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Federal Court Says Ohio Must Let Transgender People Correct Their Birth Certificates

Posted on: December 17th, 2020 by Art Leonard No Comments

U.S. District Judge Michael H. Watson ruled on December 16 that Ohio’s refusal to issue corrected birth certificates for transgender people violates the United States Constitution.  Lambda Legal and the American Civil Liberties Union sued state officials on behalf of four transgender plaintiffs whose attempts to get their birth certificates changed to correctly identify their gender had been thwarted.  Ray v. McCloud, Case No. 2:18-cv-272 (S.D. Ohio).

At the time Lambda sued two years ago, there were only three states that categorically prohibited such changes: Kansas, Ohio and Tennessee.  Since then, Kansas has settled a Lambda Legal lawsuit by agreeing to change its policy.  That leaves Tennessee as the last holdout.

However, Judge Watson’s opinion did not address what requirements Ohio may impose to determine whether a particular transgender individual may obtain a new birth certificate correctly reflecting their gender identity.  Some jurisdictions require proof of surgical alteration or at least some clinical treatment, some others are satisfied with a doctor’s attestation as to gender identity, and some will accept a sworn declaration by the individual as to their correct gender identity.  All that the judge held in this case was that the state cannot categorically refuse to make such changes under any circumstances.

This issue has had an inconsistent history in Ohio.   State courts had turned down attempts by transgender individuals to get court orders to change their birth certificates for many years, but then the state did a turnabout and started allowing them until 2016, when it reverted to its former prohibition.  Judge Watson noted that at least ten transgender people had actually obtained new birth certificates before the policy was changed.  Since the statute governing birth certificates in Ohio does not even mention the issue but generally provides that a birth certificate can be corrected if information “has not been properly or accurately recorded,” the state claimed that it was now acting according to its interpretation of the statute as requiring a record that was correct at the time of birth.

Lambda’s complaint on behalf of Stacie Ray, Basil Argento, Ashley Breda and “Jane Doe” asserted that the state’s policy violated their Due Process privacy rights and their Equal Protection rights under the 14th Amendment, as well as their Free Speech rights under the 1st Amendment.  Having ruled in favor of the plaintiffs on their 14th Amendment claims, Judge Watson commented in a footnote that he would decline to analyze their 1st Amendment claim.

At an earlier stage in the litigation, the court had refused to dismiss the case outright.  The December 16 ruling granted summary judgment to the plaintiffs based on the evidentiary record.  Each of the plaintiffs had explained how having a birth certificate that did not correctly reflect their gender identity caused practical problems for them, essentially misgendering them and “outing” them as transgender when they were required to provide their birth certificate.  The court also noted the significant risk of harassment and physical violence that transgender people face as an important reason to allow them to obtain birth certificates that identify them correctly, citing a 2015 U.S. Transgender Survey showing that almost one-third of transgender individuals who had to use an identity document that misgendered them consequently suffered harassment, denial of benefits or services, discrimination, or physical assault.

The court found that because the fundamental right of privacy was involved, the standard of review for their Due Process claim is “strict scrutiny,” under which the state’s policy would be presumed to be unconstitutional unless it met the burden of showing a compelling justification.  On the equal protection claim, Judge Watson found that many federal courts now agree that heightened scrutiny applies, under which the state must show an exceedingly persuasive reason for its policy.  Courts use heightened scrutiny for sex discrimination claims, arguably making relevant the Supreme Court’s Bostock decision earlier this year, which held that discrimination because of transgender status is sex discrimination within the meaning of the federal anti-discrimination law, Title VII.

Either way, however, the court concluded that the policy must fall, because the state’s arguments didn’t even support a “rational basis” for what it was doing.  Having allowed transgender people to get new birth certificates in the past, the state should have articulated a reason why it had changed that policy, but it could not credibly do so.  What the court left unstated was the likelihood that the change in policy was entirely political.

The state’s attempt to argue that its interest in having accurate birth records required this categorical policy was fatally undermined by the fact that changes to birth certificates are made in many other circumstances.  A person who gets a legal name change can get a new birth certificate showing their new legal name.  After an adoption, a new birth certificate can be issued listing the adoptive parents instead of the birth parents.  The court found that no persuasive justification had been offered for freely changing the information on birth certificates in these other circumstances but not for transgender people, especially in light of the difficulty and harm they suffered.

As noted, however, the court’s ruling was limited to the categorical ban, leaving yet to be determined the criteria Ohio was adopt for determining whether the change can be made in a particular case.  Furthermore, the state could attempt to appeal this ruling to the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals, but that court has already gone on record regarding gender identity discrimination as a form of sex discrimination in the case of the late Michigan transgender funeral director Aimee Stephens, who employment discrimination case was part of the Bostock decision by the Supreme Court.

