National Women's Law Center Files Brief With Supreme Court In Support Of Marriage Equality

(Washington, D.C.) The National Women’s Law Center (NWLC), joined by women’s legal organizations and legal scholars across the country, submitted an amicus brief in two marriage equality cases before the Supreme Court: Hollingsworth v. Perry and United States v. Windsor. At the heart of both is full equality under the law for individuals, regardless of sexual orientation, and protection against discrimination based on gender stereotypes.

On March 26, the Supreme Court will hear arguments in Hollingsworth v. Perry, which addresses the constitutionality of Proposition 8, the California ballot measure that overturned the California Supreme Court's ruling that same-sex couples have a constitutional right to marry. On March 27, the court will hear arguments in United States v. Windsor, which challenges the constitutionality of the provision of the Defense of Marriage Act that bars the federal government from recognizing marriages of same-sex couples.

“No individual should be subjected to laws that prevent her from entering into marriage with the person she loves,” said NWLC Co-President Marcia D. Greenberger. “These laws deny full citizenship to all in our country in profound ways. Moreover, they do so on the basis of gender stereotypes as to the only acceptable relationships between men and women. The decision whether and whom to marry is central to personal liberty, and the government has no authority to restrict the most personal decisions based on stereotypes about traditional gender roles.”

In its brief, NWLC asserts that the Constitution’s equal protection guarantee requires that laws that discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation be subjected to heightened scrutiny by the courts, like laws that discriminate on the basis of race and sex. Such close review is necessary on numerous grounds, including that discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation frequently seeks to force individuals to conform to gender stereotypes. Over the last forty years, repeated rulings from the Supreme Court applying heightened scrutiny to laws that discriminate on the basis of sex have served as an important bulwark in protecting women and men from legal rules that assume they will conform to gender-stereotyped roles and burden those individuals who depart from the stereotypes. Gender-stereotyped laws that discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation should also be presumed unconstitutional by courts, the brief argues.

“The Supreme Court’s close scrutiny of discriminatory laws founded in gender stereotypes has been based on the recognition that when the law enforces assumptions about the proper roles of men and women, it limits opportunities and choices and deprives individuals of a core, essential liberty – to live their lives as they see fit,” Greenberger said. “The Supreme Court has held that the government may not impose laws that treat men and women differently based on an ‘interest’ in perpetuating traditional gender roles. The court should also hold that the government may not decide who is permitted to marry based on gender stereotypes about who men and women should love.”

Joining the National Women’s Law Center on the amicus brief are Equal Rights Advocates, Legal Momentum, Legal Voice, National Association of Women Lawyers, National Partnership for Women and Families, Southwest Women’s Law Center, Women’s Law Project and California Women’s Law Center, and 8 law professors associated with the Williams Institute at the University of California, Los Angeles. The Williams Institute and the law firm Paul Hastings co-authored the brief with the National Women’s Law Center.

For more information, visit: http://www.nwlc.org/resource/nwlc-files-amicus-briefs-hollingsworth-v-perry-and-united-states-v-windsor 

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