Facts—Colorado voters adopted an amendment to the state’s constitution (Amendment 2) that prohibited all state and local legislation designed to protect homosexuals. The trial court issued a preliminary injunction against enforcement of the amendment; the Colorado Supreme Court decided that…
Facts—The Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967 (ADEA) applied to state employees except for elected officials or those appointed to policy-making positions. Two Missouri state judges, who were required by state law to retire at the age of 70,…
Facts—Vinson, a former employee, claimed that during her employment at the bank she had been subjected to sexual harassment. She worked at the bank for four years, was discharged in November 1978, and sued in the District Court, claiming that…
Facts—The city of Cleburne, Texas, denied a permit for a group home for the mentally retarded. The U.S. District Court upheld the ordinance and its application, arguing that no fundamental right or suspect class was at issue. By contrast, the…
Facts—Mexican American parents whose children attended elementary and secondary schools in a school district in San Antonio that had a low propertytax base challenged the Texas system of financing public education. The growing disparities between districts in population and taxable…
Facts—The Virginia Military Institute (VMI), a state-supported institution, offered an education to men but not to women. Women seeking admission un- der the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment initially lost in a U.S. District Court, which found that…
Facts—Petitioner, a female lawyer, was employed in 1972 as an associate in a large law firm in Atlanta. Respondent law firm was a general partnership and in 1980 consisted of fifty partners and approximately fifty lawyers employed as associates. Hishon…
Facts—Michael M., a seventeen-year-old male, was charged with violating California’s statutory rape law. The complaint, filed on behalf of the victim by her older sister, stated that on June 3, 1978, petitioner and Sharon, the alleged sixteen-year-old victim, met at…
Facts—Sharon Frontiero, a lieutenant in the U.S. Air Force, sought dependency allowances for her husband. Dependency would have been assumed for a man in her position, but women were required to show that men depended upon them for one-half or…
Facts—Sally, a mother, separated from her husband and on the death of her adopted son filed a petition in the Probate Court of Ada County, Idaho. She sought to be named administratrix of her son Richard’s estate. Meanwhile the father,…