Ch. 7 Sec. 2 Qs

Sec. 2 Qs

2.     List three guidelines the Supreme Court uses in judgment of cases involving equal protection rights

a.     The Rational Base Test

b.     The Suspect Classification Test

c.      The Fundamental Rights Test

3.     Describe the circumstances in which the Court requires the state to bear the burden of proof to justify a law

a.     When a challenged law involves suspect classification (classification made on the base of race or national origin) it is not enough for the state to show the law is an okay way to deal with a public issue. Then the Supreme Court makes the state show that there is “some compelling public interest” to justify the law.

4.     Explain the Court’s reasoning in overturning the “separate but equal” doctrine in the Brown decision

a.     Brown and associates made a successful argument that segregated schools could never be equal.

b.     The Court was also already slowly reversing laws on separation, but this case was a sort of final straw.

5.     Does the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment allow the government to draw distinctions between different classes of people?

a.     Yes because they must draw distinctions. For example population surveys draw a distinction between those under 35 and those over. However, they cannot draw unreasonable distinctions. Distinctions that people deem as unreasonable can be challenged in court.

6.     What were the far-reaching effects of the Brown decision?

a.     The decision in favor of Brown and it’s anti-discrimination ruling created a door for many other cases that dealt with segregation. For example any public segregation was essentially struck down – separate park benches, separate beaches ect.