 Hello, and welcome to Roger Williams University School of Law's Virtual Symposium on Justice for All Transformative Gender Law. My name is Gregory Bowman and I have the honor and privilege of serving as the Dean of our Fine Law School, and I'm very excited to start us off today. This annual Justice for All issue of the Law Review and the Accompanying Symposium were created several years ago by the Board of Editors of our Law Review. And the symposium and the issue are stirring examples, I think, of what can happen when you have bright, talented, mission-focused student leadership and how that leadership of the students can make a law school that is already very good even better. So I'm pleased to welcome you this morning. I would like to start us off by reading our Law School's Land and Labor Acknowledgement. As we begin our program today, I want to take a moment to reflect on the lands on which we reside. We are coming from many places and we want to acknowledge the ancestral homelands and traditional territories of indigenous and native peoples who have been here since time immemorial and to recognize that we must continue to build our solidarity and kinship with native peoples across the Americas and across the globe. Roger Williams University School of Law is located in Bristol, Rhode Island. And so we acknowledge and we honor the Narra Kansett and Poconova people, as well as Soames, the original name of the land on which our campus resides. We also acknowledge that this country would not exist if not for the free enslaved labor of Black people. And we recognize that the town of Bristol and the very land on which our campus resides have benefited significantly from the trade of enslaved people from Africa. The economy of New England, of Rhode Island, and more specifically of Bristol, was built from wealth generated through the triangle trade of human lives. During this time of ongoing national reckoning with our history of slavery and the disparate treatment of Black people, we honor the legacy of the African diaspora and the Black lives, knowledge, and skills stolen due to violence and white supremacy. As we gather here virtually today, the movement for justice and liberation is building in our country. Yet many are still being met with violence and even being killed, while other people in our country actively work to stand in the way of progress. As upholders of justice, our hope is to become agents of change for members of our society who have been met with violence, physical, mental, emotional, through our privilege. And as upholders of justice, we believe that our students, who soon will be practitioners of law, can be and already are agents of change as well. So thank you again for being here. We really appreciate you taking the time to be with us for today's exciting day. It's now my pleasure to turn the virtual podium over to Eddie Lee Schaub, who is the president of the Rhode Island Women's Bar Association. Thank you very much, Dean Bowman. And good morning, as the dean said, my name is Eddie Lee Schaub. I'm the president of the Rhode Island Women's Bar Association. I'm also a senior assistant city solicitor for the city of Providence. And although I'm not a Roger Williams alum, I'm so proud and glad for the relationship that the Women's Bar Association has been fostering, and will be continuing to foster with the law school. I'm also delighted to have been invited to speak at the beginning of this symposium and to introduce a few of the background and history of the law school's law review as well as the Justice for All program. So the Roger Williams University Law Review is a relatively young organization, not unlike the law school itself. Their first issue was published in the spring of 1996. The Law Review is a student-run organization that publishes three journals of legal scholarship each academic year. Student editors run the Law Review and are responsible for content, timely publication, and all other organizational decisions. The Law Review usually publishes three issues throughout the academic year. First, the winter issue is devoted to topics with a national focus. Second, the spring issue revolves around topics germane to the Rhode Island legal landscape, including a survey of new Rhode Island law and includes student reviews of recent legislative enactments, as well as an analysis of significant Rhode Island Supreme Court opinions. As the only law review in Rhode Island, the Law Review is uniquely positioned and qualified to publish scholarship in this field. As a quick aside, I can personally attest to the quality of that legal review, and I personally relied upon a number of Law Review articles regarding Rhode Island law in my practice. And finally, the Law Review publishes an issue featuring articles from academic symposia at the law school. The Law Review is ultimately committed to promoting and enabling both honest and full discussion of legally significant topics on the national and local level. Editions incorporate a comprehensive range of articles and essays from professors, judges, and practitioners. In addition, the Law Review displays student work in the form of comments and notes. Second-year students also write the survey of Rhode Island law, a section that has become a resource for local practitioners in the state like myself. A little bit about the history of the Justice for All program. The phrase justice for all dates back to the founding of our country, but it has become increasingly clear that many groups of people are often left out of the all category. An individual's race, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, religion, citizenship, ability, age, and or socioeconomic status are just a few of the factors that can lock an individual out from receiving equal treatment in our justice system. People in those groups have limited access to resources like lawyers, legal services, and legal education, which undermines the very core principle of justice that is at the essence of the United States Constitution. Less than 30 years after its founding, the Roger Williams Law Review sought to increase their call for pieces oriented around social justice and founded the Justice for All Journal, an annual publication that lives within the Roger Williams Law Review. To support that mission, the 2020-2021 Law Review Editorial Board created two new roles within the Law Review Editorial Board to promote the journal and select timely topics for both the publication and the annual symposium. The Justice for All Journal is now approaching its third year. The articles in the Justice for All Journal range from traditional to non-traditional pieces. The goal is to make it accessible, not only in a physical sense, but in such a way that people from all backgrounds can understand its content. The journal prides itself on publishing timely content from a variety of sources that are not solely legal in nature. The symposium event supports that mission, and we hope will continue to promote the purpose of justice for all. So this year's symposium event focuses on transformative gender law. The event will have three portions, two panels and a keynote speaker. The first panel will focus on Title IX. Title IX has had such an impact that is rarely considered in its fullness. Primarily its impact on athletics, education funding, opportunities, and sexual assault. This panel brings theory and practice together to reflect on the deep impact of this statute in our legal system and American life. Our keynote speaker, Zikia Thomas, will discuss the legal and political history of the ERA and why it matters now more than ever, especially to protect bodily autonomy and what lawyers can do to help. The second panel will focus on the transformation of the law in regards to transgender rights and the effects on transgender individuals. There will be a brief discussion on the projection into the future of those rights. So for everyone paying attention at home in Zoom land, that was basically the canned portion of my speaking portion to introduce the panel and to introduce what the day was gonna look like and to give a bit of background. I was now invited to have the opportunity to talk to all of you about a little bit of an anecdotal experience, my experience with gender rights, my experience with the ERA, and anything that might be relevant to this symposia. And as president of the Rhode Island Women's Bar Association, my cup runneth over with stories that I can share with you about access to justice based on an individual's gender, gender identity, and gender presentation. Where to start? So first and foremost, I did have the pleasure and opportunity of representing the state of Rhode Island as a special assistant attorney general and defended the attorney general on an ERA challenge. I'm so happy that we are discussing today the Equal Rights Amendment and its impact and where it currently stands. There's been a number of litigation, a number of cases throughout the country brought to try and seek to codify the ERA because it was passed by a number of states. The lawsuit, unfortunately, that was brought against the attorney general was not the type, in my legal opinion, that would have been sufficient to provide the women in Rhode Island the type of protection that the actual ERA once codified would provide. I mean, we all understand, for those of us who are women, who are friends of women in the legal profession, we all know those experiences where women are in the legal profession either undercut, underrepresented, or undermined by virtue of their gender presentation. Something very recently that just happened to me. I am on a case that has been receiving a little bit of local news. I have been seated at council table and a local paper of record did not acknowledge that I was an attorney at the table. Now, it might have been an oversight. They might have been an accident or it might have been by virtue of my gender presentation and the paradigm that is difficult for individuals to recognize that women can in fact be lawyers in the justice system. It was not surprising to me considering the judge as a man and every other lawyer in the room was a man. In my career and life and experiences, I've also had the opportunity to work with a number of individuals from the transgender community, individuals who I respect and care for. And the reality is that gender law and gender transformation and respecting the rights of those individuals is really the core of respecting those individuals as humans at all. In Rhode Island, as a member of the Women's Bar Association, we recognize a woman in law every year to receive the Ada Sawyer Award. Ada Sawyer was the first woman in Rhode Island to be recognized as an attorney. And the way that she became recognized as an attorney is that she had to sue for the right to be acknowledged as a human at all in order to qualify to sit for the bar and become admitted. This wasn't 300 years ago before the spanning of our country, it was in the 1920s, I mean, only a little more than 100 years later, we're still dealing with equity issues and equality issues and the ability to access justice by virtue of gender and gender presentation. I honestly could keep going on and on and on about the issues, frustrations that I have felt, but I am so grateful to be part of the Rhode Island legal community. I'm so grateful to have been invited to speak to all of you about some of the issues here today and to introduce what appears to be a tremendous panel of speakers and an amazing program by Roger Williams here today. And so without further ado and without taking up even more of your time, can you tell him a litigator and like sound of my own voice? I will now turn it over to the editor-in-chief of the Roger Williams Law Review, Stephanie Fisher. Thank you again for allowing me to speak. Thank you so much for that wonderful introduction. Good morning everyone, my name is Stephanie Fisher and I'm the editor-in-chief of the Roger Williams Law Review. On behalf of the entire law review, I'd like to welcome you to our event. Thank you for taking the time to attend. I'd like to also extend a very sincere thank you to the faculty and staff at the law school who continue to support our efforts. We could never do this without you. And most especially, thank you to our justice for all editor, Ms. Levy-Freedman and our justice for all research and development editor, Ms. Stalen. They both worked tirelessly for this event, have been the main point of contact for all of our speakers. Thank you both so much. Today's event is a webinar. We will have two panels and a keynote speaker and the agenda for today's event, denoting the times for each panel and the breaks is located on the registration page. You can download that for additional details. In addition, biographical information for each speaker and moderator is listed on the registration page. To make note, this event has been approved for five continuing legal education credits as well. After the event, a recording of the entire webinar will be available on the school's YouTube channel. Throughout the webinar event, attendees will have the opportunity to submit questions to the speakers. To do so, please submit your questions in the question and answer feature, which should be located at the bottom toolbar of your Zoom screen. We will submit those questions to the speakers as time permits towards the end of each segment. Our first panel will begin shortly at 10 a.m. We will take a brief break until then. Again, thank you for attending and we hope you enjoy the event. Good morning. My name is Hillary Leigh G. Friedman. I'm a 3L here at Roger Williams University School of Law and I'm the editor of the Justice for All Edition. And I'm very honored that I was able to plan this session today on Title IX. Now, Title IX is only 37 words. It reads, no person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving federal financial assistance. Now, within those roughly three dozen words are a world of meanings to different people and in different contexts. But since Congress added those words a little over 50 years ago, the ways in which education, especially for those who identify as women, has changed in largely positive but also some negative ways is numerically staggering at times. Today, what our panelists will be addressing is where Title IX has been, where it is now and where they think it might be going. Not just in American society but also in their own professional lives. We're super fortunate to have Professor Monica to share a D'Souza guide this conversation. Professor D'Souza is a professor of law here at Roger Williams. She arrived last year and since then has become an indispensable faculty member beloved by her students for her wisdom and her wit and the care and attention she brings to every lecture and every student. Before entering legal academia, she was a staff attorney at Rhode Island Legal Services where she began practicing in 2002 as a Scadden Fellow after graduating from Georgetown Law. She created a school-based legal clinic at her former elementary school in Pawtucket, Rhode Island where she represented parents and students in school discipline and special education classes as well as public benefits and eviction defense matters. Professor Tashara D'Souza specializes in issues of equity and education law and policy. In 2014, she took a sabbatical from academic teaching at the time she was a tenured professor at New England Law and she worked as a volunteer attorney in the public benefits unit at Rhode Island Legal Services. Her current pro bono work includes volunteering in the housing unit at Rhode Island Legal Services through a collaboration with the Law School's Weinstein Center for Pro Bono and Experiential Education. So thank you so much for taking the time to join us today and I place this panel in your extremely capable hands, Professor Tashara D'Souza. Thank you so much, Hilary. It's really a pleasure to be here with all of you and to have this incredible honor of introducing our panelists. I'd like to begin by introducing Lynette Leibinger. Lynette Leibinger is a longtime civil rights litigator in Rhode Island. After a two-year clerkship with federal judge Raymond Patine, Leibinger joined a law firm founded by Milton Stanzler who was himself instrumental in creating the Rhode Island chapter of the ACLU. Leibinger continued her advocacy, championing constitutional and civil rights litigation throughout her years of private practice in a 35-year association with her law partner, John Roney. And since 2018, she has limited her practice to cases sponsored by the ACLU of Rhode Island. Leibinger has served, Attorney Leibinger has served as a trial and appellate counsel in a wide range of cases, championing constitutional and civil rights. In 1980, Leibinger and Glad Founder John Ward successfully challenged a local high school's refusal to permit a male student to bring a male date to his senior prom. Leibinger has represented the plaintiff class in the landmark Title IX sex discrimination case, challenging the treatment of women athletes at Brown University, Cohen v. Brown University. She has litigated many high-profile civil rights cases in Rhode Island, including cases involving discrimination based on race, gender, age, disability, reproductive rights and First Amendment rights. One of these cases included representation of a teenager in vindicating her First Amendment right not to have a religious display in her high school and representing a prison inmate in vindicating his right to practice his religion while incarcerated. She currently represents a class of three to five-year-old children who have special needs to ensure that Providence provides them federally mandated education and other related services. Leibinger also served as a judge of the housing court of the city of Providence from 2004 to 2019, and she is a fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers as well as a member and secretary of the Board of Trustees of the New England Institute of Technology, of the numerous awards that Leibinger has received for her civil rights advocacy. One of those included a recognition in 2019 by the Roger Williams University Law Review that Lynette Leibinger is indeed a gender equity champion and she was a recipient of the law school's honorary Doctor of Law degrees in 2021. So it's an incredible honor to be able to be here with attorney Lynette Leibinger. Next, I would like to also introduce Dr. Jennifer Stanley. Dr. Stanley is the Associate Dean for Student Life and the Title IX Coordinator at Roger Williams University. Dr. Stanley joined our community, the Roger community in 1997 and she climbed the ranks of Residence Life serving as the Director of the Gender and Sexuality Center during her tenure. Dr. Stanley's commitment to violence prevention has been demonstrated through her direction of the RWU Green Dot Bystander Intervention Efforts. Dr. Stanley has chaired the campus Title IX Task Force serving as a member of the Bias Response Team and also in her implementation of the National Association of Student Personnel Administrators Culture of Respect Program. This was a two-year campus self-assessment to enhance sexual assault prevention efforts. Dr. Stanley is a voice for higher education leaders serving as a member of the NASPA Region I Advisory Board since 2000. This included a three-year national appointment to NASPA's Center for Women. Dr. Stanley also serves on the National Board of Directors of the Silent Witness Initiative, a volunteer organization addressing issues of relationship violence and represents RWU as a member of the Rhode Island Cross Campus Learning Collaborative for Sexual Violence Prevention. Recently, Dr. Stanley was featured on a podcast, Public Health Out Loud, focusing on sexual assault prevention on college campuses and she is the 2022 recipient of NASPA's Regional Institutional Leadership Award. Thank you, Dr. Stanley, for being here with us and for all this incredible work that you are doing. Next, I'd like to introduce Susan Ware. Susan Ware is an independent scholar, prolific author, specializes in 20th century U.S. history, women's history and biography. She's written numerous books, including Why They Marched, Untold Stories of the Women who fought for the right to vote. She's also written Game Set Match, Billie Jean King and the Revolution in Women's Sports and Title IX, A Brief History with Documents from 2012 to 2022. Professor Ware also served as general editor of the, excuse me, American National Biography. And it's just amazing as I list all these incredible accomplishments that all of you have had, I can't tell you how happy the students are that you are here today. This is something that the campus community, our law school community has really been looking forward to. And I wanted to just give a little bit of background to the first question that I have for each of you. And it's a quote that I often share with my students, but it applies so well to Title IX and really the seismic impact that Title IX has had in our lives. There's a legal theorist, his name is Roscoe Pound and he has a quote that is often associated with his work. And it is, law makes habits. It does not wait for them to grow. And so when we look at Title IX, a law that was enacted in 1972 prohibiting sex-based discrimination in programs and activities in educational institutions that receive federal funding. And then we look at all of the changes that have flowed from this law throughout the last half century. As I think back to what we've just learned about the incredible work that all of you have been doing in this arena for decades, I wonder if you can tell us a little