Sup Ct Holds that Public Law Schools Can Deny Affiliation and Funding to Religious Groups that Discriminate Against Gay Students

CLS v. Martinez: The Supreme Court Rightly Holds that Public Law Schools Can Deny Affiliation and Funding to Religious Groups that Discriminate Against Gay Students

By MARCI A. HAMILTON

Thursday, July 1, 2010

This Monday, June 28, the Supreme Court decided Christian Legal Society v. Martinez, striking a blow for higher education in the United States.

As I discussed in a prior column, the Christian Legal Society (CLS) argued that Hastings Law School (a public law school that is part of the University of California system) had discriminated against it. In particular, CLS claimed that the law school discriminatorily refused to place its imprimatur on CLS, or to provide CLS with the funding that student groups typically receive.

Why did Hastings withhold affiliation and funding from CLS? Because CLS's policies exclude homosexuals from positions of full membership or leadership in the organization.

Hastings has a non-discrimination policy -- reflecting California law -- that extends to "race, color, religion, national origin, ancestry, disability, age, sex or sexual orientation," and it deemed the exclusion to constitute sexual-orientation discrimination.

The Court's decision in favor of Hastings is sound at every level, as I will explain.

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http://writ.lp.findlaw.com/hamilton/20100701.html