Premium Essay

Equal Protection Clause In Civil Rights Cases

Submitted By
Words 438
Pages 2
The Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution helps protect certain peoples rights from the law.

Many of the Constitutional experts have considered the equal protection laws to be the utmost important part of the U.S. Constitution. The Clause, which took effect in 1868, provides that no state shall deny to any person within its jurisdiction "the equal protection of the laws". The Equal Protection clause is an important clause within the Amendment, that was put there to make sure that every person regardless of age, race, and religion would be treated the same as the government. This Clause has been used in several civil rights cases including the landmark case of Brown v. Board of Education (1954).
One of the major groups

Similar Documents

Premium Essay

Comparative Public Law Case Study

...department of law Pune Comparative public Law - I First Assignment “DISCUSS THE “EQUAL PROTECTION CLAUSE WITH RESPECT TO “14 TH AMENDMENT OF THE U.S CONSTITUTION AND ANAYLZE WITH RESPECT TOEVOLUTION OF FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS” SUBMITTED BY SHREYA CHAURASIA L.L.M .I ST SEMESTER ROLL NO. 64 PRN-15010143064 [2015-2016] Introduction “No person shall...be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law... Amendment V Article [V] (Amendment 5 - Rights of Persons) No person shall be held to...

Words: 6956 - Pages: 28

Premium Essay

Equal Protection Clause

...Equal Protection to Students The Equal Protection Clause belongs to the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution and it states that “no state shall deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws” (“The Equal Protection Clause”). Being one of the amendments gained from the civil war, the framers envisioned that its primary purpose would be to protect the newly freed slaves from racial discrimination. However, the wording of the Fourteenth Amendment gives off that equal protection clause protects against any type of discrimination and gives equal protection of law to all persons. Equal protection in schools soon started to expand and develop. The equal protection for students allow for anyone to gain...

Words: 703 - Pages: 3

Premium Essay

Mendez V. Westminster Case In 1954

...for this reason that the Supreme Court decision in the Brown v. Board of Education case in 1954 does not deserve to be considered the start of the Civil Rights Movement. The event that truly set off this famous movement was the decision in the Mendez v. Westminster case in 1947, because this case acted as a precedent for all other court cases regarding equal rights in education and provided hope for change. In the early and mid-twentieth century, America was operating based off of the 1896 Plessy v. Ferguson ruling that “separate but equal” was perfectly legal. This...

Words: 1341 - Pages: 6

Premium Essay

Equal Protection Clause

...implemented the Equal Protection Clause. Throughout this essay, I will explain the Equal Protection Clause, where the clause originated from, give example of the clause being applied to cases, and show how the clause is enforced today. The Equal Protection Clause is part of the United States Constitutions 14th amendment. In the Constitution, it states “nor shall any State…deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws” (Epstein and Walker). Meaning that the State must apply equal application of the law to...

Words: 832 - Pages: 4

Free Essay

Equal Protection

...The Equal Protection Clause what is it and how does it affect you? So how many people out there actually know what our Constitution entails? This would be the part where we hear crickets. Why because unless you are super passionate about politics or want to eventually run for congress at some point in your life you, like so many other American citizens have no idea what laws and amendments are set in place. This is where I seek to educate at least on one small faction of the fourteenth amendment. Now I know that for some learning about our government is probably high on the list of things you would rather not do however, there is a lot that we could all stand to learn about protecting these rights we hardly know anything about. The Equal Protection Clause is part of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. The clause, which took effect in 1868, provides that no state shall deny to any person with its jurisdiction “the equal protection of the laws”. In other words it is the constitutional guarantee that no person or class of persons shall be denied the same protection of the laws that is enjoyed by other persons or other classes in like circumstances. With the amount of problems this country has faced and is facing dealing with discrimination and inequality I believe it holds a very valuable place within our Constitution and more importantly our society. The Equal Protection clause was the center piece of the Civil rights movement and it contributed...

Words: 1343 - Pages: 6

Premium Essay

Do You Agree With The 14th Amendment

...Equal Protection Clayton Paral The American Constitution POL 303 Lisa Marmorato March 30, 2015 In our constitution we are afforded the right of equal protection. This means no matter our race, sex, or sexaul prefercence. The fourteenth amendment made it so no one man or women was more important than another. It wasn’t always like this. Some laws would only apply to a person of a certain race. Without the fourteenth amendment many of us would of never been afforded equal protection. Without the supreme court we wouldn’t of came to where we are now. When you look back to the begin. The original constitution afforded no guarantee of equal protection. I feel that every man or woman has the right to equal protection....