bit about not only what you've witnessed in terms of the seismic changes related to Title IX, but also how your work has created many of these changes. You've all been working to ensure that Title IX has really formed new habits in our society. So it's a bit of a broader question, but I'd like to first turn it over to Attorney Lynette Labinger. Thank you. So what we'd like to do at this point is actually with the same question, rather a bit broad question, but to give the panelists really an opportunity to talk a bit about how they have viewed this work in their lives, through their experience and the tremendous work that they have done to make sure that Title IX has had these meaningful reforms. I would like to next turn to Dr. Stanley. Dr. Stanley, thank you so much for being here and I'll turn it over to you. Absolutely, thank you for inviting me to be a part of this amazing day. And what a great question and a big question, right? So I think there are several spaces where I see that I have power to shape new habits, while the current federal regulations really tend to be reactive in their approach to addressing harassment and discrimination, especially as it relates to sexual misconduct. I think I find that there's significant opportunity for college communities to change culture and the spirit of Title IX through prevention work, specifically bystander intervention. And there's many models. I think every school has some model that they use. Here at Roger Williams, we use a program called the Green Dot Model and we've been, I'm gonna say this is about our seventh year working with that model. And we train pretty much everyone, new students, returning students, faculty, staff. We use short modules, full day workshops and really try to give some perspective and understanding of Title IX, but in a way that folks understand practically what we mean, how to understand, how to get support when they need it or how to recognize concerns when they see it coming up in other places. And honestly, like anecdotally, I see truly that more students are speaking up, they're stepping in, they're looking out for themselves and others, which really what more can you ask for rather than waiting for somebody to come forward with a complaint, having our community say, hey, something's wrong here, let me step in and try to prevent the issue before it escalates to something else. And while that truly might not eradicate the need for Title IX offices or Title IX coordinators, it certainly has the power to make our campuses safer. Those are skills that we all take with us as citizens of the world. And I think it's an important place to start and hopefully we can expand those efforts in K through 12. So it's not waiting for folks to be college age or adult learners to first be exposed to bystander intervention, what can we be doing K through 12 to make that change a lot earlier? Additionally, as mentioned in the intro, I do a lot of statewide collaborative work. And I think that that's truly important because while my focus and priority is to the folks in my campus community, students at Roger Williams aren't just gonna stay here, they're gonna visit friends at other schools, they're gonna be in other places at conferences or in their research and studies. And knowing that I've got this collaborative partnership with others across the state, I think is really important. It gives an opportunity to assess trends, to collaborate in best practices. In particular, the cross-campus collaborative, we meet monthly and we actually share in ongoing learning and professional development in an effort to enhance all of our skills and make sure we're bringing the best back to our home campuses. And that group in particular also has a student committee that works in conjunction with them. So there's student representation throughout our state of students working together to highlight their Title IX policies on their campuses, highlights, resources, and also help us find places where there might be gaps in the supports or other things that we need to address on our campus, which I think is really a terrific opportunity for students at all levels. And so I really feel that the proactive piece is the place where I can probably make the most, shake the most culture, but another place is that I think sometimes we forget that pregnant and parenting students also are afforded protections under Title IX and a lot of smaller schools don't have very robust policies or procedures embedded into their supports on campus. I think if you look to larger state schools or community colleges, you may see those supports a little bit more explicitly. So I think that's a place where we all have opportunity moving forward to make sure that our campus policies address supports needed for pregnant and parenting students, as well as the sexual misconduct or sometimes I think it's the biggest focus of Title IX as well as equity in all other aspects of gender and sex, whether it's athletics or in other spaces. And so, yeah, I think there's a lot of work still to be done and hopefully we'll continue to make some positive change there. Thank you so much for that, Dr. Stanley. And it was so interesting that you picked up on this piece of the pregnant and parenting students because we know with changes to the incoming demographic of students at colleges and universities tending to track a little bit older maybe than they have in previous generations, some of those issues are going to be even more front and center than perhaps they have been in the past. So thank you so much for highlighting that important issue. Next, I would like to turn to Susan Weir who is also going to take on this larger question of the habits that have been changed through Title IX in your work and your experience, if you could just tell us a little bit about what you have seen. Thank you so much for being here. Thanks for inviting me and greetings from New Hampshire and my pronouns are she and hers, which I couldn't quite figure out how to do on my Zoom name plan. So I'm sorry, but to address the question at hand about helping to ensure that Title IX forms new habits in our society, I want to put on my historian slash biographers hat and talk about somebody who actually did just that. And her name is Bernice Sandler, always known as Bunny Sandler, who's often called the godmother of Title IX and she died four years ago at the age of 90. And perhaps some of you had the chance to work with her over the years. And if so, you know what a force of nature she was. And here's her Title IX backstory. In 1969, after receiving her PhD from the University of Maryland, she wanted to get a teaching job and her department had multiple openings, but she was passed over for all of them because as a colleague told her, and this is a direct quote, she came on too strong for a woman. And those five words really launched her career as a feminist. And that year, Sandler joined the now defunct Women's Equity Action League, also called Wheel. And casting about for ways to combat discrimination in higher education like she had clearly experienced, she discovered that a 1965 executive order covering racial discrimination in federal contracts had been amended to include women in 1967. And she called this her Eureka moment. She says she even screamed out with excitement when she was reading it, I think in a footnote, because it meant that a federal law prohibited sex discrimination in colleges and universities, which were not covered by Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. So based on Sandler's discovery, Wheel filed a class action suit in January 1970 against all the colleges and universities in the country. I love this. Let's not just go after one or two, let's take them all on. And it alleged an industry wide pattern of discrimination against women, especially in admissions, hiring, promotions and salary. And spurred in large part by Sandler's research and activism in June and July of 1970. Again, this is two years before the laws passed. Representative Edith Green, a Democrat from Oregon, held seven days of hearings on sex discrimination in higher education. And she then very smartly hired Sandler to edit the written record of the hearings. And to the naysayers who doubted that sex discrimination was a problem on campus, Bunny said that they kept saying, oh, there's no discrimination, send us proof, then maybe we'll believe you. The two thick volumes of testimony and appendices, which are probably in your library if it still has the physical copy, filled with what she termed horror stories of women's inequitable treatment on campus, which were frankly just the way things were. Things like Attorney Lavinger talked about the admissions quotas and other things. And it established beyond a doubt that this was a legitimate and pressing issue in education, one for which there was really no current recourse. And a direct result was the passage of the Education Amendments of 1972 co-sponsored by Representative Green and Senator Birch Bay, a Democrat from Indiana, which contained the 37 word Title IX prohibiting sex discrimination. And the law passed on June 8th, 1972 and was signed into law by President Richard Nixon on June 23rd. And if you're up on your Watergate chronology, you'll notice that this is the same month as the break-in at Democratic headquarters that led to Nixon's downfall. So there was a lot going on in Washington in June of 1972. But to go back to my original point, the original impetus behind the law was the widespread discrimination women faced in all aspects of the educational experience from students to professors to administrators. Athletics was barely mentioned in the hearings or the congressional debate. And even Bunny Sandler, who was quite athletically inclined and became an avid recreational runner around this time, only thought that it might mean like more field days for girls at annual school, at schools every year. So the early and immediate controversy about women's sports took everybody by surprise. And while athletics continues to be a top enforcement priority, how could it not when female students make up almost 60% of college enrollments but receive only 44% of athletic participation opportunities? In many ways, Title IX is now much more aligned with its original intent of addressing a broad range of educational issues and concerns on its agenda and not just a single issue like athletics, which dominated in the 1970s and 80s. And I always say when I'm talking or teaching this topic is that Title IX provides a textbook case of the difficulties and the rewards of putting abstract principles like equal opportunity and gender equity into concrete everyday practice. And it's not easy as we have found ever since. And not surprisingly, implementation of the law got off to a very slow start. It was passed in 1972, but it wasn't until 1979 that the Department of Health, Education and Welfare circulated its first set of guidelines telling schools what standards they would have to meet to show they were in compliance with the law. But still there was quite a lot of progress in the 1970s. In some ways it's a real breakout period partly because there's an active women's movement too. But still the threat of enforcement coupled with the possibility of the loss of federal funds could put pressure on administrators or school officials who feared the consequences of non-compliance. So you didn't have to necessarily file a complaint. You could just raise the issue. And Donna Lopiano, who's again someone that some of you may have paths have crossed over the years is a former athlete who ran the women's athletic program at the University of Texas in the 70s and 80s put it this way, this is a quote. It was more like a guillotine in the courtyard. People were afraid of it. And I think that really captures it. And then Bunny Sandler said something in 1981 that really speaks to, I think the way the question was framed. She said that the very existence of Title IX quote is a good example of how having a law in place leads to voluntary change. The vast majority of institutions have not made all the changes we would like but they have made some changes end of quote. And looking back on her own personal odyssey as the godmother of Title IX, Bunny Sandler admits she was naive at the time. And this is one of my favorite quotes that's applicable to so much that's happened to feminism in the last 50 years. Here it is. I believe that if we passed Title IX, it would only take a year or two for all the inequities based on sex to be eliminated. After two years, I upped my estimate to five years, then to 10, then to 25, until I finally realized that we were trying to change very strong patterns of behavior and belief and that the changes would take more than my lifetime to accomplish end of quote. So clearly we are in it for the long haul. And I think the way to honor Bunny Sandler's legacy is by continuing to press for true gender equity in all aspects of American life, but especially in education with Title IX as a key tool because goodness knows there is still so much to be done. Thank you. Thank you so much. That was incredible. The historian perspective is so important, I think in this arena because it's so easy to almost gloss over all of the daily very challenging work that had to be done by people like you and the rest of our panelists, but also by Bunny Sandler, who is so beautifully profiled for us. And I think it's inspiring for our students to hear that, right? It's insightful, it's inspiring for them in law school. We give them so much information and sometimes they say, oh my goodness, there's so many problems, there are so many challenges, but I think seeing how people have really been able to do this in their careers, in their lives and keep that spark where they say, and there's still problems, we're going to wake up in the morning and we're going to keep fighting, it's a wonderful message for us to hear. So thank you for that. I'd like to move on to a second question if you would be so kind as to help us address this next point as we hear from all of you and we think about, yes, the changes that have happened with Title IX, but then thinking about this law, I've heard a few of the panelists mentioned that they're vague provisions, they're concerns, maybe there might be some backtrack in years to come. If you could see the law changing in a direction that you feel might be more productive, what would some of those changes be that you might recommend to our elected officials? And I'll turn first to Dr. Stanley. Wow, so, well, one of the places where I see some change, especially again, as it relates to how we handle sexual misconduct, I think there's significant opportunity in the area of restorative justice and conflict mediation practices. So I'm not sure that that's something at the federal or kind of the legislative level, other than providing the flexibility in our processes to ensure that those are options. But I think for especially law students we're thinking about their future, if this is an area of passion or interest, keeping that as a lens, knowing that there should be more options than just a formal hearing, where the outcome is a student might be separated from the university. So where's the true remedy, right? If you just sort of banish someone from school and then maybe they move on to something else and you're never changing the behaviors or habits. And so I think it's also connected to the first question that you asked. So a focus on restorative justice, conflict mediation, and it's not appropriate in every situation, but I'm finding more and more situations it is. And there are some cases where as a Title IX coordinator, I might not have even recommended that in a situation and I've had student complainants actually want to explore those options with me. And so I think there's a lot of opportunity there, especially if the ultimate goal is to remedy behavior and prevent recidivism, why not have other options as well to explore that. And then additionally, I think one thing that's very interesting in my experience is that I think there's often a misconception about the role of the Title IX coordinator and the Title IX office, I have to be neutral, right? And I think there often is a misconception that the Title IX office is a victim's advocacy office. And while my goal is to provide support for victims, but also for respondents, I have to remain neutral. And so I think it's really important to remember that that's an essential part of the duty. So the duty is to prevent remedy and address the prohibitive behaviors. I have to be an advocate for the policy. And so remembering that your Title IX policy is a contract with your community members. And so it's really important if you are tapped as an advisor for either party, remembering that that's a way that the Title IX process can help either side of the equation, right? And I think sometimes that gets a little bit skewed. So for those of you as a part of today's symposium, if you're thinking about this as an area of interest, just remembering those aspects. And I think the question that's in the queue is a good one that kind of supports that, right? So that hopefully there are opportunities for law students to support the Title IX programs in our state and in other states serving as advisors, serving as support folks because often, and I know the current regulations believe that they're trying to equal the playing field for both complainants and respondents, but in reality, they're skewing the support where oftentimes we find that respondents may have different types of resources and possibly the complainants don't have equity in that process. And so even on the surface, if it seems like, both parties have the opportunity to have the advisor of their choice participate in the process and support them, that doesn't always mean that it's equitable, right? So I think we have to keep an eye to that as well. Thank you, Dr. Stanley. And because you referenced the question in the queue, I just wanna read it out loud so that the rest of the participants can hear the question. And then if you'd like to just make another quick response to that before we go on, the question asks, is there a way to have more attorney advisors accessible to current students, navigating Title IX processes or TRO civil processes, pro bono legal resources currently available in our eye are only available under VOCA, which only covers family court. This leaves a large gap for students survivors unless they are affluent students to have equitable access to advisors or legal representation, especially when respondents, defendants do have access to hire their own attorneys. So this was the question in the queue. And if you'd like to say anything else in response to that, thank you so much. Yeah, absolutely. And I think it's a wonderful question and really gets to the heart of trying to address the inequities that are in the process. So even if your policy is written in a way that demonstrates an effort for due process and equity, it doesn't necessarily ensure that. And as referenced in the intro, athletic teams are getting cut because higher education is really trying to manage tight budgets, right? And so what's an area that gets cut sometimes are all of these other options for support. And it's really nobody's fault. It's just kind of the nature of trying to keep higher education in business. But I think the question is a wonderful one. And if there are ways to develop programs that would give experience to law students and allow students who are going through these processes to have folks with expertise in this area be their supports. And it's interesting that this question is posed because recently I've been having some discussion with Dean Lorraine Lally from the School of Law who is the Title IX deputy for the law school. And so she and I have started some of those conversations to see if this might be something that could be developed and moved forward. And so I'm hopeful and optimistic that we can make something like that actually happen not just for our students here at Roger Williams but maybe an opportunity that could support students anywhere in Rhode Island. Thank you so much for that. And I also commend the student for putting the question in the queue because this is the way that we get change, right? We have to raise it to the level so that people are aware that maybe there may be issues and we wanna keep those front and center. So I really appreciate the question. Susan Ware, I wanna come back to you now because you again have this incredible historian's perspective and even the experience that you mentioned that quote was just amazing thinking, oh, in one to two years we will solve all of this. You have to love the optimism, right? But now when you see that it does take so long and yet we wanna have a law that is working as well as possible so that it doesn't take hopefully another 50 years, right? So that we can start to address this sooner rather than later. What are some of the changes that you might recommend? Well, I think I'll speak from what I know best which is the impact of Title IX on athletics. That's what I've mainly studied. And we're at a current moment where a huge challenge is going to be how to fit our increasingly non-binary sense of gender into a sports system which is rigidly segregated by sex. And this issue came up in the 1970s because most of the other aspects of Title IX when they were talking about getting rid of admissions quotas and things like that, the standard was women would be treated equally with men on the same par. They were worried that if they just combined the teams, women's teams and men's teams, women