Chip... Chip... Chipping Away At The Civil Rights Act

They are just chipping away, hammer stroke by hammer stroke. The Republicans have always hated the Civil Rights Act of 1964! The latest court ruling in the case of Ames v. The City of New York... But first a little history.

Ames v. Ohio : Supreme Court Upholds Uniformity in Title VII Discrimination Claims

Buchanan

 by Derek Meuth

June 13, 2025

On June 5, 2025, a unanimous Supreme Court struck down precedent in the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals that placed a heightened burden on members of a majority group bringing claims of discrimination under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (Title VII).  Title VII is the federal employment law prohibiting discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex (which includes sexual orientation, gender identity, and pregnancy), and national origin. The Court’s decision in Ames v. Ohio Dep’t of Youth Services, 605 U.S. ___ (2025) is part of recent shifts that are trending to a focus not on past historical imbalance or concepts of equity but on any unequal treatment.

Okay fast forward to this month,

The District Court granted summary judgment against Ames, and the Sixth Circuit affirmed. The court initially applied the traditional framework for evaluating discrimination claims based on circumstantial evidence, as first created by the Supreme Court in McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green, 411 U.S. 792 (1973). Under that framework, a plaintiff must make a prima facie showing that she was subject to discrimination. This is a flexible standard under which the plaintiff must present evidence suggesting that the defendant acted with discriminatory intent.  Plaintiffs can typically satisfy this burden by identifying members outside of plaintiff’s class that were treated more favorably than plaintiff, or by offering other evidence of discriminatory intent.

As the Sixth Circuit noted, Ames’s evidence that the defendant hired two non-heterosexual employees instead of Ames would ordinarily satisfy the prima facie standard. However, the District Court and Sixth Circuit imposed an additional burden on Ames, requiring her to show “background circumstances to support the suspicion that the defendant is that unusual employer who discriminates against the majority.” The Sixth Circuit noted that this additional burden can be met by evidence that the decision maker was a member of the relevant minority group (e.g., if a gay or lesbian supervisor was responsible for hiring non-heterosexual employees instead of Ames), or with “statistical evidence” showing a pattern of discrimination against individuals in a majority group. Because Ames did not present either kind of evidence, she failed to meet her burden.

This isn't really nothing new. Here in Connecticut this was brought up during the debate on the gender inclusive non-discrimination bills. The law protects anyone who was discriminated against because of their gender. Period. That goes for LGBTQ+ centers, it goes for LGBTQ+ housing, and it goes for anything LGBTQ+... straight can apply. 

So...

Court Ruling Strikes a Blow Against Civil Rights Enforcement

National Review

By Jared Bauman & Susan Greene

November 17, 2025

A misapplication of the First Amendment has led to an injustice.

One of the most consequential threats to civil rights law in a generation has just emerged — and not from the political right, but from the progressive left. The First Circuit, long a champion of civil liberties, has gutted student protections under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Not only does this ruling highlight a gap in civil rights enforcement that disproportionately affects Jewish students, it also undermines the protections against discriminatory harassment that all Americans enjoy under long-standing civil rights laws.

In early 2024, Jewish and Israeli students sued the Massachusetts Institute of Technology for violating Title VI, which requires universities receiving federal funds to take action when discrimination based on protected characteristics — such as being Jewish or Israeli — creates a “hostile environment.” Their lawsuit followed years of escalating hostility toward Jewish students. First, there was the invitation several academic departments extended to Mohammad El-Kurd, an advocate of the “torturous & slow” deaths of Israeli “pigs,” to speak on campus. Then, there was a Holocaust Remembrance Day marked by an image of a defaced Holocaust memorial. After the October 7, 2023, massacre, MIT students received an email from classmates affirming Hamas’s right to “resist oppression and colonization” through violence and pledging support for such efforts “[u]ntil liberation.” Protesters shut down parts of campus and ominously promised a coming “solution: Intifada revolution!”

The First Circuit ruled against the Jewish and Israeli students last month, advancing a novel and troubling interpretation of Title VI. In its view, the abuse the students faced was beyond the reach of Title VI because it was expressed through speech “protected by the First Amendment,” and Title VI does not “requir[e] a university to quash protected speech.”

That directive — that a private university need not “quash protected speech” to comply with Title VI — is legally untenable because it conflates the requirements of two distinct areas of law: constitutional and civil rights. This confusion, in turn, creates an artificial conflict that risks undermining the integrity of both.

Hey but that is what the conservatives want... the conservatives never like the Civil Rights Act. It even cased a flip! The conservative Southern Democrats switched en masse to become Southern Republicans. Here is something to consider: In the Senate, 82% of Republicans voted for the final bill. The Republican Senate Minority Leader, Everett Dirksen, was the key figure who forged the bipartisan compromise needed to end the Southern filibuster and in the House, 80% of Republicans voted for the bill. The Civil Rights Act shook the political world to its core... the Republicans became stanch conservatives and the Democrats moved left once the southern block left.

But once again...

Civil rights law, by contrast, obligates both public and private entities to protect individuals from discrimination in various settings, including schools (the focus of Title VI). To fulfill this mandate, institutions must limit speech that infringes on the civil rights of others. The operative question is not whether that speech is protected or unprotected (a question belonging to a different legal framework); rather, the question is whether the speech rises to the level of discriminatory harassment.

This is not new. It Connecticut there was a case at UConn where in the middle of the night a bunch of students were yell racial epithets. Their arrests were overturned and First Amendment grounds.

So what do non-discriminations laws do to protect us from discrimination? Everything... but the laws also protects from reverse discriminations. So all the Supreme Court ruling does is to restate what the law does and send s the case back to the lower court. The lower court has to rehear the case, if when the defendant says, "... evidence that the defendant hired two non-heterosexual employees instead of Ames would ordinarily satisfy the prima facie standard." is true then it will be discrimination.

But the burden is still on the defendant to prove that the perceived discrimination was in fact discrimination.

I was in charge of the hiring and firing in my department. One this that I always did document my reasons for not hiring or hiring someone. If the city did that, then they have strong ground to stand on.