SCOTUS rules in favor of same-sex marriage

[a500lbgorilla]

Actually, yes.

A suspect class is one which the SC thinks there is a high likelihood that the 14th amendment is gonna be violated. Ie, that the State itself is depriving people of equal protection. Suspect classes are Like race, aliens, and national orign. Then there are quasi suspect classes like gender. But everything else is non suspect (age, disability, sexual orientation). For suspect classes, the state needs a damp good reason to discriminate. For quasi, they need a pretty good reason. But for nonsuspect? They just need a reason.

Protected classes are different. They get protection under the civil rights act, which means people get into shit if they discriminate in places like employment. Disability and race are both protected classes, so you can't be fired on account of either one anywhere in the nation.

Being gay is neither a protected, nor a suspect, class. So states and businesses alike can fuck around as they please. (Except in certain areas, like marriage, religion, education, and other fundamental rights)

Never heard of any of this. What dictates a suspect/protected class? Some back corner of some amendment to the Constitution?

[JKDS]

Never heard of any of this. What dictates a suspect/protected class? Some back corner of some amendment to the Constitution?

Suspect classes are all Judge-Made law. The 14th Amendment says States can't deprive people of equal protection of the law; yet States love doing just that. They do it so often with race, nationality, and illegals, that the Courts have started treating those groups as "suspect classes", and laws talking about them as being " suspect". Some classes are more suspect than others though, like there is almost never going to be a good reason to treat someone different due to race...but there sometimes is for gender and there's lots of reason for age.

Protected classes come from congress. They passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which is a beast of legislation. Within it though, are rules that employers have to follow. If youve ever been employed, you very likely had training on this, because employers can get in serious legal shit for violating it. I don't remember what congressional power allowed them to pass this thing, but I'm guessing it was the commerce clause of the Constitution.