would get screwed that they wouldn't be able to compete. And so they kept somewhat uneasily this system of parallel segregation and then talked about the women's teams and their men's teams but they should have equivalent resources. But not everybody fits into a women's team or a men's team as we are finding. And two very prominent examples now and they come at it from different ways. One of course is Caster Semenya with her new book out someone who clearly identifies as a woman but has chromosomal abnormalities or whatever the technical term is that make it unacceptable to the powers that be who are mainly men that she compete as a woman and how unfair she feels that is. And then also the issue of trans women and which team should they be allowed to compete on? And I don't have a clear answer to this. It's an incredibly complicated question. I'm looking back, I can't see any way in the 1970s they would have been prepared to deal with this but unfortunately the world of sports has just grown so exponentially in the 50 years that any changes to how it's organized and all the money that's involved and whatever on campuses and in professional lease are gonna be that much harder to do but we really are left with a sports system that does not reflect the way we are thinking these days many of us about questions of sex and gender. And that is a huge challenge. Absolutely, thank you so much for that. And I haven't had an opportunity yet to read the book that came out Caster's book but I'm really curious to do so and just in terms of some of the experiences that I have read little excerpts of that she faced as an intersex individual with the norms and still right in 2023 this gender essentialist approach to individuals and it makes it very difficult for us to know how to respond appropriately how the law should be changed in order to respond appropriately to some of these questions and we have a student question in the queue that is actually related to this topic. It asks, do you think that some sports are unnecessarily divided by sex? So do you think making more sports coeducational would improve funding and decrease inequality for women in sports? So that's the question that the student posed and I think in line with the conversation that we're having and our evolving understanding of gender, could it also address maybe some of the issues that otherwise might persist with that arena as well? Oh, that question makes me so happy. I wanna be on that person's team. This is what I've always thought. It drives me crazy that there are things like women's archery and women's bowling and other sports where there's absolutely no reason other than to segregate what women do as being less important to separate the teams. And I think the experience of men and women, girls and boys playing together is really important and I really encourage attempts to think about sports in ways that are coeducational or let's put it another way. Just everybody is able to participate and then we don't have to get caught up in these gender binaries. The tricky thing is certain sports like football and there's sort of a famous phrase in Title IX history of when they have all these debates, there's men, there's women and there's football. Football is just often its own category. Now I actually think nobody should be playing football because I think it's dangerous and that there actually could be a way where it could be less harmful to people's bodies and that all kinds of people can play. Is anybody listening to me? No, but I do think that for many sports there are lots of ways that we could really combine the teams, share the scores and make it so that we could move beyond this segregation by sex. I would also say that we're kind of caught in this trap that I think is gonna come up in a panel this afternoon, the difference between sex and gender. Title IX uses the word sex and in the 1970s it was thought that there were biological differences, I mean, not by everybody, but that that was an organizing concept. And then in the 80s as women studies and begin feminist theory looks at it more we started talking more about gender, about the construction of social roles, but there was still a sense that there was something pretty foundational about those sex differences. Well, now we know that isn't the case and that just makes it even more complicated but it also makes it even more necessary because we can't be disfranchising and leaving people out if we're stuck in these old ways. Absolutely, thank you so much for that. Very insightful. And you know, when you mentioned the football issue interestingly enough in one of the classes that I taught this week, this issue came up. We were reading a case about a 13 year old her last name was force. And I told the students that once in a while we have a case where it's so aptly named and this was such a case. So it was force against her school district and she wanted to play football. Well, she's 13 years old and the only football team was the eighth grade boys football team. And the school initially told her, no, you can't play, we're worried about safety. And of course then the issue was raised, we're talking about 13 year olds. The size differential, even among the boys is such that it really doesn't make much sense to say she automatically is excluded. She may be larger, she may be stronger than many of the boys who are allowed to compete for a spot on the team. So the students had a discussion about this, but one student in particular Amy, I don't know if you're watching, she made the exact same point that you made, which was I'm not sure we should be letting any 13 year old engage in this contact sport. And if we're worried about the safety of the girls, why shouldn't we also be worried about the safety of the boys? So there's a sense and for the students at least where they see the harms that are flowing to people of all genders, right? Of any sex when sometimes we do take that gender essentialist approach to what boys should do, girls should do, and so forth. So thank you for that very insightful response. Let me see if we have what I'd like to do at this point is just to make sure that there are no questions among the attendees that have not been addressed or that you would like to see addressed. So I'd like to just ask those who are in attendance if you'd like to ask a question of our panelists to please write it into the Q&A on our Zoom. And then I can ask that question. And we also, and there's one, one just came in actually. Thank you so much, Angela. So the question is, how do you think the new broader regulations for Title IX expected to come out soon will change how universities respond to complaints of gender identity discrimination or change their practices in any other way? And Dr. Stanley, if you don't mind, I will turn it over to you on this one, if you'd like to respond. All right, well, my hope is that campuses have policies that hopefully won't be too difficult to modify. I think we've gone through the exercise multiple times over the past few years. And I think in preparation for these new regulations, which just seem to get delayed and delayed and delayed, hopefully it's a matter of modifying your definitions. But the protections should be protecting your students in the spirit of Title IX. And so I'm thoughtful and as I think about our own policies here, I don't think it's going to be a big stretch. What I think it will do is just broaden the scope of how we can protect and support students. And so where the current regulations are very narrow and very specific, I think it's just an opportunity to really look at people as whole complete individuals and recognize that gender is more than the binary and more than our biological sex and allow the protections in the spirit of Title IX to support people in more broad ways. And again, I think we also have to be thinking about pregnant and parenting students. And the policies as many of our campuses have are actually written with sexual misconduct in mind, which may not be appropriate for other types of discrimination. And so thinking about the language of your policy or do you need to have policies that specifically address different things? And so I think it's good to do this annually with your policies to think about, are they still accurate and appropriate to the communities that we support? But whenever there are changes coming at the federal level, you know, it's your mandated time to do that, but hopefully schools are doing this on a regular basis because the world changes and our students change and policies that were written a decade ago are not going to meet the needs of students who are here now. And I do hope that one of the places where I see one of the most significant challenges is the cross-examination piece in the live hearings. And again, that I think there are ways to get to credibility and to include cross-examination questioning in your investigation, right? It doesn't, that doesn't have to be a part of a live hearing which I don't think benefits either party or the witnesses creates more stress and anxiety for students who already are experiencing a tremendous amount of stress and anxiety, just being students, right? So how can we make our processes more reflective of higher education unless looking like a court of law? So, you know, there's a time and a place for courts of law, but I don't think the higher education model should look like that. So, you know, certainly I think the new regulations hopefully will give us opportunity to finesse things that are in place and provide better support for all of our students. If I could add something more about the regulations and this comes from a historian's perspective, I think we need to remember that Title IX doesn't just exist in a vacuum. It's very much affected by the decade, the political context. And Lynette had mentioned briefly the 1980s when because of the Grove City decision and because of the Reagan administration, there's basically no enforcement of Title IX at all. And what you see is a pattern because the regulations are coming out of Washington that they are in some ways, not always, but they can be influenced by the political party in power and that can be either good or bad depending on your perspective. But there is a certain amount of moving forward, moving back, moving forward, changing, jousting that is built into this. And I think it just, it adds a little bit of complication probably especially on the ground because you wonder what the new regulation is going to say. But again, that is built into the process. And I think it does even out over the long haul but we can't leave politics out of this because it's very much there. Thank you so much for that perspective. Absolutely, incredibly important to keep that in mind as well, the politics piece of all of this. And I also liked your focus on the practical aspects of this and even thinking about somebody in your role, Dr. Stanley, very challenging. I talked to the students quite a bit at the law school about compliance, as a career and how difficult it is in the arena of education or any other area of law that tends to be politicized in the way that this area is to really be able to provide accurate, timely advice to your clients, whoever they may be but in this case, a university because the laws change so often. These regulations change so often. And so this becomes a very challenging part of an attorney's work if they do choose to go into this compliance area. I wanted to follow up a little bit and maybe just change gears just ever so slightly because as we prepared this panel, one of the questions that the students wanted to know about is more related to your actual work experience, okay? And so they wanted to know first, what aspects of the work that you have been engaged in has been most surprising to you, right? So as you've been working, you know, Dr. Ware from your perspective as a historian, as you uncovered so much of this information, what has perhaps surprised you that you didn't necessarily think you were going to uncover? Well, I guess I always remain surprised at how few people actually know what Title IX is and what it does, realizing, of course, this whole panel has shown there's no simple question, no simple answer to that question. But in a lot of ways, I mean, I'm so used to, I just used Title IX as a shorthand for a whole range of changes that as a feminist, I want to happen in higher education. And yet I find among those who are younger than I am and who didn't sort of cut their teeth in second-wave feminism in the 1970s, they often either have never heard of Title IX or the thing that's even scarier for me is that they kind of take it for granted. And you see this especially in the athletic opportunities. And they don't remember what it was like a time when there were not teams for girls. I didn't have teams for girls when I was growing up in high school. I turned out to be a really good athlete. I would have loved that, but there was nothing except girls athletic association. And now one of the things that Title IX and other societal changes have done has dramatically increased the opportunities for girls and women to participate in sports. And this is terrific, but they often don't realize how recent that is and how hard fought it was. And also, although they often do have a sense of this, that even though they've got so much more than they used to have, they're nowhere near getting as much as the boys and men are. And Bonnie Sandler again had a great quote about that. She said, something to the effect of, well, going from zero resources to 20% is it's good, but it's still nowhere near what it should be. And I find a gap of awareness often on campuses, especially among female athletes about how hard fought this was and how recent. And it can go away, although my sense is that sports for women have become pretty deeply embedded in colleges and also in public life that we're not going to go back to the girls' athletic associations, but we can't take our eye off the ball. It's impossible not to use sports metaphors, believe me. We really have to pay attention because nowhere in no school in this country are girls and women getting this equitable resources with men and boys when it comes to sports, nowhere. Thank you so much. And I think that perspective for us to be able to hear that this morning is so incredible because that's why I think for us to be able to be here, and it is an intergenerational type of experience where we have the students who, like you said, are in the situation where they can almost start to become complacent, where you know from what you've read in this history where it could so easily be lost or we could start to really see some of these hard fought gains unfortunately diminish in years to come. So I think it is important message for all of us to remain vigilant and to not take any of this for granted. And to also make a case to invite you back for more discussions with us and with our students because I think that dialogue is so important for them to really hear what has taken place before. And why don't I turn it over to Dr. Stanley? I'd like to ask you a very similar question in terms of the work that you've been engaged in. What has surprised you about this work? Even thinking back to maybe when you started the work and then you started to see what your actual day-to-day looked like, tell us a little bit about maybe what surprised you. Yeah, I think one of the things that continuously surprises me is that students, I think sometimes have a perspective that engaging with the Title IX office is an all or nothing choice, right? So you don't have to file a formal complaint to get support. And sometimes the reality is most of the students that I'm working with are seeking some sort of remedy other than a formal complaint. And so I think there's a fear that by reporting or coming forward, you have to connect with the local authorities. And sometimes that's the right thing to do and that's always a choice, but there are so many ways to seek supportive measures that can help remedy and move towards equity and prevention of discrimination in the higher ed experience. It doesn't have to be an all or nothing choice. And I think that that's one thing that I'm always surprised about when students think, well, if I engage with Title IX, I have to have this long investigation. I have to have a hearing and that's not the case. It's also surprising to me right now that students actually, Title IX has become a verb, right? So it's not just a policy. Like sometimes we hear like, oh, I'm gonna Title IX another student. And it's very interesting what students actually think Title IX is. And again, kind of getting back to the point I made before that Title IX is not a victim's advocacy office. There are offices and agencies that do that work and do it very well, but Title IX needs to be fair, unbiased and support the policy. And hopefully in supporting the policy, we are making sure that we are providing equity and an equitable educational environment. But it's very interesting what students know about Title IX. And we worked really hard for many years to help educate students. And then when the new regulations came, it seemed like it walked some things back. And it's hard to relearn some things that are now different or changed. And so one of my concerns as a Title IX coordinator is, will the regulations change every time there's a new presidential administration? And how do we ensure related to compliance that our community knows accurate information about what is current in the moment? And then also trying to do all the advocacy work to make sure that the spirit of Title IX doesn't get lost in whatever the final regulations are because I would have given all of my money and resources to see Betsy DeVos and her administration actually role play their regulations before they were implemented because clearly they are created by people that aren't higher ed practitioners, right? And they might think they know best and they're hopefully gathering information from a variety of different places, but until you're in it hands on, some of it makes no sense, right? And why are we creating that environment in a higher education where it's not reflective of the work that we do and the type of environment that we are, so very interesting. And we'll see what comes next, right? And I think we all have to be nimble and go with the flow, but as law students, I think there's tremendous and very interesting future opportunity if this is an area of specialty or interest for you. Thank you so much. And I wanna just ask for the attendees once again, if anyone has any questions, please do not hesitate to put it into the Q&A. The students also wanted to know a little bit about what has been the most rewarding aspect of this work for each of you. And so Dr. Ware, if I could start with you on this one, as you think of over these decades of work, what has been most rewarding? Well, I think this goes back to my sense of who I am as a historian and as a feminist. And in my work, in my writing and in my public outreach, I really am committed to sharing what I learn as a historian with broader audiences because to me, that knowledge, that sharing of knowledge and just getting people involved and excited and learning the history, which is just so important. And Title IX is, and sports are a great way to bring feminism home, especially to young kids. Like you take a group of fifth graders and you say girls team gets this, boys team gets this. Is this fair? They know it's not fair. I mean, they just know. And so sports is a wonderful way of opening up larger conversations about equity because everybody cares so much about sports. That means a lot to me. It also has been a great honor to be able to meet some of these towering figures in the field like Donna Lopiano and Billie Jean King and especially Bunny Sandler. And I'm here in my study in New Hampshire and I'm looking up. I should have taken it down before them but I have some buttons that she gave me when I interviewed her. She loved to collect buttons, feminist buttons. She had thousands of them. And the two that she gave me were Uppity Women Unite and God bless you, Title IX. So what a pleasure to have my path cross hers. Thank you so much. That's wonderful. You'll have to send me a little photo of those. I would love to see those. Dr. Stanley, from your perspective, what has been some of the most rewarding aspects of your work? Yeah, it's usually when people come through my door, it's not for the best circumstances. So I have to remember sometimes that it's not always, sometimes it's thankless work, right? But there are moments where students will circle back with me and say, thank you so much for the support, the different offices you've connected with me with have provided what I've needed to move forward. We do a lot of work with students. We have a student Title IX Task Force which is really terrific. And they have a pulse of what's happening on campus. And so I think those are the most rewarding opportunities. Seeing a student that I meet with and assist as a freshman graduate, right? Like there's nothing more rewarding than that to see that they were able to navigate and be successful despite hardships that they might have encountered. And so for those who have been doing this work a long time or even for those just starting their career in this area, don't lose sight of the fact that it's important work because there will be moments where my hair gets whiter every day and sometimes I wonder like, is this the right path? And then, do you just have to keep it in perspective and know that it's important work? It really