The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco issued a ruling Tuesday upholding most of the district court's decision that the 2010 law is not overly broad and vague. It also upheld that court's decision that one part of the law is in violation of the constitution.
But the appeals court opposed the district court's ruling against a claim made by defendants that the law was enacted with discriminatory intent in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment. Writing for the majority, Judge Jed S. Rakoff said the district court should not have issued a summary judgment against the defendants without allowing them a chance to argue in full. That claim will now go back to the district court for trial.
Attorneys on both sides made oral arguments January in San Francisco. The 2010 law shuttered the Tucson Unified School District's popular Mexican-American studies program, sparking protests from students who said they benefited from the courses.
Attorney Erwin Chemerinsky, representing a group of former students who sued the state, said in court in January that the ban was enacted with a discriminatory goal and should be thrown out. State attorney Leslie Kyman Cooper denied there were discriminatory intentions, saying the law aimed to end divisive and segregated teaching.
Rakoff said in the ruling that the lower court abused its discretion by issuing a summary judgment instead of allowing the defendants to make a case for their argument. "Indeed, this evidence is in many respects relevant to our analysis of the merits of the equal protection claim, infra, where we conclude that there is a genuine issue of fact as to whether the statute was enacted and/or enforced with discriminatory intent," Rakoff wrote.
Judge Richard Clifton concurred on most of the opinion issued Tuesday, but he opposed sending back the issue of discriminatory intent back to the lower court. "I agree that Plaintiffs should be given the opportunity to present that evidence, but we should not pretend that proof of that proposition is already in the record. As the record stands now, there is not enough to justify the majority opinion's conclusion," Clifton wrote.
Although the Tucson district was forced to end its popular Mexican-American studies program, it has recently resumed teaching ethnic studies courses.
