Scott Tibbs



Stop mutilating the law for political ends

By Scott Tibbs, October 1, 2019

If you want to argue for protections for homosexual and transgender employees from discrimination as a matter of policy, fine, make that case. But to argue that Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 makes such discrimination illegal is patently absurd.

First: The law was passed in 1964, and you have to take the original intent into account. There is no way Congress intended to make discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity (SOGI) illegal in 1964. Sodomy was a criminal offense in every state in the nation, with Illinois the only exception.

Second, and most importantly: You have to actually consider the text of the law. There is not one single word in the text that makes it illegal under federal law to discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity. Banning discrimination based on sex is not the same thing, because sex is the biological demarcation between male and female, not behavior.

Again, if you want to make the case that banning discrimination based on SOGI should be the law, then make that case. What you do not get to do is warp and twist an existing law written 55 years ago and pretend it aligns with modern sensibilities. It does not, and you know it. Stop lying.

There have been multiple efforts to make SOGI protections part of federal law, and all of them have failed. The honorable thing to do is to continue working to pass that legislation. The dishonorable thing to do is to bypass Congress and get activist "judges" to rewrite the law.



Opinion Archives

E-mail Scott

Scott's Links

About the Author

ConservaTibbs.com