Supreme Court justice says discrimination is a state issue!
WASHINGTON - January 3, 2011 - Supreme Court Justice Antonino Scalia's belief that women have no protection under the Constitution could herald the return of officially sanctioned gender discrimination, a prominent Washington lawyer says.
In a magazine interview published this month, Justice Scalia reiterated his position that the Constitution's 14th Amendment doesn't guarantee protection against discrimination on the basis of gender or sexual orientation.
"Certainly the Constitution does not require discrimination on the basis of sex," Scalia told California Lawyer. "The only issue is whether it prohibits it. It doesn't. Nobody ever thought that that's what it meant. Nobody ever voted for that."
Scalia, long known to be a constitutional "originalist" and a conservative stalwart on the Supreme Court, argued that it's up to legislatures to pass laws that protect women against discrimination, and doing so wouldn't be unconstitutional.
"If indeed the current society has come to different views, that's fine. You do not need the Constitution to reflect the wishes of the current society," he said. "If the current society wants to outlaw discrimination by sex, we have things called legislatures, and they enact things called laws. You don't need the Constitution to keep things up-to-date. All you need is a legislature and ballot box."
