Wolf Presses U.S. Supreme Court to Preserve Civil Rights of Women and Girls
Today, the Women’s Liberation Front (WoLF) filed a friend-of-the-court brief in the case of Doe v. Boyertown Area School District, Supreme Court Docket No. 18-658.
In this case, a group of students sued their school district over its failure to maintain safe and private sex-segregated bathrooms. It all started when Alexis Lightcap walked into the girls’ room and found a male student there. Here is Alexis in her own words:
I was a junior in high school when I ducked into the girls’ room at school one day to find … a boy. I froze. Three years at this particular school, and that had never happened to me before. The girls’ bathroom had always been the girls’ getaway place — a place for privacy, mostly, but also a little refuge — a place to get away from boys, maybe talk about boys, but not meet boys. My first thought was to get out. My second was to find my teacher and let her know what had happened. The teacher told me to tell the principal, so I did. And the principal did nothing.
Not only did Alexis’s principal do nothing, but the federal courts have done nothing either; in fact they’ve made the matter worse. Alexis and her peers lost their case in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, so they appealed. They also lost their appeal in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, where the Court issued a stunning ruling that essentially denies the reality and material significance of biological sex. At that point WoLF filed a friend-of-the-court brief with the Third Circuit asking for a rehearing. Four appellate justices voted to reconsider the case, but that wasn’t enough to get Alexis and her fellow students a full rehearing. So they asked the Supreme Court to resolve this critical question.
We cautiously believe that this may be the case that the Supreme Court takes up to finally settle the question of what the words sex and gender mean under Title IX, other civil rights laws, and the U.S. Constitution. Stay tuned!
In sisterhood,
WoLF Board
P.S.: While we’ve been fortunate to file this brief without incurring lawyers’ fees, the printing and delivery fees for a Supreme Court brief are substantial. WoLF greatly appreciates all the donations we have received in support of this and our other work on behalf of women and girls. If you should want to help us continue this sort of work, please consider donating here.