does make a difference. And there are tremendous opportunities to change the experience of a student to make it better, help them find remedy. And then again, in all the prevention, hopefully we can prevent things from happening before they even do. And I think that's where I'm always optimistic that there's a lot of opportunity for culture change but it takes all of us, right? It can't just be one or two people. We all have to do our part to make that change. Thank you so much. And that's actually a wonderful segue to what I wanted us to close with today because one of the questions that we often hear from students as professors is, you've given me all of this information, you've sometimes depressed me, right? With the information that you've given me, now what? What do you want me to do with this information? And in conversations that I've had even in recent weeks with students, we've come to this realization oftentimes, together in my office that maybe we need to take more of a community organizing lens to a lot of the work that we do so that when we provide the information to an audience, whether it's a class or attendees at a conference such as the one that we're at right now, we might be able to then tell them, and now we want you to take this info and do this step, right? Take this next step. So I wonder if you can, putting on to the best of your ability this type of almost grassroots community organizing lens, what would you encourage us all to do with this information? And why don't I go to Dr. Ware first? Well, I think the most important thing is just to realize we're in it for the long haul. Feminism will always be necessary, even though there are gains that have been made, there will still be many more things that need to be done. And then just to look around and find your allies and find the people you care about and just know that it's an important fight. But remember what Bunny Sandler said, it's not gonna be two years, five years, 25, it's gonna go on long past your lifetime. But for me, as I get towards the end of a career, I find that I draw great satisfaction from knowing that I have been part of this larger struggle for more than 50 years. And I draw comfort in knowing that it will continue long after me. And who's going to continue it? All the people who are in law school with you and who are watching this webinar. So I say just go for it and I'll be with you in spirit. Thank you so much. We really appreciate it in spirit and in person. Okay, because we, that's right, that's right. And Dr. Stanley, what advice or what suggestions for next steps would you have for all of us? Thank you. Sure, so I mean, certainly if it's a passion area, explore that. I would say for all of us that we have opportunities in our everyday lives to make change and to be advocates and from the things that you engage in as a consumer, what are the businesses that you support? Who are the people that you elect into office? You vote, use your voice in that way to speak up. But we have to kind of embrace our collective responsibility and not assume somebody else is going to fix it. So there are lots of ways. And I think as we reflect on either the choices we make and the work that we do or just where we shop and if you are out in the world and you see something happening, speak up, step in. I mean, there's so many ways, again with the bystander that it's not just about the experience on a college campus. These are things that we can engage in in our everyday lives and maybe the world would be a different, better place if there were more kind, caring people that spoke up and stepped in but as attorneys, as future attorneys, like you have tremendous opportunity to make some really positive change in the world and don't ever minimize the power that you have in doing that. So and if anybody's ever interested, come on over to my office. I'm a highly caffeinated individual. I would love to have coffee with you and or tea and chat more about your interests or you wanna get involved in our students title nine task force. We're always looking for new perspectives, new voices. So please join us. Thank you so much. And the students are incredible. The students that we have here are incredible. I learned so much from my students. They're insightful, they're energetic and they want to make the world a better place. And so it's important, right? To be able to establish those relationships and make sure that we're adequately preparing this next generation so that they can continue this wonderful, incredible work that both of you have been doing for decades. And so I just wanna thank you. Once again, Dr. Ware, Dr. Stanley for taking the time to be with us today. This has been so inspiring. I really enjoyed listening to both of you. Dr. Stanley, I hope our paths will cross campus. Now that I know you and Dr. Ware, if you are ever in Rhode Island, please do come visit us. We have really, really appreciated being able to spend this time with you. I wanna also thank Hillary and the Law Review for putting together this panel and for inviting me to participate. We also wanna let everyone know that we will now just take a few minutes of a break and we will resume at 11.30 a.m. with our keynote speaker. So I do thank everyone so much for being with us this morning. This has been incredible. It really sets us up, I think, for a wonderful weekend. So thank you so much to both of our panelists. We really appreciate it. Welcome to all of you who are joining us for this keynote and welcome back to those of you who joined us for our excellent panel this morning on Title IX. And if you did miss it, check out YouTube soon, because it will go up. My name is Hillary Levy-Freedman. I'm a 3L at Roger Williams University School of Law and I'm the editor of this year's Justice For All Edition. Now, this is the second year of the Justice For All Edition of the Roger Williams Law Review. And the issue was created to bring light to the need to expand the meaning of all in the phrase, justice for all. Now that phrase, justice for all, of course, goes back to the founding, but it is clear that many groups of people are left out of that all category. A person's race, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, religion, citizenship, ability, age, and or socioeconomic status are just a few of the factors that can lock them out of receiving equal treatment in our criminal justice system or our civil justice system. We recognize how intersections of those identities often compound inequities in the legal system at all levels in all ways. So when we got together, the leadership of the law review to talk about the topic of this year's Justice For All issue, we quickly honed in on changes in gender law, which are constantly shaping all of our lives. We really wanted to focus on the transformation in gender law over the past five plus decades, specifically thinking about how gender identity or expression, sex and sexual orientation intersect with the law and a range of other identities. Now, as we all know, there have been many fights over the past several decades to secure rights. Yet in the past decade, we've seen the slow and steady and at moments, calamitous erosion of some of those rights. So what can be done using the law, as we're all in law school or many of our lawyers on today, that's what we all want to do. And specifically, we wanted to think about what we can do in terms of the Constitution. So 100 years ago, in 1923, following passage of the 19th Amendment, women's rights advocates sought to enshrine the principles of gender equality in the Constitution to help overcome many of the obstacles that kept women as second-class citizens. Over the next 50 years, the fight continued. Until 1972, just a little over 50 years ago, when Congress sent the following text to the states for ratification, quote, a quality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex. The Congress shall have the power to enforce by appropriate legislation the provisions of this article. So after that, things got really interesting in the ERA battle. Suffice it to say that the fight to pass the Equal Rights Amendment is ongoing, and that is the focus of today's keynote, in which we are extremely fortunate to hear from one of the true leaders in that fight, the Kia Thomas. Now note that the requisite ratification by 38 states has occurred for the ERA, the last was Virginia in 2020, inspired by a lot of momentum, partially from the Me Too movement and other events of the second half of the 20 teens. But the ERA still is not law. So to guide our conversation on the ERA history, what next steps there are in the fight for equality and how and why the ERA could help protect everyone's bodily autonomy, our own professor, Emily Sack, will be moderating our keynote today. Professor Sack is a nationally recognized expert on domestic violence and reform of the court system. US Supreme Court Justice Stevens cited Professor Sack's article with struggle for the future of domestic violence policy, in his opinion in the domestic violence case, Castle Rock v. Gonzalez. Active in the community, Professor Sack is very active on elder abuse issues, and she serves as a member of the board and chair of Emerge, a batter's intervention and parenting skills program for men who abuse intimate partners. Prior to joining Roger Williams University School of Law, Professor Sack worked in diverse offices, such as the Senate Judiciary Committee staff of the late Senator Kennedy, the ACLU, and New York Center for Court Innovation. Here at Roger Williams, Professor Sack is a core part and a centerpiece of our faculty where she has been an award-winning teacher and professor almost for this entire century. She teaches criminal law, criminal procedure, family law, children in the law, which I'm lucky to currently be a student in, death penalty law, and of course, domestic violence law. So thank you to Professor Sack and Ms. Thomas for being with us today, and I turn it over to you. Thank you so much, Hillary. Somehow I feel very ancient, but I really want to thank the law review for choosing to make this a centerpiece and focus their symposium on this this year. And thank you for giving me the opportunity to participate. Really honored and thrilled to introduce Zakea Thomas. Zakea Thomas is president and CEO of the ERA Coalition and the Fund for Women's Equality. She is an agent for change and she leads a diverse coalition of over 290 partner organizations, representing 80 million people, all fighting for equality. The coalition advocates for gender, racial, and reproductive justice, LGBTQ plus rights, and much more under the unifying banner of sex equality and the goal to enshrine the Equal Rights Amendment into the US Constitution. Zakea is an astute political strategist, an adept campaign manager, and an experienced nonprofit manager. Additionally, she is an adjunct professor at Georgetown Law School, where she teaches a nonpartisan course on how to run for political office and volunteers on several nonprofit boards, ranging from protecting reproductive rights to individual financial empowerment. And thank you so much, Zakea. So what we thought we would do is have a sort of conversation about the ERA and all things related to it. For those of you who, in the audience, we'd love to hear your questions, please put them in the Q and A, and we will definitely try to get to all of them. So let me just start out, first of all, welcome and thank you so much, Zakea, for taking your time today. Start out by asking, Hillary just read for us the actual text of the ERA, which is quite short. What you believe is so important to get the ERA enshrined into our Constitution and why your organization is spending its energy trying to do just that. Well, thank you so much for having me, Professor Sack. So we at the ERA Coalition are focused on getting the Equal Rights Amendment added to the Constitution because it's simple. I mean, as you see in the text of the language, of the bill, we are not in the Constitution right now. If we want to put ourselves in there, we have to do so with an Equal Rights Amendment because it is the foundation upon which all of our laws should be based. If you look at the Dove's decision as an example, one of the reasons why that case went the direction it could or it did is because there is not a stipulation in the Constitution that says that you cannot discriminate on the basis of sex. So as we try to think about ways in which we can protect against the erosion of our rights that we see going on right now, we really are bringing together this movement of movements of organizations that range from gender justice, reproductive rights, LGBT plus rights, young advocates. We have folks who've been fighting in this movement for well, not 100, but 50 years who all understand that if we don't have that foundation of equality guaranteed in our Constitution, this rollback of rights that we see will continue to happen because there's no prohibition against it. And that's why we're working so hard to get equal rights movement out of the Constitution. And great, and we're gonna get into some of the, all the issues that you just mentioned, but before we get into the whole process of enacting the ERA, let's talk a little more specifically about what the ERA would do or would not do. And there seem to be several different strands of opposition to the ERA and let me just go through some of them, and then we can take them kind of one at a time and what your response is to them. Some would argue that there are already several pieces of federal legislation that protect gender equality so that the ERA is not needed. Others argue that it will lead to lack of protections for women. I don't know if, I'm assuming you've seen that series on Phyllis Schlafly, Mrs. America, but for those of the audience who have not seen it, it talks about one of the initial opponents to the ERA. And I'm old enough to remember that she used to say things like we'll all have to go to the same bathrooms and women will have to fight in wars and things like that. And so she sort of, that strand of opposition. Yeah, the world's gonna collapse if we have gender equality. Yes, yes, yes. So there's that strand of opposition. And then there's also discussions about how it will interact with other issues, some of which you just mentioned, like abortion rights and transgender rights. So I don't know if you wanna take those one at a time and talk about why you think those really are not real concerns. So let's start with the first question you asked, which is what will the Equal Rights Amendment do? And so we'd like to think of the Equal Rights Amendment as a promise of a better future for our country. Really, by looking at the text of the amendment, it really empowers Congress to create laws and regulations that would protect against sex discrimination. And when you look at the opposition saying, well, then that will force us to have no distinctions based on sex, which is actually incorrect. What the amendment allows for the courts and for legislatures to do is to create protection against discrimination. It's not taking something away, it's adding an extra layer of protection so that we all are covered and are not discriminated against because of our sex. So we like to think of it as that promise of a better future. And it enables Congress and the courts to have tools to actually make the change we wanna see in this world to protect against discrimination. And when you look at the bathroom bills, for instance, I think it's kind of humorous when people say that, oh, if we have an Equal Rights Amendment, that means that you'll have to all use the same bathrooms. Well, people already do use the same bathrooms. We have unisex bathrooms already. And you look at states that have Equal Rights Amendments in their state constitutions, they still have gender-specific bathrooms, but it doesn't mean that they have to have gender-specific bathrooms. It means that you have the option to do whichever you want as long as it doesn't discriminate. And when you talk about some of the arguments that the opposition is using, there's a lot of fear-mongering regarding having creditors in bathrooms, saying that, oh, men are, if we have unisex bathrooms, men are gonna go into the bathroom, women's bathrooms dressed up as women and assault women. If men wanted to assault women, they're not gonna dress up as women to go into the bathroom and do it. They do it already. They do it in our locker rooms, in our schools, they do it anywhere they want to because there's no protection against that. The laws that we have on the books, we have a whole patchwork of laws on the books that are supposed to protect against discrimination, but they don't have teeth, I shouldn't say that way. They aren't enforceable in some ways. The Violence Against Women Act isn't as strong as it could be because you can't sue in civil court against the perpetrator. And so there's really nothing holding people accountable. You can't force a municipal law enforcement agency to enforce a protective order because you don't have a foundation for that protection in the Constitution. So these are some of the things that the Equal Rights Amendment has the potential to remedy if we put in place laws and regulations that actually do so. So it's a proactive measure that we have to do. Once we have the Equal Rights Amendment in the Constitution, that's just the first step. And if you think about it's taken us a hundred years to get to the first step of having the Equal Rights Amendment in the Constitution, then the real work of implementation happens. And you see in section two of the amendment that Congress is empowered to take steps to implement the amendment. And that's what we're looking to do. So our work is really focused on first getting the Equal Rights Amendment into the Constitution, but then making sure once it's there that we have the coalition, the movement and the people behind it to ensure that we implement the amendment to make gender equality a reality in this country. And just following up, excuse me, following up on that, when you say Congress needs to implement it, can you give a sense of the types of laws and things that you're thinking of? Yeah, so we're thinking of laws that would protect it. So we already have laws in the book. So the Violence Against Women Act right now doesn't, isn't empowered to do the thing that needs to but Congress could then create laws that supplement and say, okay, these are the remedies that you have. These are the legal remedies you have in order to protect against discrimination. When you look at the Paycheck Fairness Act is another one where right now, technically, Payfair of Fair Pay is actually supposed to be in our legal system, but it's not enforceable. If you have an Equal Rights Amendment, it's actually enforceable and you can create legislation around that. And that's really what it does. It gives tools and empowers the legislator to actually make those kind of changes, both on the state level and on the federal level. And so turning to what it does not do or some of the concerns that I was talking about before, talk about the interaction with the ERA with reproductive rights and transgender rights because I think people don't necessarily realize that there is an impact in that, those areas too. There is, and for a long time, reproductive rights advocates and ERA advocates were saying, okay, well, the ERA doesn't really have anything to do with abortion because we had Roe versus Wade in place. So there's 50 years of legal precedent that was protecting against abortion, protecting against abortion bans and denying abortion care. But when the Dove decision went away, we saw very clearly that the protections we thought we had in place based on the 14th Amendment are not actually there. They're not, we can't actually rely on those to create the kind of laws and the situations that we need in this country. And so what the Equal Rights Amendment will not do is automatically make everything a fair and evil equal playing field. We have to do the work to make sure that it gets there. So one of the things that folks talk about on the opposition is if you have an Equal Rights Amendment that means abortion on demand anywhere, anytime. And while some of us are okay with that and we think it's perfectly fine, it's not actually the case. What would be the case is then Congress would be empowered to create laws that protect abortion access. States would be able to create laws that protect abortion access. What states would not be able to do is to create laws that deny access to abortion across the country. And the same goes with domestic violence. They're, it would strengthen the laws that we currently have on the books because it would give Congress and the legislature the opportunity to create those laws and have them enforceable. And so really that's the distinction. And when we talk about the transgender community in particular, what we see across this country is horrific in my opinion. We're targeting children. We're targeting people because of who they are. And as a black woman in America, I'm very suspect when we create laws that discriminate against people because of who they are. And we should all be concerned because when we start down the road of eroding rights for certain people, who's going to prevent them from doing it to us? I mean, the constitution, we can't forget was written for and by white landowning men when the rest of us were considered property. I mean, yes, white women were considered property back then for the most part. And so if we wanna see ourselves in the constitution, we have to put ourselves there. And that legal