Opinion ID: 776131
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Enforcement of The Equal Protection Clause

Text: 4 The original three judge panel in this case agreed with the state's equal protection argument that it was immune from plaintiff's suit under the Eleventh Amendment, and the Court dismissed the suit without reaching the merits. Judge Ryan's opinion for the Court concluded that Congress had improperly expanded the Equal Protection Clause by imposing heightened scrutiny in disability cases when it only requires rational basis scrutiny. The Court said that [i]t is well established that disability is not a suspect class for purposes of equal protection analysis and so the State may discriminate on the basis of disability if such classification is rationally related to a legitimate state interest. Popovich v. Cuyahoga County Court of Common Pleas, Domestic Relations Div., 227 F.3d 627, 637 (6th Cir. 2000). The panel did not reach any question concerning whether Congress had authority under the Due Process Clause to require accommodation of the disabled in state child custody proceedings. 5 On December 12, 2000, we elected to rehear this case en banc, but delayed consideration until the Supreme Court announced its decision in Board of Trustees of the University of Alabama v. Garrett, 531 U.S. 356, 121 S. Ct. 955, decided February 21, 2001. In June of 2001, the en banc court heard oral argument. In Garrett, the Supreme Court, 5 to 4, held that the Eleventh Amendment bars federal employment discrimination suits against a state based on disability, as authorized by Title I of the Americans with Disabilities Act. The Court, noting that the Title I legislation is limited to employment discrimination against the disabled, said that the scope of the constitutional right at issue is simply equal protection. Id. at 963. Title I does not encompass claims based on substantive rights under the Due Process Clause, and therefore the scope of the constitutional right Congress is enforcing does not go beyond equal protection liability. The Court then held that Section 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment does not give Congress the power to enforce the Equal Protection Clause by authorizing federal employment discrimination suits against states based purely on disability. Like Judge Ryan's opinion for the panel in this case, the Court reasoned that under equal protection principles, disability -- unlike race -- is not a suspect category and does not deserve heightened scrutiny. Therefore, States may make reasonable employment decisions on the basis of disability. Title I of the Disabilities Act, which addresses discrimination in employment based on disability, may only trigger minimum rational-basis review, id., and Congress may not enforce the Equal Protection Clause by creating a higher standard of liability and enforcing it against the states in federal court. Sovereign immunity under the Eleventh Amendment forbids heightened state liability in federal courts in disability claims because such claims have never before received more constitutional protection than rational basis review. The Court held that Title I is not congruent with the Equal Protection Clause because it greatly expands discrimination liability by adding a very large new suspect class of plaintiffs. Id. at 967-68. Thus the Supreme Court followed the same line of reasoning constraining congressional enforcement of the Equal Protection Clause as the panel of this Court suggested in its opinion in this case. It is clear after Garrett that congressional authority under section 5 to enforce the Equal Protection Clause is limited and will not sustain the Disabilities Act as an exception to Eleventh Amendment state immunity. 4 6