Posted on 12/05/2005 10:43:59 AM PST by Former Military Chick
WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court confronts a gay rights issue this week, in a case that asks whether law schools can bar military recruiters because of the Pentagon's "don't ask, don't tell" policy.
Each fall recruiters of all types jam law schools seeking top students in job fairs, receptions and interview sessions.
Justices will decide whether universities that accept government money must accommodate the military even if the schools forbid the participation of recruiters from public agencies and private companies that have discriminatory policies.
It is the first time that the court has dealt with a gay-rights related case since a contentious 2003 ruling that struck down laws criminalizing gay sex. In 2000, the court ruled that the Boy Scouts have the right to ban leaders who are openly gay.
The latest appeal pits the Pentagon against a group of law schools and professors. The justices hear arguments on Tuesday.
The government contends if it provides financial support to a college — with grants for research, for example — then in exchange it should be able to recruit "the very students whose education it has supported." In this case, that means having the ability to recruit students, a tool made more essential since the Sept. 11 attacks.
Federal financial support of colleges tops $35 billion a year.
Law schools say they would welcome military recruiters if the Pentagon dropped its policy against openly gay personnel. Gay men and women may serve only if they keep their sexual orientation to themselves.
The outcome turns on the First Amendment and whether schools can be made to associate with military recruiters or promote their appearances on campus.
"Part of the cultural meaning of the case is bound up in questions about gay rights," said Cornell Law School professor Trevor Morrison, a former clerk to Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. "Indirectly, it's about the 'don't ask, don't tell policy."'
The Supreme Court often splits 5-4 in free-speech cases, so it is hard to predict the outcome, as well as how the impending retirement of Justice Sandra Day O'Connor may affect the case.
If Samuel Alito, President Bush's nominee to succeed O'Connor, is confirmed by the Senate before the case is decided, then Alito could be called on to break any tie vote. The ruling will likely take months to complete.
Alito, who worked as a lawyer for the Reagan administration, probably would be sympathetic to the government's arguments that college access is necessary to fill military jobs, Morrison said.
O'Connor has been a moderate in gay rights cases, voting in 2003 to prevent states from making the private sexual conduct of gays a crime. Justice Antonin Scalia wrote a blistering dissent, saying that the court had "largely signed on to the so-called homosexual agenda."
A federal law, known as the Solomon Amendment, mandates that universities, including their law and medical schools and other branches, give the military the same access as other recruiters or forfeit public money.
Congress passed the Solomon Amendment in 1994, the same year that lawmakers approved the "don't ask, don't tell" policy.
"In order to recruit the most talented men and women into the armed services, the military must be able to recruit students on college and university campuses, just as other employers do," justices were told in a filing by Paul Clement, the Bush administration's top Supreme Court lawyer.
The law had been contested by law schools that have policies that prevent on-campus recruiting by organizations that base hiring on race, gender or sexual orientation.
Justices were told in a filing for Harvard University, which six of the current nine court members attended, and other leading colleges that the case would "threaten grave damage to the integrity and independence of the nation's universities."
A split panel of the Philadelphia-based 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals found that it was reasonably likely that the law violated free speech rights. Just as the Boy Scouts have a right to exclude gays based on a First Amendment right of expression, law schools also may bar groups they consider discriminatory, the court said.
Alito serves on that appeals court but was not involved in the case.
The case is Rumsfeld v. Forum for Academic and Institutional Rights, 04-1152.
Given the SCOTUS is six to three in favor of the Marxist Deconstructionists, I wouldn't be too optimistic about them defending the nation.
The government contends if it provides financial support to a college — with grants for research, for example — then in exchange it should be able to recruit "the very students whose education it has supported." In this case, that means having the ability to recruit students, a tool made more essential since the Sept. 11 attacks.
Federal financial support of colleges tops $35 billion a year.
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Absolutely. Life is a two-way street, even though liberals/socialists do not see it that way, as we know. If the Pentagon is ruled against, they should RETRACT ALL GOVERNMENT FUNDING -- then let us hear the little anti-military socialists squeal like the pigs they are.
Again with the gays. You don't HAVE to sign up for the military. If you really want to, then good. Abide by the rules, just as you would with any other employer.
If you don't, then leave the rest of us alone and go do your thing...we're not interested in it....
Gay this gay that. It's getting really old..
The universites involved think they do not have a moral or social obligation to meet the standards set in receiving funds from the taxpayers..i.e.; federal funding. This is like saying to a blind man, give us your money so we can train a dog to help you, but if you don't meet our arbitrary standards for society, we won't even let you talk to a dog we train. I don't think that boat of crap will float, nor should it. Do as we say or we won't let you have what you paid for...this seems to be the thought process the schools are promoting. I hope SCOTUS sees though this b.s.
Those federal funds also include student loans so they can lessen the amount of students being indoctrinated by the communist professors. GREAT !!!!
Ivy Leagues have their own endowments in the billions of dollars. They don't need any funding. Cut them off, quit subsidizing liberal BS.
I don't know why the taxpayer is subsidizing law schools anyway. Seems like the last thing we need is more lawyers.
Yeah, let's take this away for a year and see how fast the leftists BEG to get recruiters back on campus.
C'mon, it'd be fun! Let's do it.
This case has NOTHING to do with the gay agenda. It has EVERYTHING to do with colleges not wanting to do what the government says it must in order to feed from the $$$ bin.
Government should not be in the education business at any level. All schools, K-12 and higher should be private enterprises. Freedom and capitalism go together. Federal, state, and county involvement in education is socialism. Marx, Lenin, and totalitarian dictatorships of all types (Hitler, Stalin, Mao) have relied on public schools to brain-wash young people, which is exactly what's happening now in the U.S.
I think that the law will be upheld. My law school allows the military on campus for interviews, but puts a disclaimer on announcements when they are coming.
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