protection from the constitution only comes if we have an equal rights amendment. And that's why this is so important. It doesn't take rights away from people. And I think that's really the problem is folks say that well, if you get more rights, that means I have less rights. And that's not what we're talking about because the equal rights amendment protects men, it protects women, it protects non-binary people, it protects trans people, it protects everyone. Because what it says is you cannot deny someone something based on their sex. Yeah. And just to get into some of the legalities of this and I know you are not an attorney is but you seem very comfortable with these issues. My understanding, at least one of the arguments from a legal perspective is that the ERA will raise sex gender to a suspect classification. And as we know, currently the Supreme Court does not treat gender discrimination under that highest strict scrutiny type of standard. And so I think it would be helpful if you feel comfortable talking a little bit about how that would make a difference in some of the things you've just talked about like abortion rights, what would the DOB decision have looked like or potentially if the ERA had existed? So if we had that higher level of scrutiny then you couldn't then the state governments and federal governments across the board would have to have a much higher case for discriminating against against someone based on sex right now because you don't have that higher level of scrutiny, the state can do whatever they want as long as they have a justification for it. But you need a much stronger and more compelling reason to discriminate if you're at the level of strict scrutiny. And I know there's some cases going across the country right now involving strict scrutiny that actually are trying to put strict scrutiny on its head and Julie Sook actually she's one of our advisory council members. She's I believe at Columbia Law School she's written a couple of books about this about how having that level of protection and the benefits of it, but also how it's trying to be torn apart and eroded right now and used against its original purpose. So there are folks out there who are doing that research and looking at the depth of it. But the bottom line is that if we had that higher level of scrutiny then the state governments, local governments, federal government would have to be more cautious intentional and purposeful in the legislation that they put forward or else it would be struck down under the constitution. Yeah, and I think that when we saw obviously from the Dove's decision that facing some of these really critical rights on the right to privacy, we know is at least under the Supreme Court on very fragile territory. And so even back with Roe v. Wade there were people who said it should have been based on the Equal Protection Clause. But obviously there are problems with the Equal Protection Clause as involved gender. And so it seems as though the ERA would make such a huge difference that couldn't be kind of manipulated in the way that the right to privacy has been manipulated by the court. Yeah, so incidentally, I even said that the Constitution doesn't demand that you discriminate on the basis of sex, but it doesn't prohibit it. And so, I mean, the justices have even said and there's case law to document that if we want to have protection against sex discrimination, you have to make it happen on our own. Right, so let's turn a little bit to the actual process of enacting and ratifying the ERA. Actually, let's start first because Hillary mentioned, this started in 1923 and I'm not asking you to go into every play by play since then, but could you give a sense of how the ratification process started and kind of where it is right now? And so I would love to give you a play by play of the last 100 years of the women's and feminist movement and women's gender equality. But so we're actually celebrating the 100th anniversary of the Introduction to Equal Rights Amendment. We on, it's actually December 13th is when the ERA was first introduced in Congress. And so we're actually gonna do a celebration around that day because that's momentous for us. But then 50 years after that, 1972, we had the, I think Congress passed the Equal Rights Amendment with strong bipartisan support. Remember, both the Republican Party and the Democratic Party had the Equal Rights Amendment on their platforms during those presidential elections in the late 60s, early 70s. So there was strong consensus across the country that this is something that we wanted. And when you mentioned Phyllis Schlafly, there's a cult of personality around her that's just been, it's just been inflated. So she was actually the front for a lot of business interests, but they knew that if you had a white businessmen saying, oh, women, you can't have your rights, that's not gonna look right. But if you have a housewife who's saying that it's better for the country, it's better for women if we don't have the Equal Rights Amendment because it would take away rights from folks, that's a lie. And the lies that they also perpetrated were that marriage equality would become legal. Women would have to fight in combat zones. Bathrooms wasn't a thing then, but you get the sense of where I'm going with this. So what we've seen is all the things that they said would come tearing down on this country and would be the ruin of us. I mean, gay marriage is celebrated across this country and across the world because it's a beautiful thing to see people being able to be who they are and show their love for one another. Women in combat means that they're able to increase, they're able to increase their job prospects because they're able to move up the ladder higher and become higher-ranking officers and get better pay because they're able to do that. It's not saying you have to do it, but it's saying you have the opportunity to. And that's the other part about it too. When you look at the abortion question, we're not saying you have to go out and get an abortion. You have to get one on demand. It's saying you have the option to do it. Don't like abortions, don't have one. I have a cool T-shirt or sweatshirt that says that big smiley face that says don't like abortion, don't have one. And it's true because we don't all agree on an abortion, but most of us agree that we should be in charge of our bodies and having someone else tell us that we don't have that capacity is not something we want as a country that we consider the home of the free or home of the brave, land of the free home of the brave. So when we, so I'm getting off track here, but going back to the amendment itself. So in 1972, it was passed by both houses of Congress with strong bipartisan support. Over the next few years, we got up to 35 states ratifying. And then we had this pushback by these corporate interests because do you have to pay women more under the, if you have an equal rights amendment, you probably have to pay women equal pay for equal work. You can't discriminate against them in health insurance. You can't charge them more for health insurance but give them less coverage or say you're charging them for things such as, they say because women can become pregnant, it's okay to charge them higher rates, but then they don't cover pregnancy as part of the plan. And so it's an additional cost anyway. So it's really not truth in advertising. And if you have to, if you actually have to stand up to protective orders and all the other things that actually cost money to implement, then people realize that it's an economic interest but they're using social issues as the front because they know that people get charged up about social issues, but if you actually tell them why you're doing the thing, they're going to realize it's not, it's an economic interest and it's someone's economic interest and not ours because women who are able to control their bodies who have better pay, it's better for the country. And frankly, paternal leave, paid family leave is better for the entire family. And we've seen studies that show that other countries have done the same thing. So fast forward to the last decade. So we then had, so there was an arbitrary time limit that was added to the Equal Rights Amendment as the third clause or the third section. I'm sorry, actually it's in the timeline. In the preamble, there's a clause that says that there's a timeline on when the Equal Rights Amendment could be added or ratified. But then Congress then moved the timeline again in a subsequent session of Congress. It's noted it's a subsequent session of Congress, not the same session. And so our argument is that because Congress has moved the deadline, has been able to add this arbitrary timeline, has moved the timeline once, Congress has the authority to remove the timeline. And so that's the work that we're doing right now. Now that we have the amendment ratified by the requisite 38 states, it should be in the constitution and it wasn't put in the constitution because the archivist at the time sought legal counsel from the Trump Judiciary Department and they said, okay, well, because the timeline has passed then it's null and void. So you can't put in the constitution. We have a new administration. The legal memo that was put forth is still holding. Our president thinks and knows that he as the president doesn't have the authority to put a constitutional amendment into the constitution. The archivist, it's a ministerial duty and that's what the archivist job is, but he wants Congress to act so that we have Congress taking away that timeline and making it official that yes, affirming that this is the bill, that the amendment is part of the constitution and it should be recognized as such. So that's really the work that we're doing right now. We currently have two bills in the House and the Senate co-sponsored that the first bill affirms that the Equal Rights Amendment has been ratified and it's met all the criteria to be added to the constitution and that the timeline is notwithstanding. The other bill also affirms that the Equal Rights Amendment has been met all the requirements and that it calls on the archivist to publish the Equal Rights Amendment. So we're actually further along and closer than we've ever been in history to having the Equal Rights Amendment in the constitution. We had our first vote in the Senate last year and we had majority support in the Senate, but we could not get past the filibuster. We're still working on that. Majority leader Schumer had used a procedural move to make it so that we can bring the vote up again before the session is over. So we're hoping that we can get that back in front of folks before the 2024 election. And in the House, we've also been working in a discharge petition to get Congresswoman Ayanna Presley's bill to the floor to bypass committee because we also have strong bipartisan support there as well. So we are closer than we've ever been. It's been a hundred years. We just need to get this thing in the constitution. Then we can actually start the real work of making sure that we have gender equality across the country. So let me just, you said really important and I just wanna make sure everyone understands some of these steps. So just to talk a little bit about the role of the archivist which sounds kind of arcane but is actually quite important in the situation. So the archivist is a presidential appointment as I understand it confirmed by the Senate but it is sort of a congressionally created position I guess. And it's in actually the process they are supposed to, as you said, perform kind of a ministerial function of ratifying or sorry. Certifying. Certifying, sorry. The ratifications of the states of the ERA and then when the requisite number is reached which is 38 to quote publish it in the constitution. My understanding, first of all is that there's a controversy over whether that's actually even necessary for this to be a valid amendment. If you look at article five of the constitution that talks about how to create amendments it says, when you get the requisite number the amendment will be valid or something to that effect I'm here. Here you're right. Yes, yeah. So can you just talk a little bit about the archivist in the prior administration you said was kind of resistant what is their reasoning for why they aren't just performing this misterial task? Because they, well, first of all everything in our country is political let's just start with that. So from a few, so the current archivist was actually confirmed this year and she, Colleen Shogan and she has said that it's not her responsibility that Congress actually needs to that Congress actually needs to confirm that the Equal Rights Amendment is part of the constitution. If you ask a lot of folks in our coalition myself included it is the law of the land we just need to execute it. But until it's published officially most folks won't agree with that. But to your earlier point they don't actually need to do anything it's met all the criteria and so it should be recognized as law we're taking the extra steps to make sure it is recognized as law and that's why we're working with Congress to go through the steps. To be honest, like each branch of the government is pointing at each other to say it's your job it's your job, it's your job but again, that's DC that's the political environment in which we work but we understand that and so we're working all the avenues we're working with the president and his office to do what we need to there to build support and to let them know that we're pulling at 80% in the polls right now for the Equal Rights Amendment I don't know any politician who's pulling that high or any issue except abortion if you pair abortion and the Equal Rights Amendment together the numbers are ridiculously high across the country and we're working with the Senate we're working with the House and we were going through there was a case that the three attorneys general from the last three states brought forth saying that the Equal Rights Amendment should be published should be at its constitution because their rights as states because they proceeded with the ratification then it should be published because they took the steps that needed to be and then their rights were not taken into consideration when the archivist said that we're not gonna publish the amendment and so we're going at this from all different levels because each level is pointing at the other to say it's your job, it's your job but we know that it's there we just need folks to come to the table and say we agree it's there, go do the thing because one of the concerns is if we don't have the Congress weigh in some of the concern is it's gonna go to someone's going to bring a case and take it to the Supreme Court and with the Supreme Court we're pretty sure how it's gonna turn out if unless Congress can say no, no, no we took the deadline away we affirm that it's legit and that it should be the law of the land and having that seal because the judiciary has already said it's Congress should be able to act and that the AG's case they said Congress has the ability to act the president has said Congress has the ability to act Congress is showing that there is bipartisan support majority bipartisan support in both houses we just need to get through the procedural issues that we find in the House and the Senate to get the Equal Rights Amendment to the floor the new legislation to the floor for a vote to make sure that the Equal Rights Amendment is affirmed and published in the constitution we shouldn't have to take that step or we're doing that anyway just to make sure that it we're taking all avenues to make sure it happens. So is the archivist position that she needs some type of directive from Congress in order to publish it and is that still true under this current archivist from the Biden administration? Yeah, so if you look at her the confirmation hearing earlier this year so she was asked the question whether or not she believes the archivist has the power to certify amendments when there's a dispute as to how many states have ratified and her understanding is the function for the archivist is that has been described as a ministerial one so they published an amendment as a part of the constitution they're not the one who decides whether it's part of the constitution so she kind of answered didn't answer the question but the understanding is that she feels as though Congress should act to take away the timeline and to affirm the Equal Rights Amendment and once they do that then she has the ability to proceed and publish the Equal Rights Amendment. And as you were saying every branch is pointing at each other so it may be sort of surprising that President Biden isn't taking more of an active role in pushing this forward. I understand that he doesn't necessarily have the actual authority to do it but doesn't he have a lot of influence obviously both in Congress but also like in his executive branch memo like the one that was written during the Trump administration that told the archivist not to do it couldn't he have his legal office of legal counsel do the same thing saying that they have to do it? Yeah, so the joke around our camps is that this president actually believes in the constitution and wants to uphold it and so he doesn't see that that's his role so he is using the bully pulpit to push forward the amendment but to actually take the step to force the archivist to publish he doesn't see that as his role. Previous administrations did see that as their role but here we are. So he has been so we know that the Equal Rights Amendment is very high has very popular support in the administration. We work with them on a regular basis. It was talked about in the presidential debates and in 2020 we need to show the folks in power that the people whose voices are not being heard need to be heard or else they're gonna get out of office. When the previous panel was talking about voting like that is the biggest thing. Unfortunately, most politicians listen to their donors and not the people who put them in office. So if we want things to change we have to put people in office who actually do the things we want rather than vote against our own interests because it's in their interest their financial interests to maintain the status quo. So yes, there is support in the White House. They are actually the White House is working with Congress. The Congress is working with the White House to build support. We just need more people to realize more elected officials in Congress to realize that people want this. They don't believe the hype that's been put out against it and it needs to be put into the Constitution because literally some people's lives are actually at stake right now. If you look at some of the legislation that's being put forth, women are dying. Trans kids are under threat. They may be committing suicide. They may be bullied and attacked. This is not a good situation for our country. If we had an Equal Rights Amendment that would allow another layer of protection and discouragement against these kind of attacks that we see in our country right now. And you were talking, which another surprising thing that you said was that there really is bipartisan support in the Congress. And I wanted to first make sure that that was true in the House as well and what's holding it up exactly? I mean, maybe you could explain for those of us who are not DC insiders to understand that. It's partisan politics. If the leadership in the House, when we see the leadership in the House in the Senate regardless of which party it is, say it's okay for you to vote how you want to on this bill. We see a lot more support for our issue, right? Because people feel empowered and they're not gonna get blowback and pushback again by their own party. How long did it take us to get a speaker of the House? That's indicative of the kind of issues we're facing. We have infighting amongst the party that's in control of our legislature. And that is really to our own detriment because we have one or two people who are holding up the entire country from moving forward. And that's a travesty. And so we just need to remember that when we go to the polls this year, next year and every year after that. And is the opposition sort of like you were saying, initially about some of these social sort of cultural war issues are kind of a front for other more economic issues. Is that, do you think still the case today? Oh, very much so. So we've actually done research to see to figure out who we should be targeting in the House in particular. And regarding like what districts we think are most likely to either flip or to have their member vote our way because they see their people want us to. When you look at how much money some of these members of Congress are getting from the interests that are opposed to equality into the Equal Rights Amendment in particular, there's no way they're gonna vote against it. And it's not because their people don't want them to it's because they have so much financial interest they've been bought. And so it's ridiculous. We have a few interns who spent the summer doing this project and they got so excited about it because when you see the money trail it's clear why people have the positions they have. And they use the social issues as a cover and a front. And we have to expose that because literally people's lives are at stake in our future and our prosperity as a country is at stake. And are those interests, are they business interests or are they business interests? Universities also have an interest in not enforcing Title IX. There are, you lose money if you report how many rapes actually happen on campus you can lose, you lose donors. And you'll have students who don't want to come to your school and you have upset parents. You have insurance agencies, you have health insurance. It's the same sort of actors who have a financial interest in the past still have a financial interest currently. There are religious institutions who have interest in this also. Look at where money is coming from and who it's going to and who benefits the most from the status quo that we have financially. And that's where you're gonna find the folks who are backed by those interests are the ones who are adamant that we shouldn't proceed. Mm-hmm, right. So I think that you've already started talking about voting, et cetera. We have an audience here with a lot of law students who are very interested in this issue. And I just wondered if you could give some ideas and specifics about what kinds of things they might be able to do to actually move this forward if that's something they're passionate about. So as I said, we are movements of movements. So there are organizations across this country who are working to push equality forward and who are working to get out the vote but working to do a myriad of work to move us forward, participate in them, join those movements, find something that you're passionate about and bring more awareness to the situation. Go on social media and talk about the Equal Rights Amendment. Have conversations when you're at home at Thanksgiving and say, did you know we don't have an Equal Rights Amendment? 