{"id":2473,"date":"2011-05-11T17:43:15","date_gmt":"2011-05-11T21:43:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/crcl\/?p=2473"},"modified":"2016-11-16T20:44:21","modified_gmt":"2016-11-17T01:44:21","slug":"essay-at-least-one-thing-to-watch-for-in-the-first-circuits-doma-case","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/crcl\/essay-at-least-one-thing-to-watch-for-in-the-first-circuits-doma-case\/","title":{"rendered":"Essay: At Least One Thing to Watch For In The First Circuit's DOMA Case"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Mary L. Bonauto and Gary D. Buseck<\/em><\/p>\n

Contrary to much of the commentary about the President\u2019s decision not to defend DOMA in court, the issue of the standard of review for sexual orientation classifications is still a live claim in the First Circuit in the upcoming appeal of the Gill v. Office of Personnel Management<\/em> case.<\/em><\/p>\n

Following the lead of Attorney General Eric Holder in his letter to Speaker Boehner, some assume that the First Circuit has already decided the issue and that \u201cbinding precedent\u201d will thwart the plaintiffs\u2019 attempt to secure heightened review.\u00a0 There is \u201cprecedent,\u201d but as surely as there is a difference between dicta and a holding, it is not \u201cbinding.\u201d<\/p>\n

The \u201cprecedent\u201d part involves one brief statement from the First Circuit\u2019s decision in Cook v. Gates<\/em> stating, \u201chomosexuals are not a suspect class.\u201d\u00a0 528 F.3d at 62.\u00a0 That isolated comment is not \u201cbinding\u201d where the issue was not even litigated in Cook v. Gates<\/em>, a challenge to\u00a0 \u201cDon\u2019t Ask, Don\u2019t Tell.\u201d \u00a0The Cook<\/em> plaintiffs argued only that the district court should have applied the type of \u201crobust and realistic rational basis review\u201d supposedly applied by the Supreme Court in Romer<\/em>. \u00a0In Gill<\/em>, by contrast, the factors have been argued with a record of uncontested expert affidavits on the heightened scrutiny factors.\u00a0 In any event, the brief discussion in Cook<\/em> is dicta<\/em> not \u201cessential to the result reached in the case.\u201d\u00a0 Cook<\/em>\u2019s basic holding was that the Court would not overrule \u201cDon\u2019t Ask, Don\u2019t Tell\u201d notwithstanding the fact that the policy was <\/em><\/strong>subject to heightened scrutiny for due process purposes.\u00a0 See <\/em>528 F.3d at 60.\u00a0 Thus, a finding that the classification in Cook<\/em> was subject to heightened scrutiny on equal protection grounds for any reason would not have changed the ultimate result.<\/p>\n

The Holder letter all but concedes that Cook<\/em> is not \u201cbinding precedent.\u201d\u00a0 Addressing those cases cited as settling the proper standard of review to be rational basis, the Attorney General rightly responded that none of the cases \u201cengages in an examination of all the factors that the Supreme Court has identified as relevant to a decision about the appropriate level of scrutiny.\u201d\u00a0 Moreover, the fact that no rational basis existed for the laws condemned in Lawrence <\/em>and Romer<\/em> does not transform those holdings into determinations on the standard of review for sexual orientation classifications (\u201cneither of those decisions reached, let alone resolved, the level of scrutiny issue\u201d).\u00a0 The Holder letter even cites Cook<\/em> for this last point.<\/p>\n

While the issue of heightened scrutiny might well be open in the First Circuit, others argue that no new classification will be added to the canon of those receiving heightened judicial scrutiny where none has been added for several decades; and the Supreme Court has curtailed protections for existing groups and on Congressional authority to protect groups through civil rights legislation.\u00a0 Kenji Yoshino, \u201cThe New Equal Protection,\u201d 124 Harv. L. Rev. 747, 757 and n. 72 (2011) (noting that the Supreme Court last accorded heightened scrutiny to a classification \u2013 nonmarital parentage \u2013 in 1977). \u00a0\u00a0Of course, the issues addressed in Professor Yoshino\u2019s article have been plaguing civil rights litigators for some years.\u00a0 They, not faux precedent, should perhaps be the bigger concern of the litigants. \u00a0However, two points are worth noting: (1) doctrinal consideration of sexual orientation heightened scrutiny was cut off in its infancy by Bowers<\/em> in 1986 and only got a new chance at life with Lawrence<\/em>\u2019s extirpation of Bowers<\/em> as precedent in 2003, suggesting that the standard of review for sexual orientation classifications remains a vital question that the courts should address; and (2) in fact, it is difficult if not impossible to think of any classification based on sexual orientation that can survive appropriate and honest rational basis review under current doctrine in any event.<\/p>\n

Mary L. Bonauto is the Civil Rights Project Director at\u00a0Gay & Lesbian Advocates & Defenders<\/em>, and Gary D. Buseck is GLAD’s Legal Director<\/em> . Bonauto and Buseck are counsel for plaintiffs in the cases of Gill v. Office of Personnel Management and Pedersen v. Office of Personnel Management.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Mary L. Bonauto and Gary D. Buseck Contrary to much of the commentary about the President\u2019s decision not to 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