By American Bar Association
The American Bar Association filed an amicus brief Tuesday with the U.S. Supreme Court, arguing that a Tennessee law that prohibits gender-affirming medical care for minors violates the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
The ABA brief, filed in support of the federal government’s challenge to the law, contends that the Tennessee law, known as Senate Bill (SB1), impermissibly denies the fundamental right to medical autonomy for certain groups while allowing it for others.
“Equal protection forbids differential treatment in the exercise of important constitutional rights absent the strongest justification, and Tennessee’s SB1 cannot withstand scrutiny under that standard,” the ABA brief says. It adds: “The ABA has recognized in its past policy statements, state policy denying any individual access to needed medical care for reasons
wholly unrelated to any medical justification — as SB1 does — is inimical to equality and equal dignity before the law.”
Gender-affirming care typically encompasses a range of social, psychological, behavioral and medical interventions that support and affirm an individual’s gender identity when it conflicts with the gender they were assigned at birth. In June, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to consider the constitutionality of SB1 in its new term that begins Oct. 7. Media reports indicate that 26 Republican-controlled states in the past three years have enacted laws restricting such care for minors.
In its brief, the ABA outlines its lengthy record of supporting LGBTQ rights, first urging the repeal of laws criminalizing private sexual relations between consenting adults more than a half century ago. Most recently in August, the ABA House of Delegates adopted policy urging legal protection of access to gender-affirming care.
“The right of patients to access treatment without arbitrary governmental interference is grounded in the common-law right of bodily integrity and self-determination, as well as liberty interests protected by the Fourteenth Amendment,” the brief says, citing the U.S. Supreme Court’s prior decisions.
The ABA brief in U.S. v. Skrmetti, which asks that the Supreme Court reverse the appeals court decision upholding the law, is available at www.americanbar.org/content/dam/aba/administrative/news/2024/us-v-skrmetti-amicus.pdf. The law firm of Arnold & Porter Kaye Scholer LLP filed the brief pro bono on behalf of the ABA.
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