family together includes an extended family.
The court held that there are limitations to the occupancy of a dwelling unit to members of a single family.
The court questioned whether the ordinance violates the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
Here, the court stated the boys are first cousins rather than brothers. Moreover, the court discussed that Mrs. Moore moved to dismiss, claiming that the ordinance was constitutionally invalid on its face.
HOW HAS THE COURT ADDRESSED RIGHTS OF PARENTS OT CONTROL THE UPBRINGING OF THEIR CHILDREN?
In Pierce v. Society of the sisters of the holy names of Jesus & Mary, 268 U.S. 510 (1925), the court held that the substantive due process is to protect this right.
Under the doctrine of Meyer v. Nebraska, 262 U.S. 390 (1923), the court stated that clearly the Act of 1922 unreasonably interferes with the liberty of parents and guardians to direct the upbringing and education of children under their control.
The court ruled that the conflicts between the private and the public school interfered with parental rights.
In Troxel v. Granville, 530 U.S. 57 (2000), the court discussed the grandparents’ rights.
The court questioned whether the Due Process Clause requires all non-parental statutes to include a showing of harm or potential harm to the child as a condition precedent to granting visitation.
In addition, the court stated that the liberty interest involved the interest of parents in the care, custody, and control of their children. Moreover, the court ruled the interest of parents is perhaps the oldest of the fundamental liberty interests recognized by this court.
Furthermore, the court held that the parents’ right to raise child and visitation order is infringement on mother’s fundamental rights.
In Justice Scalia Dissenting, the court discussed the ninth Amendment in the Constitution’s enumeration of rights “shall not be construed to deny or disparage”
The court examined the interest of the child.
Justice Kennedy, Dissenting
HOW HAS THE COURT ADDRESSED CONSTITUTIONAL PROTECTION FOR REPRODUCTIVE AUTONOMY?
The Supreme Court has recognized three aspects of reproductive autonomy to be fundamental rights: the right to procreate, the right to purchase and use contraceptives, and the right to abortion.
The Supreme Court held that the right to procreate is a fundamental right and therefore government-imposed involuntary sterilization must meet strict scrutiny.
In Buck v. Bell, 274 U.S. 200 (1927), the court discussed the state sterilization for the mental defective people.
The court held the principle that sustains compulsory vaccination is broad enough to cover cutting the fallopian tubes.
The Supreme Court never has overruled Buck v. Bell or repudiated Justice Holmes’s opinion, but Skinner v. Oklahoma 15 years later, implicitly does so by recognizing a fundamental right to procreate.
In Skinner v. Oklahoma, 316 U.S. 535 (1942), the court discussed prisoner sterilization.
The court stated the unfairness in the distinction made by the legislature.
Moreover, the court held that Oklahoma deprives certain individuals of a right that is basic to the perpetuation of a race in the right to have offspring.
Here, the court stated the statute involved is Oklahoma’s Habitual Criminal Sterilization Act.
The court discussed the act defining a “habitual criminal” as a person who, having been convicted two or more times for crimes “amounting to felonies involving moral turpitude” either in an Oklahoma court or in a court of any other state. Furthermore, the court stated that when the “habitual criminal” is convicted of such a felony in Oklahoma is sentenced to a term of imprisonment in an Oklahoma penal institution.
The court instructed the jury that the crimes of which petitioner had been convicted were felonies involving moral turpitude and that the only question for the jury was whether the operation of vasectomy could be performed on petitioner without detriment to his general health.
The court ruled that marriage and procreation are fundamental to the very existence and survival of the race.
The court stated that the petitioner is forever deprived of a basic liberty.
In addition, the court discussed the level of review necessary.
The court emphasized that strict scrutiny of the classification that a state makes in a sterilization law is essential, lest unwittingly or otherwise invidious discriminations made against groups or types of individuals in violation of the constitutional guaranty of just and equal laws.
Furthermore, the court concluded that the real question we have to consider is not one of equal protection, but whether the wholesale condemnation of a class to such an invasion of personal liberty, without opportunity to any individual to show that his is not the type of case which would justify resort to it, satisfies the demands of due process.
HOW HAS THE COURT ADDRESSED THE RIGHT TO PURCHASE AND USE CONTRACEPTIVES?
In Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479 (1965), the court held that a second aspect of reproductive freedom is the right to purchase and use contraceptives.
The court stated that “[a]ny person who uses any drug, medicinal article or instrument for the purpose of preventing conception shall be fined not less than fifty dollars or imprisoned not less than sixty days nor more than one year or be both fined and imprisoned.” “Any person who assists, abets, counsels, causes, hires or commands another to commit any offense may be prosecuted and punished as if he were the principal offender.” The appellants were found guilty as accessories and fined one-hundred dollars each.
The court discussed that its purpose is not to sit as a super-legislature to determine the wisdom, need, and propriety of laws that touch economic problems, business affairs, or social conditions. This law, however, operates directly on an intimate relation of husband and wife and their physician’s role in one aspect of that relation. Furthermore, the court reasoned that the association of people is not mentioned in the U.S. Constitution and not in the Bill of Rights.
The court ruled on the right to privacy in the context of intimate relations of husband and wife.
Moreover, the court stated that the Ninth Amendment enumerates various guarantees creating zones of privacy.
Here, the court examines the relationship lying within the zone of privacy created by several fundamental constitutional guarantees. In addition, it concerns a law that forbids the use of contraceptives rather than regulating their manufacture or sale, seeks to achieve its goals by means having a maximum destructive impact upon that relationship.
The court ruled that the “governmental purpose to control or prevent activities constitutionally subject to state regulation may not be achieved by means which sweep unnecessarily broadly and thereby invade the area of protected freedoms.”
Furthermore, the court held that Connecticut’s birth-control law unconstitutionally intrudes upon the right of marital privacy.
The Ninth Amendment reads, “The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.” Moreover, the court cited that the Amendment is almost entirely the work of James Madison. In addition, it was introduce in Congress by James Madison and passed the U.S. House and U.S. Senate with little or no debate and virtually no change in language. The court stated that it was proffered to quiet expressed fears that a bill of specifically enumerated rights could not be sufficiently broad to cover all essential rights and that the specific mention of certain rights would be interpreted as a denial that others were protected.
