POSC 130g 1st Edition Lecture 14Current LectureReligion: If people who have religious beliefs should be allowed to be exempt from certain public policies?Should people be allowed to be exempt from military service?Mozert v Hawkins: not a US Supreme Court case, lower court caseDemonstrates issue of exemption, lawsuit brought by Christian Parents- wanted Children to be removed from the classes when they were covering certain topics that the families found objectionable. Parents had children going to public school but didn’t like the textbook that the teacher decided to us. Holt published covered different readings but the parents objected to certain things in the textbook. They spent 200 hours reviewing the Holt series and found numerous passages that offered religious beliefs i.e. evolution, futuristic stuff, magic, false viewsof death, etc. The argument that was advanced was the family’s religious freedom rights were violated if children were exposed. The parents wanted the children to be excused from class when this material was covered. It violates the first amendment only during the seven categories. The lower court ruled for it. The court reversed it on appeal because it was too muchof a burden on the school and didn’t violate exercise rights. If the government enacts a policy to protect religious freedom, but some critics say that if the government is working to protect the rights of one religion that is establishing a religion. This would violate the establishment clause, one of the prongs in the Lemon Test. Do public schools teach only evolution and are not allowed to make other explanations as to how the world came into existence? Philosophers believe that the government shouldn’t tell the people what to think, but according to that philosophy, the government is supposed to be neutral and not impose a particular value system on them. If this is an accurate characterization,is it problematic that public schools only teach a scientific explanation to the exclusion of religion? Is that neutral? There is a problem for democratic theory if the government is supposed to be neutral but still atthe same time preach science. Can you teach intelligent design?Race and LawWhat is the meaning of equal protection of the laws?Before we were dealing with due process and constitutional rights, religious freedom, what is the proper relationship between church and state, and now we are dealing with the idea of equality.The concept of race is one of the most important, it has been a difficulty in the United States.The right to equal protection comes from the 14th amendment- legal attempts to prohibit racial discrimination. The Concept of Racein the 19th century, there were a lot of scientific theories about raceArthur de Gobineau’s Essay on the Inequality of the Human Races (1853-1855) Houston Stewart Chamberlain’s The Foundations of the Twentieth Century (1899, 1911)Madison Grant’s The Passing of a Great Race (1917)Lothrop Stoddard’s The Rising Tide of Color Against White-World Supremacy (1920)these thinkers were people who were influenced by the Eugenics movement that was studied earlier.Arian myth: southern and eastern Europeans were less than northern Europeans; whites were better than Asians and Africans. There were books that promoted racism, these aren’t only ancient ideas The debates about racial differences in terms of genetics were derived by the bell curve debate and Jenson= promoted racial differences.The claims have been proven to be false, this was exposed by many scholars such as Steven Gull. In 1980s and 1990s, critical race theory developedBias in the legal systemDerek Bell, Kimberle Crenshaw, Richard Delgado, Charles Larence, Ian Haney-Lopez, Mari Matsuda, and Adrien WingThey are trying to show profound racial bias in the American legal systemDifference between race and ethnicity: historically treated as a biological category and ethnicity as a social construction. Ethnicity is different from class- ethnicity refers to social classification inwhich individuals have a culture that differentiates them from different social groupsRace was treated as a biological designation, ethnicity as socialAnother viewpoint: Ethnicity is the larger category and race is a sub-category of ethnicity, all races are ethnic groups, but not all ethnic groups are racesIn the late 20th century, Race Formation, published by Omi and Winant, argued that racial groups can be differentiated in different ethnic categories, this was the precursor for critical racetheory and the idea that race is socially constructed. Critical race theorists, in some states, Asians might be colored or non-colored. If a comparative analysis, how different races are classified varies tremendously.Race is not biological, different states in the US classify it differently; people have multiple identities. Even though the concept of race has become more complicated, it doesn’t mean the legal system has acknowledged more sophisticated treatment of raceLaw still acts as race is a real thing: realification, legal system classifies people as though racial categories have an intrinsic meaning. Legal categories are questionableLegal Treatment of RaceLegal Definitions of Racein the UK, there was a debate as to what groups deserve legal protection. In the UK, the Court of Appeals (high court), people wanted to argue for protection under the law they would use Race Relations Act. In order to be protected, a group had to be considered an ethnic group. In England, had to argue they experienced discrimination and an ethnic group.Mandla v. Dowell Lee (1983) : case that involved a group from South Asian, as a religious minority from India. The Seek student wanted to be allowed to wear a turban during gym and the family brought suit when the school wouldn’t allow it. Did Sikhs count as an ethnic group to be able to use the law? The court said they did. But in a later case, there was a man from the Caribbean, the Rastafarian, that was associated with Jamaica, and wanted to be a chauffer for the government. They didn’t want to cut their head, had dreadlocks, put it in a hat. He tried to bring a lawsuit saying he had been a victim of discrimination for the hair but the government decided he didn’t count as an ethnic minority. Classification of Native Americans: “Blood quantum” rule, determine who could claim in the identity, if one had a grandparent to count for a member of the groupBlack White Paradigm: