Federal Court: LGBT Job Discrimination is Illegal

A federal circuit appeals court has ruled that existing law prohibits workplace discrimination against LGBT people. The ruling is a landmark decision from the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago, becoming the first time a federal court has come down in favor of LGBT rights on the issue.

Existing federal law specifically cites race, color, religion, sex, and national origin as protected groups in the workplace, but is mum about whether that also covers sexual orientation. The matter has long been a sticking point to LGBT rights groups seeking federal legislation, like the Employment Nondiscrimination Act, to remediate the issue.

The Seventh Circuit ruling now suggests they may not even need it.

“Discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation is a form of sex discrimination,” the court said in an 8-3 opinion arguing that “sexual orientation” was sufficiently subsumed within existing law. “It would require considerable calisthenics to remove the ‘sex’ from ‘sexual orientation.'”

The immediate case concerned Kimberly Hively, a part-time professor at Ivy Tech Community College in South Bend, Indiana, who said she was denied a full-time professorship because she is a lesbian.

“Hively’s claim is no different from the claims brought by women who were rejected for jobs in traditionally male workplaces, such as fire departments, construction, and policing,” the opinion by chief judge Diane P. Wood continued.

[image via Shuttstock]

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