Words: 1769 - Pages: 8

Free Essay

Plessy V. Ferguson

...What are the important and relevant faces of the case? 2. What issues is the court addressing? What is the legal problem? 3. What law is the court applying? 4. What is the court’s decision, analysis, and rationale? For this week, you need to find a case that deals with Due Process, the Equal Protection Clause or Delegation. Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) What are the important and relevant faces of the case? The Case is based upon The Equal Protection Clause, in which, this case occurred one hundred and nineteen years ago, but it was very interesting as to see what has changed during the century. In 1890, Louisiana State passed laws prohibited races to sit together on railroads; something in common with segregation in the south in the 1950’s and buses. Trains were required to have seating for different races and were divided by curtains or some form of barricade to prevent the races from sitting beside one another. Homer Adolph Plessy, a Louisiana businessman, who lived a society of whites and blacks, happen to have a black grandparent, in which Louisiana law defined him as an “octaroon”, one eight of black heritage. Plessy did not consider himself black, but Louisiana did and therefore made him sit in the segregated area for blacks. Plessy did not agree and challenged the Jim Crow laws by breaking the law intentionally and sitting in an area of the train that Louisiana law said he was prohibited to sit in, in which case caused him to be arrested and charged with criminal...

Words: 969 - Pages: 4

Premium Essay

Civil Rights Cases: United States Vs. Memphis & Charleston Railroad

...Bennett Eighinger 10/6/15 The Civil Rights Cases 109 U.S. 3 (1883) Procedural Posture: In 1883, five cases were brought before separate lower courts where Black Americans had sued theaters, hotels and transit companies for refusing them admittance or otherwise excluding them from institutions that had been deemed as “white only”: United States v. Stanley, United States v. Ryan, United States v. Nichols, United States v. Singleton, and Robinson v. Memphis & Charleston Railroad. The plaintiffs were individually seeking writs of error for being denied access to these facilities as it violated their Constitutional rights as citizens under the Equal Protection clause in the Civil Rights Act of 1875. The decision was made that the Supreme Court would rule on all 5 cases as one Supreme Court case for efficiency and consistency....

Words: 671 - Pages: 3

Premium Essay

San Antonio Independent Schools Case Study

...San Antonio Independent School District v. Rodriguez, 411 U.S. 1 (1973) Historical Setting After Civil Rights success in the 1960’s, many of the United States underrepresented citizenry such as minorities and poor searched for equality through the Constitution. In San Antonio, Texas, citizens found that the school finance system was unjust and filed suit under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The Federal District Court found that the Texas school finance system violated the Fourteenth Amendment. The State appealed to the Supreme Court. Case Summary San Antonio Independent School District v. Rodriguez (1973) argued that education was a “fundamental right” implied in the Constitution and that poor Hispanic families were being treated as a “suspect class” due to financial disparities between wealthy and poor school districts. The argument was that this inequality of funding between school district’s violated the Equal Protection Clause. The State contended that education was not an Federal enumerated power, therefore it was reserved to the State and that included financial decisions. Court’s Decision The Court found in a 5-4 ruling that this was not a violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment because education is not a guarantee...

Words: 1404 - Pages: 6

Premium Essay

Gratz V Bollinger Case Summary

...Written Case Brief Case Title: Gratz v. Bollinger 2003. The Law: This case involved the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment, Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and 42 U.S.C. §1981. The Equal Protection Clause says that states must treat every person equally under the law. A state can’t discriminate against a person or a group of people for no good reason (“Bill of Rights Institute...”); there must be a compelling government interest to rationalize any type of discrimination. Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 says that programs that receive federal funding cannot discriminate against a person based on their race. A wronged party can file a complaint with the Department of Justice to pursue a legal course of action (“Title IV of the Civil Rights…”)....

Words: 1674 - Pages: 7

Free Essay

The Equal Protection Clause

...racial equality by the Equal Protection clause. The clause was a deciding factor in cases that involved racism. Though it sometimes limited rights, the Equal Protection clause eventually became a key element to justice. Lum vs. Rice (1927) was a Supreme Court case where the Mississippi education board did not allow a nine year old girl to attend the all-white Rosedale Consolidated School because of her ethnicity. Gong Lum’s daughter, Martha Lum, was Chinese and a native-born in the United States. One day, a superintendent at Rosedale told Martha to leave school because she was not Caucasian. Gong Lum later filed for suit and the state trial court was in his favor. The state took the issue to officials to readmit Martha Lum, however, the Supreme Court opposed the state’s decision. The Supreme Court supported their argument from the Cumming vs. Richmond County Board of Education case (1899) where it showed that schools are allowed to be separated for white and “colored” students. They also focused on whether or not Martha Lum was being denied of her equal protection of the laws from the 14th Amendment. This brought the Supreme Court to uphold the Plessy vs. Ferguson case (1896) by approaching the concept “separate but equal.” They declared that Martha Lum was not white and the Board of Trustees was allowed to exclude her from Rosedale. In 1954, the Brown family went against the Board of Education because they believed segregated schools can never be equal despite their similar...