80% of the country thinks we have one. They don't realize that we don't. And so having conversations is actually important. One of the things I charge people with is have a conversation with someone without trying to change their minds. Just have a conversation. Be open to it. Don't defend your position. Don't push your position on them. Just have a conversation because we've lost that art in that way of communing, which is why we're so divided. It's easy to put people in a bucket and say, oh, you believe this. We are a nonpartisan organization, but we are political. We do understand the importance of political power in leveraging it. But we need to bring more people to the table and not make assumptions based on how they think because they may not have understand how this issue might impact them or someone else because this has never been brought to their attention. So we try not to make assumptions about that. Voting is, of course, the biggest thing you can do. And I know a lot of us feel as though our vote doesn't count, but more and more these days, voting decisions are being made by like 100 votes out of thousands of votes or maybe 1,000 votes out of a million votes. It does make a difference. And if you don't vote, you're actually giving the other, you're giving whatever side you don't like an opportunity because you're not weighing in on it and you're letting someone else take your vote away from you. And if you want to be practical, if you are an activist, call your member of Congress. Tell them what you, they listen to their constituents, more so than they listen to someone outside of it. Listen to money first, let's be honest. And then they listen to their constituents, not all of them. I shouldn't be so creative. There are a lot of good people in elective office, but there are a lot of bad people too and people who don't have our interests at heart. And so we need to be judicious on the people we sent into those positions. So, I mean, it's a wrap to summarize, vote. Talk to your member of Congress. Talk up the Equal Rights Amendment and join an organization. But if you can't do those things, if it seems like it's too hard, join the conversation online, right? Just have a, and talk to people, raise awareness about the things you care about. And hell, at some point, I teach a class on how to run for office, run for office, run for local office. All my students always want to run for Congress. I'm like, yeah, you can run for Congress, but you can make a lot more impact in your community. If you're running for the local offices, for your state, Senate, for your state house, for your municipality, that's where real change is made because those are the communities that you can make more impact and then expand that on the larger scale. I just wanted to circle back to a couple of things you raised. One, I think sometimes people who live in a liberal state that might have something in their state constitution that is ERA-like say, well, why should I care about having a federal ERA? What is the purpose? Let's say every state, I mean, this is unlikely, but let's just say every state has passed its own version of the ERA. What's the point of having a federal law, federal constitution amendment, excuse me. Because we need the stronger protection at the federal level. Many times the federal law does Trump state law. And so you wanna make sure that you have protection at every level that you have. If nothing else, making sure that you have that positive protection, I think is important. If nothing else fundamentally, we are one of very few democracies. Actually, I don't know if any democracy that doesn't have an equal rights that was written in the modern era has a constitution written in the modern era that doesn't have an equal rights amendment in its constitution. Let me think about that. We think the world looks up to us, but in that one way in particular, we are the outlier and not in the positive. We need to make sure that we are upholding and standing to the values that we purport, that we have as a nation. And this is a fundamental one. Equality is a fundamental value for our country and we need to make sure that we're not only saying that, but we're actually living that. And that's really one of the reasons we need to have it. If nothing else, if not for the legal protection that affords across the board, we need it because it is a symbol of who we want to be as a country and who we say we are and we're actually putting it into practice. This morning in the first panel, one of the attorneys who has done a lot of civil rights work pointed out that Rhode Island has kind of a version of the ERA in its constitution, but she said that the Rhode Island Supreme Court several years ago had actually issued a decision where they said that that did not provide for any individual enforceable rights so that a private person could not bring an action. So I think that's a very good example of what you're talking about that we may think we have protections that don't actually exist to the extent that they would under a federal Equal Rights Amendment. Go ahead, I'm sorry. No, and actually the majority of the states actually do have equal rights amendments in their state. Even some states that didn't ratify the federal ERA have had equal rights amendments or something similar in their state constitutions. Right. So I have a couple more questions for you but I also wanna just invite the audience to put some questions into the Q&A so we can answer those. Zakiya can answer those. But as I'm doing that, let me also just circle back to the Supreme Court for a minute because you mentioned that they would get involved only if there was a challenge once the archivist published the, you know, published the amendment. But, and you said, well, if Congress authorized it, you know, if these bills passed that you talked about the ERA would be on much firmer ground. And I guess my question for you is given this Supreme Court, do you think that even with that type of congressional support, there would be any concern that they would somehow rule that the deadline had passed, et cetera, et cetera. And therefore it was not a valid amendment. Well, what this Court has demonstrated that they don't hold precedent and they don't hold the rule of law the same ways previous courts may have. Like there have been some questionable decisions that have been made in my opinion by this court that give me pause to think that it's a no-brainer. I think I would love to say that any court that actually sees, if any court that actually looks at the history of the amendment, precedent of other amendments before it would say that, okay, it's met all the requirements, it's done. Congress has done its job, the people have spoken, it needs to be in there. But we've seen this court has been very activist. They are very activist judges on that court. And they also believe that it's their job to help shape the policy rather than just make judicial decisions or decisions based on the merit and the facts in front of them. So I don't have much faith but I have to keep working on that in my, that's not true. I do have faith. I have faith that they will realize the importance of this moment. And even those who abortion was their thing and they knew they were going in there to take down Roe and they did their job. But they see the merit of this bill, of this amendment, and they understand that this is what the country needs and that they should do the right thing. We want everyone to do the right thing. This isn't just for me, it's not just for you, it's for everyone in this country and for generations to come. And it will impact them. And I'm hopeful that they'll make the right decision. Is it likely? I don't know, but I'm hopeful that they will. And just to speak about your own background with this, how did this become a passion for you because I think for law students here, and by the way, I think you should become a professor of law, I guess you are an adjunct professor of law but you seem like you are very comfortable discussing legal issues. How did this become your passion? And I think it's really important for students to see career paths that they might wanna take. Yeah, so my career path has been, I like to say I find myself where I need to be when I need to be there. And this position is no different. So I was actually the executive director of the National Women's Party, which you may know of. It was actually, they were part of the Suffragette Movement to bring the 19th Amendment to fruition and actually helped write, the founders helped write the Equal Rights Amendment. And so I've always known as a black woman in America that my rights are tenuous. Like when you talk about abortion access and you look back on forced pregnancy, I mean, that's how my people came to be in this country, like rape, sexual assault, domination force, all the things, right? And so I have a deeper understanding of what it means to be able to say that I have protection. I don't really feel as though the country is designed to protect me, not my interests, definitely. And so I have a vested interest in making sure we have an Equal Rights Amendment. I mean, as a black person, my civil rights have been under someone else's thumb my entire life and for generations before me. And so I wanna make sure that we're doing everything we can, having all the tools that we need to make sure that this country is actually living up to the promise that we all strive for when we're young, because it hasn't. And we need to put in the hard work, do the things we need to and use our skills and talents the way we can. So my career started off and took a few turns. I actually have a master's of social work and I studied social welfare policy because I knew that the systems were messed up and I wanted to understand how they're messed up and how I can fix them. And so I went into, from there, I went into politics. So I managed political campaigns and I only worked with women, people of color, women and people of color, so men and women of color but also white women as well. Because I knew that we have a much harder time getting funding and having people who actually understand our challenges and trying to run for office. And so I use my skills and talents there and that's what I bring to this as the president and CEO of the RA Coalition. I bring all of my lived experiences to the table to actually make this happen because I have skills, talents and a vision for what I want this country to be like. And it's up to me to make sure that I contribute in the ways that I can to make that happen. Wow, that's very inspiring really, Zikia. Sorry, just back to a more technical question which has to do with the ratification and the timeline. Again, for people who may not be as familiar with it, why did Congress originally put a timeline on the ratification and was that done for other amendments or can you give a sense of that? Yes, so two things. So a timeline has been put on other bills but the difference being the timeline for the Equal Rights Amendment was that it's the preamble and not to the text of the amendment itself. So there is a distinction. I mean, if you talk to anyone who studies, who studies statutory law and understands that like the preamble is one thing but it does what you're really voting on what really the meat of the bill is, is the text of the bill. There have been other bills that have had a timeline but in this case in particular, the reason why the timeline was added was because it was added as basically the death knell because the member of Congress who added that language knew that if there was going to be this big push against it and it would never get 38 states. Well, look, we got 38 states. And if you can add a timeline to the bill, if you can extend the timeline to the bill, then you can remove the timeline to the bill and that's where we are right now. Right, we have a question, which is who else do you think would be influential to get on board to help see this get across the finish line? Are there specific groups that you're working with or specific political figures or other figures? Who's missing in the coalition, I guess, would be interesting. So there's two parts to that question. One is we need more people, frankly. Like we need everyone who's listening to this webinar, watching this webinar, everyone at the law school, everyone that I'm about to do a convening here, everyone who doesn't know what's going on to be invested and engaged because that's actually how it's going to happen. The political will is what's gonna get it over the finish line. That's what's taken so long. It's because not enough people have invested and people think that we have things that we don't have rights that we don't. But if you talk about political figures, I mean, the president is engaged, but I said, again, you need political will. You need people calling their members of Congress and saying, this is important to me. We need people who understand that, who believe in abortion access to call their member of Congress. They need to talk to the people that care about this issue also for them. And I should say, we are not an abortion rights group, but right now that is a very hot topic in our world. And that is one that is very closely, could very well be tied to the Equal Rights Amendment. So I just wanna put that out there. And we have reproductive rights and justice organizations represented in our coalition. But we really, it really is, you can have all of the big names in the country pushing for this, but until you have the political will to get it done, it's not going to happen. And that's why we need more people invested in this because the people who can make the decisions are making them, but they have other priorities unless we make this one for them. Right, so another couple of questions. One is, can you talk a little bit about the ratification process, particularly the states that recently ratified the amendment? How was that actually done politically? Again, based on my knowledge from the Mrs. America series, it seemed like Shlafly and all the opponents at the time with the original ratifications was very, was really working the states, et cetera. And I assume that this is happening on the other side as well. And maybe you can talk a little bit about how you've got those more recent states to move forward with this. Yes, so it is a state effort. And so Pat Spearman in Nevada was actually the spearhead. She led the effort in Nevada for the ratification in that state. And there are actually a number of states. So what happened is that's, in her state, the ratification had to go to the legislature. So different states have different ratification processes. But in Virginia, Illinois, and Nevada, the process is it has to be introduced in the legislature and it has to be ratified through the legislature. So she started this campaign with a number of other members of the Arizona State House to push forward this, the amendment to get it ratified. So that was, it was called the three state solution. So we knew we needed three states. And so we started, we, the coalition, others outside of the coalition, but all of us under the umbrella of pushing for equality started this process of building support for the Equal Rights Amendment on the state level to get the final three states needed to ratify the amendment. I'm from Virginia, so I'm very proud that we were the final state needed. But there are still other states currently that are working towards ratification efforts. And so it's brilliant to see because we know that if we have support on the state level and the local level, that builds up to the national level as well. And so there are continuing efforts to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment in states that have not yet done so. But it is really a state effort. It's getting it on, getting the either a ballot initiative or if it's a referendum or if to have the legislature actually ratify, vote to ratify directly. And in terms of moving it forward in Congress with the bills that you've talked about, are the people who are, you mentioned from states that have ratified the amendment, are they putting pressure on their Congress people to pass this bill or these bills that you talked about? We do. And so as part of the coalition, we're all over the nation. So we do congressional actions all the time. We have campaigns going all the time. Call your member of Congress. Tell them that you want the Equal Rights Amendment. We do tweet storms. We flood them with messages. We flood them with phone calls. But you do have folks who are opposed to equality that have, I mean, the people who are in those states who want to see this happen are disheartened in a lot of ways because they see all the issues that they care about being completely ignored or fought against by their member of Congress. And so that's what it goes back to. If they're not representing you, vote them out. And a lot of us are being represented by people who do not have our interests at heart, whether it's this issue, it's healthcare, mental health, gun violence, all of the things. And so we just need to be more mindful of the people we put in office. And I think a question is in the Q and A that a lot of people have, which is would the ERA negatively impact any existing benefits or protections for women? Are there things like child support or social security benefits or things like that? And this actually goes to one of the questions that's in the Q and A. So the Equal Rights Amendment actually, it doesn't mean there are no distinctions based on sex, but what it does say is you can't discriminate. So if we remember Ruth Bader Ginsburg actually used one of the first discrimination cases she brought was a man who is who, I think he was being, you probably know this better than I do. He was being discriminated against because he wanted to take time off to take care of for his parents. But because he was a man, they didn't want him, there was no, people don't think that was okay because he's, why would you take off time to care for your parents? It's not a thing. So we do see that some of the earlier discrimination cases were actually men because we know that the judges in those cases, would have more understanding if it was a man being discriminated against than a woman. And so that's why she was very strategic in bringing those cases forward. So if you think of it this way, it doesn't mean that you can't have that there isn't child support, it's spousal support or not spousal support. Child support is based on who is a primary breadwinner and what is needed to take care of those children if you don't have custody. So it doesn't mean that it goes away, it just means it's more equitable and who actually gets, if you're caring for your children and you're not the primary breadwinner then you do need support. And if you're a man and you aren't, I've seen this happen. Like I have friends who they got a divorce and they made more than their husband but the husband has joint custody so they have to provide support. It happens and that's a good thing. It's a good thing that we have more equity in our system and it doesn't take away, it just means that more people are eligible to benefit from the laws that we have in place and it makes it more equal. I saw a movie last night, 50 for 50 by 450. It's about women leaders on the national level, presidents, prime ministers and the like and in a lot of countries, they don't really look at mother and father, they look at parental. And so when you take out mother and father that you take out the gender lens of things then you have parental rights. You have parental leave and we see that men are able to invest in their families more. It's an obscene amount of men feel like they can't take parental leave when it's offered to them because society says that you can't. They could, but because we have this idea in mind about what makes a man what a man is as a breadwinner it really does harm our families and it harms our future and children and men and everyone involved in that situation. So that's why it doesn't take away