We’ve seen across the country incidents where school officials secretly social-transition minor children in alternate gender identities without their parents’ consent or even knowledge. Lawsuits have been ongoing across the country, with the first one now reaching the Supreme Court.
In this case, the school district in Ludlow, Massachusetts, disregarded parents’ instructions not to discuss gender-identity issues with their children and interfered with the parents’ decision-making through secret online discussions in which a counselor suggested that the children were not safe with their parents. Another staff member actively promoted students’ transitioning. District officials acted according to a protocol they claimed was required by state educational guidelines and nondiscrimination laws. The parents of two children complained to school administration, only to be publicly disparaged by the superintendent and school board chairman. They sued in federal court, alleging a violation of their constitutional rights (1) to direct the upbringing of their children; (2) to make medical and mental-health decisions for their children; and (3) familial privacy. The district court granted the defendants’ motion to dismiss, and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit affirmed.
The Manhattan Institute, having filed an amicus brief supporting the parents before the First Circuit, has now filed a brief supporting their petition to the Supreme Court. Updating that original brief and many others we’ve filed since (linked here), and presenting medical research showing that social transition is not a neutral act but an active intervention, we argue that school policies and practices like the one at issue here infringe on parents’ fundamental right to guide their children’s healthcare.
Ilya Shapiro is a senior fellow and director of Constitutional Studies at the Manhattan Institute. Follow him on Twitter here.
Leor Sapir is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute.
John Ketcham is a legal policy fellow and director of Cities at the Manhattan Institute.
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