Scalia Says Constitution Doesn't Protect Women From Gender Discrimination

[Deep13]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/atlantic/20110104/cm_atlantic/scaliasaysconstitutiondoesntprotectwomenfromgenderdiscrimination6424_1

* * * "Certainly the Constitution does not require discrimination on the basis of sex. The only issue is whether it prohibits it. It doesn't. Nobody ever thought that that's what it meant. Nobody ever voted for that," said the famously conservative justice, adding, "If the current society wants to outlaw discrimination by sex, hey we have things called legislatures, and they enact things called laws. You don't need a constitution to keep things up-to-date." What does he mean by this and is it worth getting outraged over? * * *

[still_one]

1. Why any woman or minority vote republican is beyond me /nt

[no_hypocrisy]

2. To paraphrase "Animal Farm", some citizens are more equal than others.

It sickens me to think a senior Supreme Court Justice doesn't recognize that this country is supposed to be based on equality as a default, not something that has to be legislated to be valid and protected.

[XOKCowboy]

3. So his Constitution says corporations are persons but women aren't?

The mind reels.....

[Zoeisright]

4. Oh drop dead, you scumbag waste of oxygen.

God, I hate him.

[Arugula Latte]

7. Seriously, if anyone was ever overdue for dropping dead it's Scalia.

Can we get volunteers to sneak up on him and blow airhorns?

[suston96]

5. He is right about not needing a constitution to keep things up to date.....

But the following seems to include equal protection under the law.....

14th Amendment
Amendment XIV
Section 1.

All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside. No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

I believe Justice Scalia needs to read the Constitution a few times until he gets it right.

[Deep13]

6. +1

[Riftaxe]

8. 14th which seems to be the basis of the question

"Section. 1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

Section. 2. Representatives shall be apportioned among the several States according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed. But when the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice President of the United States, Representatives in Congress, the Executive and Judicial officers of a State, or the members of the Legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such State, being twenty-one years of age, and citizens of the United States, or in any way abridged, except for participation in rebellion, or other crime, the basis of representation therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in such State.

Section. 3. No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.

Section. 4. The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United States nor any State shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave; but all such debts, obligations and claims shall be held illegal and void.

Section. 5. The Congress shall have power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.