逍遥学能 2013-06-09 13:27
Going beyond statutory interpretation, the Supreme Court in other cases applied the due-process and equal-protection clauses of the fourteenth Amendment and the due-process of the Fifth Amendment, respectively, tostrike down state and federal laws that rested on gender classification found to be injurious to women.
超越法律解释，最高法院在其他一些案子里，分别运用了第14修正案中的“适当程序”和 “平等保护”条款和第5修正案的 “适当程序”条款，枪毙了一些伤害妇女的、建立在性别分类基础上的州和联邦法律。
The leading case in this line of decisions was Reed v. Reed (1971). Here the Court upheld the claim of an Idaho woman that a state court’s appointment of her estranged husband as the administrator of their deceased child’s estate, in accordance with an Idaho law that categorically favored men over women in matters of this sort, was a denial of equal protection 初中地理 of the law under the Fourteenth Amendment.
这一系列司法裁定中的首要案例是对里德控里德（1971年）一案的裁定。 在此案中，最高法院支持爱达荷州一位妇女的要求。她声称，该州法院指定与她分居的丈夫作为他们已故孩子的遗产管理人。这一指定是根据该州在此类案件中直截了当地偏向男性而非女性的一条法律，最高法院认为这条法律背弃了第14条修正案中法律的平等保护条款。
In Frontiero v. Richardson (1973), the Burger justices declared a federal law unconstitutional as a violation of the equal-protection requirement. The law in question regarded the dependents of male military personnel as automatically entitled to a basic subsistence allowance, but required the dependents of female military personnel to prove their actual dependency before they could qualify for an allowance.
在佛朗提尔控对理查德森一案(1973年)中，博格法院的法官们宣布一条联邦法律违宪，因为它违反了平等保护的要求。受到质疑的这条法律，认为男性军职人员的被抚养人可自动获得基本补助金，但要求女性军职人员的被抚养人必须先证明被抚养关系的真实性, 才有资格获得这笔补助金。
The Court further struck down a Utah statute that required divorced fathers to support their sons until age twenty-one, but their daughters only until age eighteen；and a Louisiana law that excluded women from jury duty unless they volunteered for it.
最高法院进一步否决了犹他州的一个法律，该法令要求离婚的父亲资助儿子到21岁，但要求资助女儿只到18岁；它还枪毙了路易斯安那州剥夺妇女担任陪审员的义务、除非她们出于自愿的一条法律。
In employment matters the Court held that states could not force pregnant women to take maternity sick leave at a specified time on the ground that such a policy violated the due-process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Although states and private employers could deny disability insurance benefits to women undergoing normal pregnancy and childbirth, they could not deny women employees’ unemployment compensation benefits when they stopped working because of pregnancy.
在就业问题上，最高法院认为各州不得强迫孕妇在特定时段请产假，因为法院认为这样的政策违反了第14条修正案的“适当程序”条款。虽然州和私人雇主可以拒发处于正常怀孕和生育阶段妇女的残疾保险福利，但不得拒发因怀孕而中止工作的女雇员的失业补偿金。
In gender discrimination cases the Supreme Court in the 1980s continued to hand down decisions favorable to women’s claim to equality. For example, the Court upheld a state antidiscrimination law that required women to be admitted to an all-male leadership training organization, against a claim that the law violated First Amendment rights of free association. In Meritor Savings Bank v.Vinson (1986), the Court for the first time applied Title VII to a claim of sexual harassment; it accepted the concepts of “hostile environment” and “quid pro quo” interaction as definitions of harassment.
在20世纪80年代有关性别歧视的案子中，最高法院继续宣布支持妇女对平等要求的裁定。例如，某州的反歧视法要求准许女性进入完全为男性开办的领导培训组织，针对认为该法案违反了第一修正案中自由结社的指控，最高法院支持了上述的州反歧视法。在美里特储蓄银行控文森一案中，法院首次将第七款运用到对“性骚扰”的投诉。法院接受了“具有敌意的环境”和“交换 ”互动作用的概念，把它们作为“骚扰”的定义。
As in the death penalty case, the Burger Court manifested moderate reform tendencies on the abortion question, a controversial social issue throughout the 1970s. In a case of 1973, it struck down a Texas law that made abortion a criminal offense, on the ground that the law violated a woman’s constitutional right of privacy under the Fourteenth Amendment. Justice Blackmun’s majority opinion stimulated that in the first and second trimesters of pregnancy the state’s power to regulate abortion was either nonexistent or subordinate to the woman’s right to decide the question of death or abortion. Only in the third trimester might the state prohibit abortion outright, and even then it could not prohibit abortion to save the life or health of the mother. In another case of the same year, relying on the same ground of invasion of privacy, the Court invalidated the recent Georgia law that made abortion crime.
堕胎问题是贯穿于20世纪70年代的颇有争议的社会问题。正如在死刑案子中，博格法院在“堕胎问题”中显露出温和的改革倾向。在 1973年的一个案子中，最高法院枪毙了德克萨斯州把堕胎定为刑事罪的法律，理由是该法违反了第14修正案中宪法保证的妇女隐私权。伯莱克芒法官代表的多数意见认为：在怀孕的第一和第二妊娠期，要么州没有规定堕胎的权力，要么应服从妇女对死亡和堕胎的决定权。仅仅在第三妊娠期，州才可以完全禁止堕胎，但即使在这个阶段，州也不可禁止出于保护母亲生命和健康目的实行的堕胎。在1973年的另一个案子里，同样以侵犯隐私权为由，最高法院宣布当时佐治亚州把堕胎定为刑事犯罪的法律无效。
历史理解要点：
虽然美国第19条修正案最终做出妇女在选举权上不得受性别歧视的保证，但在20世纪60年代以前，各种形式的性别歧视继续限制着社会生活中的女性。
从20世纪七八十年代起， 美国最高法院，特别是博格法院任期内，更多地限制男性以保护女性， 宣布了一系列有利于妇女的反性别歧视的裁定，使妇女在美国社会中，特别在就业、生育、堕胎、人生安全和社会福利等方面的平等权利得到法律保护。