Lambda Legal attorneys who worked on this case include Kara Ingelhart and Peter Renn.  Malita Picasso and John Knight of the ACLU’s LGBT Rights Project and Freda Levenson, Susan Becker, Elizabeth Bonham and David Carey of the ACLU of Ohio were co-counsel, as well as pro bono counsel Jennifer Roach from Thompson Hine LLP.

 

United States Supreme Court Refuses to Review Transgender Bathroom Case from Boyertown, Pennsylvania

Posted on: May 28th, 2019 by Art Leonard No Comments

The Supreme Court announced on May 28 that it will not review a decision by the Philadelphia-based 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals, which had rejected a constitutional and statutory challenge by cisgender students at Boyertown (Pennsylvania) Senior High School, who were upset that the School District decided to let transgender students use facilities consistent with their gender identity.  Doe v. Boyertown Area School District & Pennsylvania Youth Congress Foundation, 897 F.3d 518 (3rd Cir. 2018), cert. denied, 2019 WL 2257330 (May 28, 2019).

The federal lawsuit stemmed from a decision in 2016 by the School District to permit transgender students to use restrooms and locker rooms consistent with their gender identity.  Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) and local attorneys affiliated with the Independence Law Center in Harrisburg filed suit on behalf of several cisgender students, proceeding under pseudonyms, contending that this decision violated their rights on three theories: constitutional right of bodily privacy under the 14th Amendment, creation of a “hostile environment” in violation of Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, which bans sex discrimination by schools that get federal funds, and violation of the right of privacy under Pennsylvania state common law.  Upon filing their complaint, the plaintiffs asked U.S. District Judge Edward G. Smith (E.D. Pa.) to issue a preliminary injunction to block the school district’s policy while the case was pending.

Lawyers for the American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania and the ACLU’s National LGBT Rights Project joined the case, representing the Pennsylvania Youth Congress Foundation, which intervened as a co-defendant to help the School District defend its policy.

This case is part of a national campaign by ADF to preserve and defend restrictions on restroom and locker room use by transgender students, part of ADF’s overall goal – consistent with the Trump Administration’s anti-transgender policies – to deprive transgender people of any protection under federal law.  So far, ADF has lost a succession of “bathroom” cases, and the 3rd Circuit’s ruling in this case was one of its most notable defeats.  At the same time, however, the Education Department under the leadership of Trump’s appointee, Betsy De Vos, has reversed the Obama Administration’s policy and now refuses to investigate discrimination claims by transgender students under Title IX, leaving it up to individuals to file lawsuits seeking protection under the statute.

Judge Smith refused to issue the requested preliminary injunction on August 25, 2017, 276 F. Supp. 3d 324, writing an extensive decision that concluded that the plaintiffs were unlikely to prevail on the merits of any of their theories, and that mere exposure to transgender students was not going to impose an irreparable injury on them anyway.   Judge Smith was appointed by President Barack Obama in 2013, but it was noteworthy that at his Senate confirmation vote, he received more votes from Republican Senators than Democratic Senators.

Plaintiffs appealed to the 3rd Circuit, and suffered a loss before a unanimous three judge panel, which issued its decision on June 18, 2018.  The opinion was written by Circuit Judge Theodore McKee, who was appointed by President Bill Clinton.  The other judges on the panel were Circuit Judge Patty Shwartz, who was appointed by President Obama to fill the vacancy created by Circuit Judge Marion Trump Barry, President Trump’s sister, when she took senior status; and Senior Circuit Judge Richard Nygaard, who was appointed by President Ronald Reagan.

Judge McKee’s opinion set the stage with an extended discussion of gender identity based on the expert testimony offered by defendants in opposition to the motion for preliminary relief, including a much-cited amicus brief by the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American Medical Association, which stated that policies excluding transgender students from “privacy facilities” consistent with their gender identities “have detrimental effects on the physical and mental health, safety, and well-being of transgender individuals.”  Judge McKee also quoted from an amicus brief filed by National PTA and Gay-Lesbian-Straight Education Network (GLSEN), that forcing transgender students to use bathrooms or locker rooms that don’t match their gender identity causes “severe psychological distress often leading to attempted suicide.”  In other words, the starting point for the court’s discussion was that the School District’s policy was responding to a serious problem faced by transgender students.

