Cases and Terms
Module 10
Chapter 10
Cases – Chapter 10
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Adarand Constructors v. Pena (1995): Held that any
discrimination based on race must clearly be necessary to
a compelling state goal (i.e., strict scrutiny), regardless of
whether its purpose is to help a racial minority.
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Baker v. Carr (1962): Established that the issue of
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Barron v. Baltimore (1833): Ruled that the Bill of
legislative apportionment would no longer be considered a
“political question” but could be adjudicated in courts.
Rights applied only to the national government and not to
the states. This decision has been subsequently modified
by decisions that have been rendered after the adoption of
the Fourteenth Amendment.
Cases – Chapter 10
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Brown v. Board of Education (1954): Overturned the
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Civil Rights Cases (1883): In overturning the Civil Rights
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Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857): Declared that African
doctrine of “separate but equal” that had been established
in Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) and decided that such racial
discrimination would now be considered inherently unequal.
Act of 1875, the Court ruled that the Fourteenth
Amendment outlawed only discriminatory state action and
not discriminatory private action.
Americans were not, and could not be, American citizens.
This case, which also invalidated the Missouri Compromise
of 1820, helped serve as a catalyst to the Civil War and was
overturned by the Fourteenth Amendment.
Cases – Chapter 10
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Frontiero v. Richardson (1973): Struck down a military
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Korematsu v. United States (1944): Sanctioned the
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regulation whereby families of male members of the military
were assumed to be dependent upon them (thus making
the serviceman eligible for an extra allowance) whereas
females were required to prove dependency by their family
members.
exclusion of Japanese Americans from areas in California
where they were thought to pose a military threat. In this
case, however, Justice Hugo Black said that any
classifications based on race were “immediately suspect”
and would be subject to increased scrutiny.
Lawrence and Garner v. Texas (2003): Texas statute
forbidding consenting adults from engaging in homosexual
sex in the privacy of their own home held unconstitutional
under the Fourteenth Amendment’s Due Process Clause.
Cases – Chapter 10
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Plessy v. Ferguson (1896): Upheld state Jim
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Reed v. Reed (1971): Used the equal protection
Crow laws by establishing the doctrine of “separate
but equal,” a doctrine not overturned until the
decision in Brown v. Board of Education (1954).
clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to overturn a
state law that automatically preferred males to
females as administrators of an estate. Held that
laws which treat men and women differently must
be based on an important government objective
and must be substantially related to achieving that
goal. This was the first use of intermediate or
heightened scrutiny applied to gender classification.
Cases – Chapter 10
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Regents of the University of California v. Bakke
(1978): Held that the university could not use an
explicit numerical quota system in admitting minority
studnets but could “take race into account.”
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Reynolds v. Sims (1964): Applied the principle of
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Romer v. Evans (1996): Overturned a Colorado
“one person one vote” to both houses of state
legislatures.
amendment, which had been adopted by popular
referendum, that outlawed all local laws designed to
extend special benefits or protections to homosexuals.
Cases – Chapter 10
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The Slaughterhouse Cases (1873): In
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Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of
Education (1971): Upheld the limited use of
rejecting the pleas of New Orleans’ butchers
who were required under state law to pursue
their calling in specified abattoirs, the Court
gave a very narrow reading to the privileges and
immunities clause of the Fourteenth
Amendment.
mandatory school busing as a means of dealing
with prior de jure segregation
Michigan Cases
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The lawsuits decided by the Supreme
Court were both filed in 1997 in the
Eastern District, U.S. District Court by
white applicants, who challenged the use
of race in the admissions processes of the
University’s largest undergraduate school,
the College of Literature Science, and the
Arts (Gratz v. Bollinger) and its Law School
(Grutter v. Bollinger).
Terms – Chapter 10
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Affirmative Action Programs: The name given to a
variety of programs designed to increase minority
representation that may or may not include racial
preferences or quotas.
Citizenship: An acknowledgment of membership in a
nation. The Fourteenth Amendment provides that
persons born in the United States or naturalized are
citizens. Congress is granted the power of naturalization
in Article I, Section 8.
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de Facto: Caused by forces other than the law.
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de Jure: Mandated by law
Terms – Chapter 10
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Due Process Clauses: Provisions found in the Fifth and
Fourteenth Amendments prohibiting the government from
taking a person’s life, liberty, or property without due
process of law. The later provision has been the primary
vehicle by which the guarantees in the Bill of Rights have
been applied by judicial decisions to the states.
Emancipation Proclamation: A presidential order issued
by Abraham Lincoln on January 1, 1863 declaring freedom
for slaves held behind Confederate lines. Adopted as a war
measure, the proclamation was later expanded with the
Thirteenth Amendment’s complete abolition of slavery.
Equal Protection Clause: A provision found within the
Fourteenth Amendment requiring that state governments
extend equal treatment to all persons.
Terms – Chapter 10
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Equal Rights Amendment: An amendment
proposed by Congress to eliminate discrimination
based on sex; the amendment fell three states shy
of ratification.
Franchise: The right to vote.
Fugitive Slave Clause: A provision found in
Article IV, Section 2 of the Constitution requiring
that states shall deliver persons “held to Service or
labor in one State, under the Laws thereof, escaping
into another.” Friction over this clause was
particularly intense in the period leading up to the
Civil War.
Terms – Chapter 10
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Grandfather Clauses: Provisions, directed against racial minorities
and eventually overturned by the courts, which restricted voting to
those who could prove that their grandfathers had voted prior to
1867, that is, prior to the time that African Americans were given
this right.
Heightened Scrutiny: The intermediate level of review generally
applied by the Supreme Court to classifications based on gender.
Incorporation: The process by which most of the guarantees
found in the Bill of Rights have been applied to the state
governments via the due process clause of the Fourteenth
Amendment.
Jim Crow Laws: Laws, now illegal, that mandated racial
segregation
Terms – Chapter 10
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Jus Sanguinis: A term meaning “law of the blood” that recognizes that
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Jus Soli: A term meaning “law of the soil” that recognizes that those born
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persons born abroad to citizens of a nation may still themselves acquire
such citizenship rights. If a person born of only one American parent wants
to claim U.S. citizenship, that person’s parent must meet a residency
requirement and the person must live for ten years in the United States,
including five continuous years from age 14 to 28.
within a nation are citizens thereof.
Literacy Tests: Tests, now suspended by law, which were once a
prerequisite for exercising the right to vote; such tests, combined with
“understanding clauses,” were often administered in a racially discriminatory
fashion.
One Person, One Vote: The principle, first articulated by the Supreme
Court in Gray v. Sanders (1963), according to which legislative and
congressional districts must have approximately equal numbers of
constituents.
Terms – Chapter 10
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Selective Incorporation: The view that the due process clause of
the Fourteenth Amendment was designed only to apply the most
fundamental provisions of the Bill of Rights to the states. Justice
Cardozo articulated this view in Palko v. Connecticut (1937).
Separate but Equal: The principle, legitimating racial segregation,
that is usually associated with the Supreme Court’s decision in
Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) but which was subsequently repudiated in
Brown v. Board of Education (1954).
Substantive Due Process: The idea that the due process clauses
of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments do not simply limit the
procedures governments may follow (procedural due process) but
also the substance of such decisions.
Suffrage: The right to vote.
Terms – Chapter 10
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Suspect Classes: Groups, like racial minorities
and aliens, to whom the Court has extended
extra judicial scrutiny because of past use of
such classifications in a discriminatory fashion.
Total Incorporation Plus: The view that the
Fourteenth Amendment was designed to apply
all the provisions of the Bill of Rights to the
states but that it was not limited to this
objective.