Words: 794 - Pages: 4

Premium Essay

Business

...and ordered him to pay child support. The Alabama Court of Civil Appeals affirmed. In the Language of the Court The U.S. Supreme Court held that the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment prohibits peremptory strikes based solely on race, and it extends to forbid gender-based peremptory challenges. A peremptory challenge must not be solely based on the juror characteristic of gender. If gender does not serve as a proxy for bias, unacceptable jurors may be removed, including those members of a group or class. Previously, the Court held that Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment governed the exercise of peremptory challenges by a prosecutor in a criminal trial. A defendant has no right to a jury composed of people of his or her own race, but a defendant does have the right to be tried by a jury whose members are selected based on nondiscriminatory criteria. The U.S. Supreme Court has repeatedly issued opinions that reaffirm its commitment to jury selection procedures that are fair and nondiscriminatory. Whether the trial is civil or criminal, potential jurors and litigants have an equal protection right to jury selection procedures that are free from state-sponsored group stereotypes rooted in and defined by historical prejudice. Intentional discrimination on the basis of gender by state actors in the use of peremptory strikes in jury selection violates the Equal Protection Clause. Litigants in any...

Words: 666 - Pages: 3

Premium Essay

Era Of Divorce Analysis

...In Baehr v Lewin, Hawaiian couples argued that denying same-sex couple marriage licenses was a form of gender discrimination that was prohibited by the Equal Protection Clause in Hawaii’s State Constitution. The judge agreed with the couples, and the couples won their case. However the judge called for a commission to secure the right to same-sex marriage and advise the couple to sue again. When they sued again in Baehr v. Miike (1996), the judge found that denying same-sex couples to right to marriage was gender discrimination that was prohibited by the state’s Equal Protection Clause. The judge said that same-sex marriage should be legal, but the ruling stayed pending on an appeal to the Supreme Court. During this time, Republicans in Hawaii’s congress passed the Hawaii State Constitutional Amendment on Marriage, in early 1998, banning same-sex marriage in the state of Hawaii. In late 1998, the Supreme Court ruled that it cannot allow same-sex marriage because same-sex marriage is prohibited by the state’s constitutional amendment on...

Words: 1702 - Pages: 7

Premium Essay

Gideon Vs Wainwright Case Summary

...minority children of the equal protection of the laws guaranteed by the 14th Amendment? b. Provide background information: Black children were unable to attend the same schools that white children attend because of segregation laws. One person in particular, Linda Brown, was denied admittance to an all white school, and Thurgood Marshall decided to challenge the protection guaranteed by the 14th Amendment. c. Provide a summary of the opinion of the Court in this case: The Court ruled that all people deserve equal protection. Although black and white areas were built equally, segregation...

Words: 2008 - Pages: 9

Free Essay

Case Study Presentation

...Case Study Presentation (Chapter 4 Page 104) Corey Airport Services Inc. versus Clear Channel Outdoor Inc. The deciding court was the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit Case decided on June 4, 2012 The events of this case began when the City of Atlanta issued a request for proposal for a five-year contract at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport in 2002. The lease arrangement envisioned in the request for proposal involved the winning bidder managing hundreds of advertising displays at one of the world’s busiest airports with a guaranteed portion of the revenue remitted to the city. Before the 2002 proposal, Defendant Clear Channel Outdoor in partnership with Defendant Barbara Fouch held the advertising concession through a month-to-month contract. Fouch had been awarded the contract by the City without entering into a competitive bidding process, and Clear Channel became Fouch’s partner by purchasing the ownership interest of Fouch’s previous business partner. The existing month-to-month contract guaranteed fifty percent of advertising revenue to the City, but the request for proposal required bid proponents to commit to paying at least sixty percent of their advertising revenue to the City. Three companies submitted proposals to the City as part of the bid process, the obligatory team of Clear Channel and Fouch was the top finisher. Plaintiff Corey Airport Services, Inc. finished in second place. After Corey failed to secure the contract...

Words: 1641 - Pages: 7