The court noted that as part of its policy the School District had renovated its “privacy facilities” to increase the privacy of individual users, and had provided single-user restrooms open to any student so that students who did not want to share facilities with others because of their gender identity would not be forced to do so.   The District also required that students claiming to be transgender meet with counselors trained to address the issue, and go through a process of being approved to use facilities consistent with their gender identity.  “Once a transgender student was approved to use the bathroom or locker room that aligned with his or her gender identity,” wrote Judge McKee, “the student was required to use only those facilities,” although any student was allowed to use the single-user restrooms.  “The student could no longer use the facilities corresponding to that student’s birth sex.”

The plaintiffs claimed that their right to privacy was violated because the school’s policy permitted them to be viewed by members of the opposite sex while partially clothed.  The 3rd Circuit found that Judge Smith “correctly found that this would not give rise to a constitutional violation because the School District’s policy served a compelling interest – to prevent discrimination against transgender students – and was narrowly tailored to that interest.”  The court pointed out that privacy rights under the Constitution are not absolute.  Furthermore, wrote McKee, “the School District’s policy fosters an environment of inclusivity, acceptance, and tolerance,” and that, as the National Education Association’s amicus brief “convincingly explains, these values serve an important educational function for both transgender and cisgender students.”

While the court empathized with cisgender students who experienced “surprise” at finding themselves “in an intimate space with a student they understood was of the opposite biological sex” – an experience specifically evoked in the plaintiffs’ brief in support of their motion – the court said, “We cannot, however, equate the situation the appellants now face with the very drastic consequences that the transgender students must endure if the school were to ignore the latter’s needs and concerns.”  And, the court pointed out, cisgender students “who feel that they must try to limit trips to the restroom to avoid contact with transgender students can use the single-user bathrooms in the school.”  The court rejected plaintiffs’ argument that the best solution to the issue was to require transgender students to use the handful of single-user restrooms, finding that this would “significantly undermine” the District’s compelling interest in treating transgender students in a non-discriminatory manner.

The court also pointed out that the plaintiffs’ privacy arguments sought to push that doctrine far beyond anything supported by existing case law. The court rejected analogies to cases involving inappropriate strip searches and peeping toms.  “Those cases involve inappropriate conduct as well as conduct that intruded into far more intimate aspects of human affairs than here.  There is simply nothing inappropriate about transgender students using the restrooms or locker rooms that correspond to their gender identity” under the School District’s policy, insisted the court, which also found that the “encounters” described by the plaintiffs did not involve transgender students doing “anything remotely out of the ordinary” while using the “privacy facilities” at the school.

As a result of these findings, the court concluded that the plaintiffs were unlikely to succeed on the merits of their privacy claims under Title IX, the Constitution, or Pennsylvania tort law.  Further, looking to “hostile environment sex discrimination” claims under Title IX (and the more developed hostile environment case law under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which covers employment discrimination and serves as a resource for courts interpreting Title IX), the court found that the possibility of encountering transgender students in a restroom failed to meet the high test set by the courts of “sexual harassment that is so severe, pervasive, or objectively offensive and that so undermines and detracts from the victims’ educational experience that he or she is effectively denied equal access to an institution’s resources and opportunities.”  The possibility of occasionally encountering one of a handful of transgender students in a “privacy facility” fell far short of meeting that test.

Furthermore, the court found that the District’s policy was “sex-neutral” in that it applied to everybody, and asserted that plaintiffs had not “provided any authority” for the proposition that a “sex-neutral policy” would violate Title IX.  “The School District’s policy allows all students to use bathrooms and locker rooms that align with their gender identity,” wrote McKee. “It does not discriminate based on sex, and therefore does not violate Title IX.”

The court drew support for its conclusion from the Chicago-based 7th Circuit Court of Appeals ruling in Ash Whitaker’s lawsuit against the Kenosha, Wisconsin, school district, where the court found that excluding a transgender boy from using the boys’ restroom facilities did violate Title IX.  See Whitaker v. Kenosha Unified School District No. 1 Board of Education, 858 F.3d 1034 (7th Cir. 2017). Consistent with that ruling, the Boyertown School District’s policy could be seen as mandated by its obligation under Title IX to provide equal educational access and opportunities to transgender students.  The court also noted transgender rights rulings by the 1st, 6th, 9th and 11th Circuits, concluding that anti-transgender discrimination in a variety of contexts violates federal laws forbidding sex discrimination.  There is an emerging consensus among federal courts of appeals along these lines.  The validity of this reasoning will be up for Supreme Court debate next Term when the Court reviews the 6th Circuit’s decision in favor of Aimee Stephens, the transgender employment discrimination plaintiff in the Harris Funeral Homes case, to be argued in the fall.