but it adds and it brings more people into the picture of who is protected under that amendment. Right, I think that's so important because I think a lot of people don't understand that and they're very concerned about it. Some people will lose if the ERA is passed. No, we all win. That's the beautiful part about it. Right. This is, I mean, I know this is something you hope does not have to happen but is there any path to sort of start anew with Congress passing a new amendment that would have? I'll ask you that question. What do you think? I'll ask everyone here. So unfortunately, we know the society in which we live right now, it is so polarized. Everyone, you can't even get members of Congress to agree that sky's blue when it is. Everyone has to have their nuance shade because we're so partisan and the politics is just the partisanship and the divisiveness is just run rampant. And I know a lot of Republicans actually like to use Ruth Bader Ginsburg actually said we should start over but she said that before we had the 38th state ratify. We're in a very different landscape now than we were when she made that statement but it keeps getting thrown in our face and we're like, we love RBG. She's phenomenal. I actually got to meet her, it was great. But that was a very different landscape and until we get to a place where our politics are not so partisan and polarized, we're not gonna be able to do this again. This is their best shot to get it done and we can get it done. We just need to get people motivated to do the right thing and show them why it's in their best interest to do so. So we have another question who first of us student who first thanks you for sharing your experience and your vision and wonders how do you think an advocate would respond or should respond to a white man who is arguing that these efforts do not involve him or that it is not his fight? So does he have a wife who works? Does he have a daughter? Does he have a son? If he doesn't have any of those things it's a different conversation. But if he has anyone he cares about who is negatively impacted by this, then that's why. So if your wife or if you all couldn't get childcare because there's not universal childcare in this country which means one of you couldn't work because it wasn't worthwhile for you to actually take time off to raise your kid or I'm sorry, you couldn't go to work because you couldn't make enough money to pay for childcare. That affects your bottom line. If you have a daughter who might find herself pregnant at some point in her life or a son who might find that he impregnated someone at some point in their life and they're not ready to have a family would you take them to get an abortion? Would you have to leave your state to take them to get an abortion because there are bans in the state in which you live. If you have a trans child at home but I mean there are a number of reasons why personally like for family members but for him himself, what he wanted to help out with his kids more would he wanna be free to take time off of work and not be penalized for it to do so to take care of his family? Would he want to be free of the gendered stereotypes that lock all of us in by this toxic masculinity that some of us see around us and that continues to perpetuate because of these gendered stereotypes that are found their way into our laws? Imagine a world where we're free of much of that because our systems, we're trying to tear down the systems that enforce that on us. We're all in prison in many ways and folks just don't see it, you have to make it relatable to them. Say this is why, even if it doesn't directly impact you though it does, you have to be able to see beyond your lived experience and understand that it's impactful for everyone. Mm-hmm. Yeah, and I think again that fear-mongering has been so powerful that people just have a sense that this is going to either destroy what they have or it doesn't impact me because it's just some sort of marginal group of feminists that are concerned about this. And I think it's so important what you're doing to make it clear that not only does this impact a broad array of rights but it really does impact everybody. So another question is about really how this coalition that you were talking about that you're part of and are leading in terms of the ERA, you have mentioned so many different rights and things that are impacted. How do you sort of prioritize what you focus on? I mean, you mentioned just now that abortion rights is something that is very important and then sort of front of mind right now. How do you kind of make decisions as a coalition about how you're gonna strategically get this moved forward? So everyone in our coalition understands that the Equal Rights Amendment is our main priority. We are the ones driving the effort to get it added to the Constitution. But as part of that, we also uplift campaigns for the rest of our partner organizations. So when we have Equal Payday comes up, we promote Equal Payday amongst our partners and our coalition so that everyone is advancing that. We sign on to letters to Congress. We talk to members of the administration as well. So we do uplift those movements as well. We uplift our partners and their issues but understanding that our main focus is the Equal Rights Amendment and that's the vehicle to which we're going to achieve this larger vision of equality that we have for the country. And so everyone understands that that's what we're fighting for. We have all these other, we have the resources that we use are being used to uplift all of our issues because we are so siloed and that's to our detriment. People, the forces that we wanna keep us separated because they know that if we come together and we work together, we're much stronger, we're much louder and we can actually do more. And so that's what we're really building is that that movement of movements coming together to actually push back against the rollback of our rights because we don't, our movement is funded in the millions and our opposition is funded in the billions. And so we have people power and that's what we're gonna use to get this thing done. Wow. So you had mentioned several times that the job is just beginning once the ERA gets actually enthrined in the constitution. Do you see your organization as continuing that fight or is it, is your job done in terms of the ERA coalition? No, so we're actually, so we're looking, we're coming upon our 10 year anniversary next year. And so as part of that reflection, we're talking about how can we use our coalition that we felt, I mean, we have a massive coalition and we're growing it every month, every day actually. How do we use that to actually make the change we wanna see? And so we're refocusing how we're going to work on implementation of the Equal Rights Amendment once we have the amendment in the constitution. So we are pulling together working groups that are going to, and actually we're doing one today that are really focusing on the different aspects of the work that we do, electoral work, work on the state level, work on the federal level and then communications, public education and awareness. And using those groups to talk about, okay, how do we message the work that we're doing now and how do we build these, the infrastructure for the work that needs to happen during implementation? So we're looking ahead, because we know that we have to get this thing done, but we also need to be mindful of what's gonna happen next because someone's gonna have to take the lead and moving that forward and we're that organization. That's great. So in terms of just the fight that you have been part of for so long, what are some surprises that you have found and maybe what are some rewarding moments that you have found? It's hard to be surprised these days, to be quite honest with you, and especially so like I've worked in the repro rights space for some time also, so like Dobbs wasn't, we knew Dobbs was coming, it was just a matter of when. And we've seen the stacking of the ports that we've seen, we've seen the polarization of our electorate more and more. So I guess sometimes the surprise is when you get people reaching out that you otherwise wouldn't. I don't know, it's small moments usually. It's when someone that you think has a particular point of view shocks you by saying the right thing, right? I can't think of a specific interest, but one of the things that I love to see is I love it when people's eyes light up, when you tell them, we don't have an equal rights amendment. And they're like, what? And I say, and this is how it, and then they start thinking about how it impacts them. And then they're like, then they go off and they tell everyone else, I was like, did you know we don't have this? Did you know this, that and the other? And that spreads and I love seeing that because that organic inquisitiveness and the spreading of that joy and not necessarily joy and energy, but the spreading of that awareness and information is really what's gonna happen because we are not situated in a way that we can actually communicate to the millions and millions of people that we need to outside of our coalition, but every person who takes the time to talk to 10 more people about this, that expands our work. Right, so in terms of, again, our audience is a lot of it is law students who, again, are interested in this, are there and many of them will be looking for jobs soon. So what are some options particularly, and I realize, you know, you're not an attorney, but I know you play one on TV. So what are some options for new lawyers who would like to go into this type of work? So I know you have to pay off your law school debt. So find a firm that does pro bono work in the area in which you're interested in. I have a number of friends who did that coming out of law school. They went to big firms that they knew that the pro bono work they do is in an area that speaks to them. And so that's one way that they could use their skills and talents to help with that. Volunteer, join a board, go knock doors on a weekend if you like to be active. I mean, sometimes knocking doors when it's not freezing cold outside can be therapeutic, right? You go and you talk to someone and you convince them, not necessarily convince them, but you have a conversation about something you're passionate about. It's a very different way to think of the world outside of law school. So I teach the class at Georgetown and every time my students come in, it's a very different class than what they're used to because I want them to focus on themselves. It's a lot very reflective. Why do you wanna run for office? What is it that motivates you? What makes you the best person for that job? And they never have to think about themselves. It's a very different way of looking at the world. And so for them, it's cathartic in some way because it's a break from the monotony, even if it's exciting, from the routine that law school provides for you. So I would say try something, try to find something that finds you joy and do it in a volunteer capacity until you pay off that law school debt. And then once you do that, then you can, I know so many people who went to law school who aren't lawyers right now because they found their passion outside of it, but you can still use those skills and that you learn in that capacity and the knowledge that you have and take that into the world and make real change. So there's so many opportunities out there. Two things, try something and knowing what you don't like is just as important as knowing what you like and be open to opportunities when they present themselves and just take life as it comes. Yeah, and I think for students, they sometimes don't recognize how powerful their voices can be both while they're still in law school and then obviously when they graduate and are lawyers, that it's really such a powerful role that you can play. And it is incredibly rewarding. It's something, you're actually doing something that you care about that makes a real difference in the world. And I try to tell my students that as well, that it's something that is just so central to making you feel like a satisfied and a valuable person in your work. And along those lines before we go on, as a law student, you have such skills and talents right now even before you go off to a firm that you don't realize it's, when I was in grad school or college, they said, okay, you come from the world and you're like here in the top of the world and then you get to grad school or college and you're like everyone else, you're with everyone else in the mix but then you leave and you're back up here. And so you have these skills and talents that you can take anywhere while you're still in school that people would love to have you use. So I can't stress this enough. Go volunteer right now on a campaign for an organization. I mean, you can join, but we have college students who are on boards, we have grad students who are on boards with me. So you can use your skills, your talents and your enthusiasm right now as a law student in a way that you find passion. Right. So I know we're running a little short on time. If anyone has some final questions if they could put them in the Q and A. And in the meantime, I think we really want to emphasize that something you've been talking about, which is this idea that we can't just sort of sit back and watch other people do these things. And maybe you could give some other sort of encouraging words to all of the audience, both students and there are a lot of lawyers in the audience and others about what we could do to get this past. The biggest thing is talking to more people about it. I mean, if you live in a state like I do where your representative is on the right side of the issue, it's sometimes it's hard to, you can't really call Congress a member of Congress elsewhere. But talk to people who are in states who maybe they could call their member of Congress. Have a conversation with someone. And again, don't try to change their mind. Just have a conversation and just try to drop a few nuggets and just keep it moving. But the more people we know, we talk to who are aware of the situation and we're in the importance of it, especially in the importance in this moment right now, that's key. So amplifying those voices on social media, talking to people who are not on social media but who have audiences themselves. If you find a way to use your megaphone and your platform in whatever way you can do it because that's really how we're going to move the needle is the more people who are engaged and involved in this, the more likely we're going to get it done now instead of having to wait more years down the road. Well, I really want to thank you so much really. I have found this personally very inspiring and you're doing incredible work and I know it's also incredibly challenging. And particularly, I mean, I'm just and some of the questions reflected this. I'm just so impressed and amazed with how many different arenas you're working on and at the same time, the Congress, the archivist, the states, I mean, it's just really incredible. And so I think everybody listening to you is very inspired and I really hope that the law students in the audience really take this to heart because this issue or whatever your issue is that you're passionate about is, you know, it's just, it's so important that you follow that. So I thank you so much, Zakiya, for taking the time to spend time with us. And I'm just looking at my leaders here. They're saying that we are now supposed to be taking a break, a lunch break until 2 p.m. when we have a terrific panel coming up on transgender rights. So everyone have a good lunch and come back and Zakiya, I hope our pass will cross again. And I'll be remiss if I didn't say go to theeracollection.org to learn more about our work and follow us on social media. Oh, that'd be great. Okay, thank you so much. All right, everybody take care and I'll see you at two. Bye everyone. Bye. Good afternoon everyone and welcome to the afternoon portion of the Justice for All symposium. The phrase justice for all dates back to the founding of our country, but it has become increasingly clear that many groups of people are often left out of the all category. A person's race, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, religion, citizenship, ability, age, and or socioeconomic status are just a few of the factors that locked them out of receiving equal treatment in our justice system. This morning we had the pleasure to hear from a panel focusing on Title IX and from our keynote speaker Zakiya Thomas from the ERA Coalition. If you are just joining us, please check out the recording which will be posted on the Law School's YouTube channel. This afternoon we have gathered to delve into one of the most pressing and evolving legal issues of our time, the transformation of law in regards to transgender rights and protections for transgender individuals. In recent years, there has been a seismic shift in the legal landscape surrounding transgender rights marked by both advancements and challenges. This panel will encompass a broad spectrum of legal considerations from education, healthcare, criminal justice, housing, employment, and personal freedoms. The legal rights and challenges facing transgender individuals are multifaceted and they intersect with matters of equality, justice, and human rights. It is crucial to recognize that as society's understanding of gender identity and expression evolves, our legal framework must adapt to ensure that all individuals regardless of their gender identity enjoy equal protection under the law. This panel will engage in a thoughtful and constructive dialogue examining recent legal developments, ongoing struggles, and future prospects for the transgender community. Through our collective insights and expertise, we aim to foster a deeper understanding of the challenges transgender individuals face in the legal arena as well as the steps needed to create a more inclusive and legal and just legal system. We hope that this panel will serve as a platform for illuminating discussions and will contribute the ongoing efforts to shape a more equitable and compassionate world for all transgender individuals. Thank you all for joining us in this critical conversation. Without further ado, I will turn it over to our wonderful moderators, Nicole Dyshlefsky and 2L student, Sam Filayashi. Thank you. Thank you, Andrea. And to start off with Sam and I just want to say thank you for having this event today. Thank you for allowing us to moderate this panel. We feel really passionately about these topics and really thankful to have been included. To start off, Sam and I want to acknowledge that we all find ourselves in different places with these discussions and that's okay. The issues we're gonna raise today may not be beginner issues in this topic, but we'll try to elicit information in a way that we're all on the same page. Today, we welcome Attorney Hill, Professor Ward and Professor Weatherby with us. Attorney Hill, thank you for joining this important discussion today. We of course want to start out with some introductions about each of our speakers. Attorney Hill, you're the Chief Legal Counsel for the Rhode Island Commission for Human Rights. Could you tell us a bit about yourself, where you're from and how you fit into this conversation? Thank you for having me, Nicole and Sam and the law school. So as Chief Legal for the Commission for Human Rights, I primarily handle housing discrimination cases but the Commission's enforcement authority extends to discrimination on all protected categories based on in housing, employment, public accommodation, credit and delivery of services. So if a person were to experience discrimination on the basis of sex, sexual orientation, gender or gender expression, the Commission for Human Rights would be a place where they could come and make a complaint and have that complaint investigated and we have enforcement authority to take a case to a hearing and achieve an outcome for a complainant if there's merit. So that's the lens that I'm coming to this from is being the State Enforcement Agency for Anti-Discrimination Laws. And the other part of your question, I'm sorry, was... Where are you from? It was a long time ago. That should be an easy question. So I've been in Rhode Island for about seven years and before that I was in Arizona but before that I was in Connecticut and I was a high school teacher. So I'm also coming at this from, my job has an educational component that people need to know their rights, be aware of their rights in order to enforce their rights. Thank you so much, Attorney Hill. All right, and then up next, Professor Weatherby. You teach legal research and writing, employment, discrimination, education law and professional responsibility at the University of Arkansas School of Law. Professor Weatherby is a prolific scholar and a dedicated teacher winning University of Arkansas School of Laws inaugural Dean's Circle Faculty Award for teaching in 2021. Her research focuses on the intersection between religious exercise and public accommodation laws, First Amendment jurisprudence and the impact on student speech, hot button school law issues and emerging legal protections for transgender individuals. So Professor Weatherby, could you please tell us a little bit about yourself where you're from and how you fit into this conversation, please? Sure, thank you so much for having me, Nicole and Sam and Andrea and the whole R view. I'm delighted to be with you today. I've been an academic now since 2013. So primarily I've been thinking, doing