We continue our discussion of the deep issues raised in the case of US v. Skrmetti. Last time we observed the Court wrestling with questions of whether the Tennessee law banning gender dysphoria treatments in minors was a form of sex discrimination. Later in the argument the Court addressed the question of whether transgender individuals, or some related group, constituted a so-called “suspect classification” and therefore laws purporting to affect that group would be subject to close examination (“Scrutiny”) by the Court. In this episode we listen, and react to, those arguments as the Court itself did. Professor Vik Amar returns to join Akhil in this task, and rightly so, since the “brothers in law” have written several recent posts on the deep questions raised by this and other recent cases. This has resulted in a new unifying theory which they begin to articulate in this episode. CLE credit is available for lawyers and judges from podcast.njsba.com.

The Supreme Court’s term is long since complete, but we turn back the clock and take a deep dive into one of the major cases of the term, United States v. Skrmetti. This case addressed questions of gender dysphoria treatment and transgender rights, but fundamentally, it was a case about the law of equality, say the brothers Amar. Yes, Vik Amar is back as a guest, and our two experts go back and listen to the oral argument and react to the Justices and the advocates as they present. It turns out that this is an excellent case for learning about how the law attempts to implement the equality promises of the Constitution, and you will hear the Justices engage in this action, or inaction. Our experts add more than their take on the arguments - they have theories that go beyond anything said in Court that day or written in the opinions that followed. This is part one of a multi-part summer treat from Amarica’s Constitution. CLE credit is available for lawyers and judges from podcast.njsba.com.

We pay tribute this week to a titan in the field whom you may not have heard of. Professor Richard Fallon, the Joseph Story Professor of Law at Harvard, passed away last week. As you will hear from his collaborator and friend, our guest Professor Michael Dorf, Dick Fallon had a deep impact in the law and the academy, and did so with grace, class, and integrity. The parallels between his career and Professor Amar’s are striking, but so is the divergence in their constitutional approaches. And this makes for a fascinating and instructive episode as we probe, rather deeply, the nature of these divergences and how they appear in various places in the law. Meanwhile this also brings us back to a fundamental matter for this podcast, namely, the nature of and validity of originalism as opposed to or in concert with other methods of interpreting and understanding the constitution and applying it in today’s, and tomorrow’s, America. That America must now, sadly, go on without Dick Fallon, but it will do so informed by his career and his greatness. We are fortunate to have Michael Dorf to show us why this is so. CLE credit is available for lawyers and judges from podcast.njsba.com.