The Supreme Court handed down several decisions Jun 30, none of them inconsequential. But I wish to deal for now, anyway, only with the two most observers seem to think the most important. That would be “Trump v Barbara” on the 14th amendment and birth right citizenship and another one with two names which we’ll get to in a few moments, regarding trans people in sports.

The 14th Amendment, ratified in 1868, stated explicitly that all born “in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof,” were citizens. The Trump administration attacked this amendment. Going after it just at the beginning of the 2nd term. Donald Trump ordered(by executive order, I believe) that this right not be applied to people whose parents had come to the US for a short stay and often left shortly after the birth. In other words, he was after people he considered phony citizens, those who were born here only because their parents traveled here so they would be US citizens from birth,.

Since Trump’s executive order was clearly contradictory of the 14th Amendment it is no surprise that court cases arose, several federal judges got involved, and the US Court System ordered that the Administration must follow the law and Constitution, not the President’s ideas. This led to a lengthy and obviously losing(for the President)series of court fights and the question wound up before the Supreme Court.

The government(Trump’s side)attempted an argument which, broken down to lay language went something like this–“These people are citizens only because their parents came here to get them citizenship and most had no intent to stay as a family. The original 14th Amendment did not have this intent, it was to guarantee citizenship to former slaves. Therefore the citizenship of these people is basically phony and need not be treated as legitimate.”

Now I think it is important to note that Trump’s side was not entirely incorrect in everything they said–not quite. It is certainly true that the 14th Amendment was for former slaves and if there had been no such issue there would have been no such amendment. It would not have been necessary. But MAGA oriented people then went on to argue that the intent of the amendment rather than its clearly spelled out legal strictures should rule, which would change the status of US. citizenship.

I have never gone to law school so I am offering only a layman’s (I hope fairly well educated) opinion here, but it would seem to me that there could be real problems. It would be an awful mess if suddenly the intent of the makers of every law and Amendment had to be considered and could be subject to federal hearings. It would be a legal mess, placing on our already overburdened courts a new, irrelevant and unneeded burden and presenting a unneeded complication in pursuing legal matters in the US.

Also, the idea that the intention of the authors should rule everything else seems to me legal nonsense. Of course the “‘intent” of the founding fathers is a legitimate subject for debates in Amending the Constitution. But it is only one of several considerations that traditionally go into decisions by Amendment writers, members of Congress and the courts. And in this case we don’t know everything about intent.

I have no doubt that it was the intent of the authors of the 14th Amendment to guarantee citizenship to former slaves. The other issue was not a consideration. But, hey, note that! Not a consideration! At least I don’t recall ever reading or hearing of any such issue over this amendment. But the precise wording of the Amendment makes it clear it applies to ALL born in the US(very small exception for children of foreign diplomats). They almost certainly had no “intent” to draw a distinction among Americans based upon the way they had attained or inherited their citizenship. There is certainly nothing in writing to suggest this.

Looking at the Amendment again, it says “All persons born or naturalized,.” with only that one narrow exception. It is surely not a legitimate function of judges or legislators to change such a straight forward statement based upon a supposition, certainly not one that was to my knowledge never written down or even publicly expressed. The Court’s decision is the only possible one that could make any legal sense or serve justice!! They got it right and did so 6-3 with a liberal-conservative mixture in the majority.

The other one(actually, technically two cases but largely the same issue)deals with transgender people and athletics. The question is whether it is all right to ban biological males from partaking in women’s sports. I personally think this is a tough one and people will divide on it differently than on the citizenship issue. My own feeling(and I am aware a lot of my fellow liberals are going to disagree)is that the court was right. Please note that the court ruling does not forbid transgender participation of this type. What it does is to give the states the right to do it.(Which roughly a half of them do already.)

Regarding the very difficult transgender issue, I understand the feeling of “left-outness” some people will feel, but here is my thinking–

I think it is really beyond question that biological males have an unfair advantage if participating in sports as female. I remember in the old Cold War days that at Olympics the USSR and the rest of the world often differed on things such as who had “won.” One thing that I know was alleged was that some of the Soviet “female” athletes weren’t, and that gave them an advantage.

Since here we have a clear question of fairness on both sides, we have to choose. I am choosing the side that I think provides the most in fairness for as many people as possible. There will likely be further appeals and maybe this will change. But it is where I stand now.

Because there were two States involved here this case may be know as “Little v Hecox,” which came from ID or “West Virginia vs BPJ.”

The Court ruled substantially the same on each but there are some differences. The main thing to remember is that in a 6-3 ruing the Supreme Court stated that State laws banning transgender athletic participation do not violate the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment.

Title 9, a 1972 Civil Rights Act meant to protect the rights of females was part of “WV v BJP” but not “Little v Hecox.” Without going into more detail than you or I want, I’ll stop the narration there. If you want to pursue this further, just google “Recent Supreme Court Decisions.” There were other recent decisions of importance and I may get to at least some of them soon.