The plaintiff’s petition to the Supreme Court to review the Boyertown decision posed two questions to the Court: “Whether a public school has a compelling interest in authorizing students who believe themselves to be members of the opposite sex to use locker rooms and restrooms reserved exclusively for the opposite sex, and whether such a policy is narrowly tailored,” and “Whether the Boyertown policy constructively denies access to locker room and restroom facilities under Title IX ‘on the basis of sex.’”  These questions were phrased by ADF to incorporate its religiously-based beliefs seeking to discredit the reality of transgender existence, similar to attempts by the Trump Administration in its proposed regulations and policy statements.  If the Court had been tempted to grant this petition, it would likely have reworded the “Questions Presented,” as it pointedly did when it granted ADF’s petition to review the Harris Funeral Homes decision on April 22.

Although the decision not to review a court of appeals case does not constitute a ruling on the merits by the Supreme Court and does not establish a binding precedent on lower courts, it sends a signal to the lower courts, the practicing bar, and the parties.  In this case, the signal is important for school districts to hear as they try to navigate between the rulings by courts in favor of transgender student claims and the Trump Administration’s reversal of Obama Administration policy on this issue.  The question whether Title IX mandates the Boyertown School District’s access policy was not squarely before the Court in this case, and the justices may have denied review because they were already committed to consider whether federal sex discrimination laws cover gender identity discrimination in the Harris Funeral Homes case.

The Court normally provides no explanation why it grants or denies a petition for review although, interestingly, in another announcement on May 28, the Court did provide such a rare explanation in Box v. Planned Parenthood of Indiana and Kentucky, 2019 WL 2257160 (Sup. Ct., May 28, 2019).  In Box, the Court denied review of a decision by the 7th Circuit striking down on constitutional grounds an Indiana law that prohibits health care providers from providing abortions that are motivated solely by the sex, race or disability of the fetus, stating: “Only the Seventh Circuit has thus far addressed this kind of law.  We follow our ordinary practice of denying petitions insofar as they raise legal issues that have not been considered by additional Courts of Appeals.”  The implication for the Boyertown case is that the 3rd Circuit opinion may have been denied review because it was the only federal appeals court ruling to address the precise question before the Court.

Hawaii Appeals Court Says Religious B&B Owner May Not Reject Same-Sex Couples as Customers

Posted on: February 24th, 2018 by Art Leonard No Comments

Hawaii Appeals Court Says Religious B&B Owner May Not Reject Same-Sex Couples as Customers

The Intermediate Court of Appeals of Hawaii has affirmed a ruling by the state’s 1st Circuit Court that the operator of an owner-occupied Bed & Breakfast violated the state’s public accommodations law by refusing to rent a room to a lesbian couple from California who were seeking vacation accommodations.  The opinion for a three-judge panel of the court by Chief Judge Craig Nakamura rejected the defendant’s argument that this application of the law violates her constitutional rights, and also rejected an argument that because the B&B is owner-occupied it is entitled to an exemption under a law governing residential real estate transactions.  Cervelli v. Aloha Bed & Breakfast, No. CAAP-13-0000806 (Feb. 23, 2018).

Diane Cervelli emailed Aloha Bed & Breakfast to determine whether a room was available for a planned vacation trip, then following up in a phone call with the owner, Phyllis Young, about making a room reservation for herself and her partner, Taeko Bufford.  Everything went well on the telephone until Cervelli mentioned that she was reserving for herself and another woman.  Young asked if Cervelli and the other woman were lesbians.  When Cervelli answered “Yes,” Young said, “We’re strong Christians.  I’m very uncomfortable in accepting the reservation from you.”  Young hung up on Cervelli.  Bufford then called and received the same treatment.  “Apart from Plaintiff’s sexual orientation,” wrote Judge Nakamura, “there was no other reason for Young’s refusal to accept Plaintiffs’ request for a room.”

Each of the women filed a complaint with the Hawaii Civil Rights Commission, alleging a violation of the state’s public accommodations law.  The Commission found “reasonable cause” to believe that Aloha B&B had violated the statute, but bowed to the plaintiffs’ desire to file a court action rather than pursue the matter administratively, issuing them a “right to sue letter.”  After the lawsuit was filed in the Circuit Court, the Commission intervened as a co-plaintiff.

The law’s definition of “public accommodation” includes “an inn, hotel, motel, or other establishment that provides lodging to transient guests,” and lists “sexual orientation” as a prohibited ground for discrimination. A different statute, governing residential leases, provides an exemption from anti-discrimination requirements for “the rental of a room or up to four rooms in a housing accommodation by an owner or lessor if the owner or lessor resides in the housing accommodation.”  Aloha B&B argued that it was entitled to the owner-occupied premises exemption, but both the circuit court and the court of appeals disagreed.  They found that the exemption was intended to govern residential leases creating a landlord-tenant relationship in which the tenant moves in and resides in the premises for an extended period of time, not for “transient” customers who generally stay for a few days at best and are not establishing their residence in the rented rooms.

