Judge’s nixing of Iowa gender-balance law could be the beginning

DES MOINES, Iowa (CN) — A California group opposing state laws requiring gender-balanced boards and commissions got a big win with a federal judge’s ruling that struck down Iowa’s law, and it hopes to repeat that victory in other states in its mission to eradicate similar laws.

The Pacific Legal Foundation, which has opposed discriminatory mandates since it filed a brief opposing affirmative action in the Baake case before the U.S. Supreme Court in 1978, successfully sued the Iowa Judicial Branch arguing the state’s law requiring an equal number of men and women lawyers on the State Judicial Nominating Commission violates equal protection under the 14th Amendment.

Joshua Thompson, director of litigation for Pacific Legal Foundation’s equality and opportunity program said in an interview Friday the Iowa decision was a big win for the group’s effort to root out such laws in every state. “We are certainly very pleased with the decision” and “feel vindicated” to get the law enjoined and declared unconstitutional, he said. “This is our first decision on the merits.”

The Iowa case was just one of a number of actions the Pacific Legal Foundation is pursuing around the country seeking to get gender-balance requirements thrown out as unconstitutional. These laws, Thomspon said, do not treat individuals as individuals, but as “embodiments of their sex or gender, their biology. The Constitution forbids that.”

One measure of the scope of the issue is a report published by the foundation in October showing at least 25 states have race- or sex-conscious mandates or quotas for public board membership.

“We aim to root out those once and for all,” Thompsons said.

In the case the group brought in federal court in Des Moines, U.S. District Judge Stephanie Rose, chief judge for the Southern District of Iowa, issued a ruling Thursday striking down as unconstitutional Iowa’s gender-balance requirement for lawyers elected to the state commission that nominates candidates for the Iowa Supreme Court and the Iowa Court of Appeals.

Rose found the state failed to demonstrate that the barriers to women being elected to the judicial nominating commission are as high as when the statute was enacted in 1987, when far fewer women were practicing law in Iowa.

“Put simply, defendant did not sufficiently establish that the remedial measure is currently necessary in Iowa to remedy past discrimination that prohibited all women from election to the commission,” she wrote. “This is not to say that gender discrimination does not exist — it plainly does across the spectrum of jobs in this country — but the evidence presented to the court does not establish this fact in this commission, in this state, at this time.”

Connie Ryan, president of the board of directors of Justice Not Politics, a judicial independence advocacy group that supports the gender-balance requirement, said, “We are very much disappointed in the ruling. We have advocated for gender balance, and continue to see the need.”

The gender-balance statute was established because at the time most people put on boards and commissions were men who were in visible positions in their communities, because it took more effort to find more women to serve.

“Things have changed, but it can be argued that is because of the law,” Ryan said. She used the analogy of a person taking medicine that makes them feel better but the symptoms return when they stop taking the medication.

“If we remove this law, what are the consequences?” she asked. “There is not equality in our society.”

It’s not clear whether the Iowa Judicial Branch will appeal Rose’s decision, but it could be rendered moot by the Iowa Legislature, which this session is expected to consider a bill that would abolish the gender-balance requirement for all state boards and commissions. Governor Kim Reynolds has said she would sign such a bill into law.

Follow @@roxalaird16

Subscribe to Closing Arguments

Sign up for new weekly newsletter Closing Arguments to get the latest about ongoing trials, major litigation and hot cases and rulings in courthouses around the U.S. and the world.

Email *

Submit