The court said that it was “clear based on the plain statutory language that Aloha B&B is a ‘place of public accommodation,’” and noted that the defendant had admitted in its pretrial statement that “it offers bed and breakfast services to the general public.” Reviewing the defendant’s advertising practices, and the data showing that the overwhelming majority of its customers – running up to 100 or more individuals a year – stay for only a few days, the court found Aloha’s claimed exemption inapplicable.  The court noted that Aloha generally rented rooms to anybody who applied, denying services only to gay people and smokers.

Aloha raised three constitutional defenses.

First, it argued that requiring it to rent a room to this lesbian couple violated Young’s right of privacy. “Aloha B&B argues that the right of privacy is ‘the right to be left alone,’” wrote Judge Nakamura.  “However, to the extent that Young has chosen to operate her bed and breakfast business from her home, she has voluntarily given up the right to be left alone.  In choosing to operate Aloha B&B from her home, Young, for commercial purposes, has opened up her home to over one hundred customers per year, charging them money for access to her home.  Indeed, the success of Aloha B&B’s business and its profits depend on members of the general public entering Young’s home as customers.  In other words, the success of Aloha B&B’s business required that Young not be left alone.”

“The privacy right implicated by this case is not the right to exclude others from a purely private home,” continued Nakamura, “but rather the right of a business owner using her home as a place of public accommodation to use invidious discrimination to choose which customers the business will serve. We conclude that Young’s asserted right to privacy did not entitle her to refuse to provide Plaintiffs with lodging based on their sexual orientation.”

Next, Young claimed a violation of her right of “intimate association,” but the court rejected this claim as well. “The relationship between Aloha B&B and the customers to whom it provides transient lodging is not the type of intimate relationship that is entitled to constitutional protection against a law designed to prohibit discrimination in public accommodations,” wrote Nakamura, again taking note of the large volume of customers passing through the premises for short stays over the course of a year.  “The hundreds of customer relationships Aloha B&B forms through its business is far from the ‘necessarily few’ family-type relationships that are subject to constitutional protection,” he wrote.  “With respect to the purpose for which the relationship is formed, Aloha B&B forms relationships with its customers for commercial, business purposes, and it is only the commercial aspects of the relationship” that the public accommodations law regulates.

Young had testified that the “primary purpose” of the B&B is to “make money,” wrote Nakamura, and, “She also admitted that if she could not make money by running Aloha B&B, she ‘wouldn’t operate it.’ Young does not operate Aloha B&B for the purpose of developing ‘deep attachments and commitments’ to its customers.”

Finally, Young made a “free exercise of religion” claim. This was doomed to fail under the federal Constitution, since the Supreme Court has held that individuals and businesses do not enjoy a constitutional exemption from complying with a “valid and neutral law of general applicability on the ground that the law proscribes (or prescribes) conduct that his religion prescribe (or proscribes).”  See Employment Division v. Smith, 494 U.S. 872 (1990).  Thus, Young sought instead to locate her argument in the Hawaii constitution, arguing that the court should depart from federal constitutional precedents and “impose a compelling state interest requirement, and apply strict scrutiny in deciding its free exercise claim under the Hawaii Constitution.”

The court was unwilling to take the bait, stating, “We need not decide whether a higher level of scrutiny should be applied to a free exercise claim under the Hawaii Constitution than the United States Constitution. This is because we conclude that [the public accommodations law] satisfies even strict scrutiny as applied to Aloha B&B’s free exercise claim.”  That is, the court concluded that the state of Hawaii “has a compelling interest in prohibiting discrimination in public accommodations,” and that the law is “narrowly tailored to achieve Hawaii’s compelling interest” in prohibiting such discrimination.

The court’s ruling affirmed the circuit court’s decision granting summary judgment in favor of the plaintiffs and the Civil Rights Commission on the liability phase of the case. Unless the case goes up to the Hawaii Supreme Court, the next step would be to send it back to the circuit court for a determination of damages for the plaintiffs.

The plaintiffs are represented by Lambda Legal staff attorney Peter C. Renn and local Hawaii counsel Jay Handlin and Linsay N. McAneeley of Carlsmith Ball LLP. Robin Wurtzel, Shirley Naomi Garcia and April L. Wilson-South represented the Civil Rights Commission in the case.  And, no surprise, Aloha B&B is represented by attorneys from Alliance Defending Freedom, a litigation organization that opposed LGBT rights at every opportunity.