research and writing about these issues, but prior to joining the legal academy, I practiced law in New York for seven years and represented school districts. And so I handled everything education law related, but part of my niche really became and really this was somewhat inconsistent with my firm's desire. I gave advice against their liking. They wish that I wouldn't have done this at the time, but it was in 2007, 2008 before people were really engaged with these issues. And I had districts that were ushering gender non-conforming and transitioning students through middle school and high school. And so I along with some really incredible administrators, superintendents and school boards advised with respect to how to handle some of the logistical issues that arose in that context and developed an expertise in the area. And then when I transitioned to legal academia, I started writing about it, thinking about it and advocating on behalf of that population. And it's been a great joy and privilege to have a small voice in this area, especially in Arkansas, where these topics are somewhat controversial. And that's what I bring to the conversation today. Yeah, thank you very much. Professor Ward, Professor Ward, I think my quick biographical statement is kind of underselling you. I could start with like John Ward, American legal hero, but I'm going to go, John Professor Ward is a lecturer at Boston University School of Law in 1978. In response to a pattern of police harassment of gay men, he gathered a group of community activists and founded GLAAD, Gay and Lesbian Advocates and Defenders, now GLBTQ Legal Advocates and Defenders. Can you tell us a bit about yourself, where you're from and how you fit into this conversation? First I have to unmute. Well, you know, actually, I'm also teaching the same course that I'm teaching at Boston University now at Boston College Law School. So I have this late life career as an adjunct. And my connection with Rhode Island actually goes back a long way. I clerked for Judge Raymond Patine in the district court. In 1976 and 1977, which was one of the most rewarding experiences of my life, Judge Patine was a hero. In my estimation, he took progressive stands about minorities, about draft debaters, about women seeking reproductive freedom, about LGBT folks in the days when it was extremely unpopular and paid a personal price for it. There was a real inspiration to be his law clerk for a year. And so yeah, in 1978, I did found glad. In a, actually, even though on paper, things were much more difficult for LGBT folks in those days, I felt that the wind was at our back that there was very little to lose because we didn't have very much. But for example, in 1980, I did a case actually in front of Judge Patine involving a young man who wanted to go to the prom with another boy. And we won that. And it was kind of, things were on the upswing and they were for a long time. So these are very different times. And even though much has been achieved, I think it's fair to say that we're feeling headwinds more than tailwinds. And so my interest is in sort of being a bully pulpit for the younger generation and finding ways because one of the things that I think has kept the movement going from the beginning is our nimbleness. And we're certainly gonna need that skill now. In terms of transgender folks, when GLAD was started, in all honesty, I can't say that everybody in the gay male and lesbian community was welcoming to trans folks. It's been an educational process. And I think one of the things that perhaps these difficult times have brought about is, if we weren't interested in intersectionality back then, it has come to us. I mean, it's undisputable that what happens to transgender folks, what happens to people of color, what happens to immigrants, and what happens to us as queer folk is all part of one struggle for human liberation. And it's that that inspires me in my work. So, oh, and by the way, I'm a recent transplant to Providence, Rhode Island, and I'm really loving living here. So I think that's about all. And I don't, I mean, it's very nice to be called a hero, there's that and the other thing, but I'm just one of the voices, you know? And the more I just keep the focus on the work, the more comfortable I feel. Thank you so much for having me. That's exactly what an American legal hero would say. Welcome to the ocean state and welcome to our panel. Yes, welcome to Rhode Island, everyone, even virtually as well. So I think we're just going to dive into our questions here. So this first one is just kind of an introduction to set the stage for everybody, kind of two complimentary questions. What is the current language that academics are now using to talk about transgender issues and transgender people? And what advice would you have for somebody who normally disengages from this topic? Because they care, but they don't want to seem offensive or disrespectful. And I suppose I'll pass the baton to attorney Hill. Thank you, Sam. Well, I'm not an academic. So I can't really say, you know, where the academic world is going. I would say a couple of things that something I'm hearing more now is gender diverse, as kind of an umbrella term for people who just don't fall into a strict binary of gender. And I also like that term better than gender non-conforming because I think it puts it into a more positive light as opposed to non-conforming sounds like it's a deficit as opposed to it's just another reality of how human beings live their lives. But as far as like engaging in the topic, don't be weird. I think that's like my top thing to say. Like if it's something you wouldn't ask a person who you don't know well, you know, regardless of their gender or sex, then you probably shouldn't be asking it to someone who you perceive to be gender diverse. Like it's just not any of your business, what somebody's like, sex life is like. And the other thing is you're gonna mess up. You know, at some point, you're probably going to misgender someone or use the wrong term or use the wrong pronoun. And the thing to do is if you catch it, say sorry, move on. If they catch it, say sorry and move on and try not to do it again. And I think gender diverse people are still people and we're all a lot more than our sex and our gender. And engaging with people in an effort to find out who they are as a person is generally something that won't steer you wrong if you're being genuine and humble about the interaction. Thank you. Hi, Professor Warder, Professor Weatherby, do you have any thoughts? I would just add, I think everything Lauren said I agree with. I would just add that as an academic, I don't look to other academics. I look to the community for the glossary of terms and actually I look at GLAD's website often to make sure that I'm staying on top of transition. This is a language that's evolving and changing quickly. So if you wanna be respectful and be on top of terms that are sensitive to the community, you're gonna engage with the research and just stay on top of it. To the second question about engaging in the dialogue, I think and write a lot about speech tolerance and I think I'll just say that it's not just about the fear of engaging in the conversation, it's about how we receive the mistakes and Lauren mentioned that we're human beings, we make mistakes, I do too. And I think I just always encourage folks to give each other grace. There's going to be outdated non-PC terms that some people are gonna use because the terminology is evolving so quickly and the fear of causing someone offense can often be the reason why folks don't engage in the first place or speak up. And so what ends up happening is that the conversation shuts down rather than people feeling comfortable engaging without being vilified for getting it wrong. So I would just encourage people to show grace, be forgiving in terms of mistakes that others make and not vilify an individual for using a term that is outdated or incorrect or insensitive and try to educate that person in a respectful way so that as Lauren said, the next time they get it right because we can make mistakes, but we learn from them. And I think it's important that everybody shows some tolerance when diving into a conversation that can be sensitive to listeners. I would just amplify that. And my students both at Boston College and at Boston University are completely enthralled by trans issues. That's what they wanna talk about yesterday, today and tomorrow. And particularly now because these cases that are coming down and which I imagine we'll get a chance to talk about a little bit later, Scrimetti and the ECNAS, the 6th and 11th Circuit cases and the horrible way that the courts are treating the issue of appropriate medical care for transgender teenagers is put it right at the forefront. And so, and in terms of the pronoun wars, if I think the older you are, the more difficult it is to adjust. And so I make mistakes. I have trouble to be honest with remembering about they because it's just, but you know, it's like what I tell myself is John, just get it right. And for people, we're gonna actually teach those cases next week, the auto phase and a couple of other cases that talk about professors that refuse to call people by their chosen pronouns. And I mean, we have no trouble going into court and saying your honor. And in some languages, you know, the third person is uses the term of respect. And so what is the big deal, that's my view on it. Thanks so much. So we're gonna, as Andrea said, we're gonna jump around a bit on our questions because we have so much ground to cover. So we're gonna start with education and Professor Ward. We're going to bring you back to Rhode Island. You successfully vindicated the right of a Rhode Island high school senior boy to bring another boy as his prom date. Can you describe the opposition's argument and how your strategy addressed it? And do you think the same arguments would be made today? Okay, I just wanna just add to what I said about the process of it's not to trivialize it. I mean, when you're talking, this is about people's human dignity and their right to be addressed as they choose. I wanna be clear about that. That's not, okay. So getting back to Aaron Frick. The defense was basically that the principle of the high school disavowed any intent to discriminate against Aaron on the basis of his sexual orientation. But he said he feared violence. Okay, and that was the basically the defenses. We're afraid that if we let this kid go to the dance with another kid of the same gender, the other students will engage in violent conduct. And so our job was to convince Judge Patine that that wasn't a good enough reason. And we talked to him about you can't allow people to have a heckler's veto over First Amendment activities and that, you know, and we actually went back and discovered that there had been security issues at the Cumberland High School prom in previous years having nothing to do with sexual orientation and that they were able to provide security and do all that stuff. And actually, as it happened, the thing, the prom went without incident. I remember being up late the night before making sure that they both, that their tuxedo orders were properly filled and so forth and so on. But the thing went fine. And it was, actually, there was, after that case was won, it got a lot of publicity back then. And there was a TV program called the Phil Donahue Show and Aaron was on, I don't know if, I guess people remember. And so, you know, from months afterwards, my office would get letters from kids all over the country saying, gee, I thought I was the only one, the only teenager who was, you know, so it was, it's one of the cases that I look back on with the greatest fondness because, you know, I think it was part of what began the long process of social change that's made life easier. One of the things that gratifies me when I teach is that my students don't apparently have the same nonsense in their head that I grew up with for the most part. And that is progress, regardless of what the right wing is doing these days. That is the hope. That is the hope that the next generation and the generation after that don't have the same, don't have the same internalized hatred or internalized barriers or internalized guilt. But that is also the hope going forward that, you know, we're continuing to march in the right direction. And so thanks in a difficult time, on a difficult topic, thanks for sharing that attorney word, Sam, to you. Yeah, thank you. And I especially appreciate it at your point about, you know, people thought that they were the only one and that they would be alone. So especially as far as being gender diverse and like being in that space, it's really important to remember that there's people before you and that there will be people after you and that there are people by your side that have that same experience. So thank you for pointing that out, too. Excuse me, I didn't mean to interrupt you, go ahead. No, of course not, go ahead. I was just gonna say one of the things that I sense sometimes in my classes is that my students, I don't ask anybody's sexual orientation, but my sense is that most of them are queer one way or the other in terms of their gender identity or in their sexual orientation or whatever. But they tend to minimize the degree of oppression that still exists. And I can understand that. I mean, it's a survival technique and it's just, you know, a lot of other things besides our gender identity or our sexual orientation, you know, but I find that I need a little bit to tease that out of them because it's still there. We're not, you know, there's still, I mean the cases that are coming down of the Supreme Court, you know, seek to perpetuate second-class citizenship. The ways may be a little bit more subtle or you can always go and get another wedding cake, blah, blah, blah, blah, but it's still there. And so I think it's important to have a bit of that edge, you know, especially for lawyers, regardless of whether you go into the movement or you, whatever you do, you know, bring my bully pulpit is bring that with you, bring that concern, you know, because it's a clue in the struggle for human liberation, you know, so. Yeah, thank you very much. And like on the topic of students feeling safe in school that are gender diverse or queer in some way, bullying is a huge issue and often goes hand in hand with any sort of type of discrimination, particularly in Rhode Island, the Rhode Island Safe School Act provides a statewide bullying policy which defines bullying as the use by one or more students of a written verbal or electronic expression or a physical actor gesture or any combination thereof directed at a student. So this policy seems to protect students from other students, but not so much students from teachers or vice versa. And I know that the concept of mandatory reporting in a school is a large issue. So I know like if anyone wants to jump in or I speak to kind of that as far as what students are facing to feel safe in schools or what gender diverse teachers might be concerned about. So I can speak to the legal landscape in Rhode Island. So you're correct that the language in the Safe Schools Act is a little under drafted but I will say that if someone is experiencing harassment or discrimination from a teacher or another student in their school, K-12 or university, you can report that as a Title IX violation. So to the, I think it's the Office of Civil Rights at the Department of Ed and if you're at the university level, you can report that to your Title IX office. I think when we think about sexual harassment, we think about it in the really like traditional men and women in the workplace sense, but it's much broader than that. The challenge with that is that there may be some, I think there was a Supreme Court case recently that called into question being able to collect on emotional damages arising from a Title IX claim and having to prove actual like compensatory damages from something that's largely an emotional event is kind of challenging. I will say in state law, like you said, Sam, it's a little more of a patchwork. In addition to the state law, RIDE, the Department of Education, the Rhode Island Department of Education has a regulation that requires all the school districts to have a comprehensive anti-bullying policy and it sets out what needs to be in that policy but then it delegates developing the specific policies to the school districts. So if your school district is interested in having a really robust policy that's easy to report and offers a high degree of protection to gender diverse students, then you could have a really good experience. Conversely, school districts could sort of slow roll it or offer lesser protection or just make it way more difficult to protect your own rights and to report. So your experience may vary depending on where you go to school, but per those regulations, it doesn't matter whether it's a student and student, a student and teacher or even a student harassing a teacher that it should cover everybody. Yeah, absolutely. And thank you for clarifying those parts as well. I think I'm going to turn it over to Nicole here. Professor, whether it be you unmuted yourself, did you wanna respond? Oh, yeah, I just wanted to say one thing and it was, we're taking a step back to something John said. I think when it comes to legal change, it's often two or three steps behind social acceptance and social tolerance. And we keep seeing a delay or a lag in the law. And my hope is as I see students come through my classroom, even in the conservative state in which I teach, I'm seeing more progressive, more open-minded acceptance and tolerance. And so I'm hopeful I'm an eternal optimist and I'm hopeful that with this next generation and the good work that Professor Ward is doing and that Lauren's doing and all the advocates that are working so hard to raise awareness on these issues that we do have a sea change legally, but it's gonna be behind a lot of social and cultural work. And so I just wanted to say that to the question, the discussion we had a couple of minutes ago. And then with respect to bullying and anti-harassment or discrimination policies, it very much depends on the jurisdiction and the district. I represented schools in New York and the law is pretty strong there actually. And it is now I should say it's evolved. But oftentimes bullying and harassment or discrimination overlap, especially when it involves gender diverse students because of Title IX prohibition against sex discrimination and the way that that term has been interpreted by DOE. And so there is protection for students that fit into the binary or even the spectrum. But for students that are bullied for other reasons that may not be recognized in those categories, it can be tricky. And again, it comes back to local administrators and educators to be protective, to identify what's going on in the classroom and to give the students a voice in terms of raising complaints and dealing with it at the school district level before it raises to the level of a legal complaint and it winds up before Lauren. So I think it really depends heavily on the administrators and the work they're doing. And a lot of that is education. And I used to go into school districts and talk to administrators because these were novel issues at the time I was in practice. Now they're more commonplace. But I think that leadership from the top needs to be sensitive and aware of these issues. And the superintendent's often set the tone for everything that comes below. So that's the only thing I'd add to the conversation. Thanks, Professor Weatherby. I would just say you have to, the administrators need to have that as a value. So, and that's where I see some of this being very difficult. Attorney Hill, did you want to- Oh, I just wanted to say one other thing is, building on what Professor Weatherby said, that it has to do with a systemic policy in your school that it's not a one-off and there's the education component. One of the other things required by the regulations is to have annual trainings for staff. And there's some really good providers here in the state, Thundermist and GLAD, among others. And so they have some idea of whether the school districts are fulfilling that requirement to provide training for their teachers. But it can't just be, we have this wonderful written policy. Look how great it is. It has to be sort of a continuous, are we living up to what's in this policy and enforcing it? I just wanted to add that the other setting where abuse of transgender individuals is systemic is the prison system. GLAD, a few years ago, was enabled for the first time in Massachusetts to place a transgender woman in Framingham in the woman's prison after she spent a number of years under horrendous conditions in Concord. And the correctional authorities in Massachusetts, kind of in response to that, I would argue, slapped a charge of indecent assault on her. And working with another lawyer, we were able to get that charge dropped. But it just, the hostility in that setting in a liberal state like Massachusetts and in other states that are not quite so liberal is unbelievable from some of the other inmates, from lack of education, from the attitude of the correctional officers, from the attitude of the top officials. And in California, where they have a law requiring gender-appropriate placement, the war cry has been, the men are coming. There's this canard, this completely, basically baseless idea that men are masquerading as women to get into women's prison. And it's just, to say it is, it's just not sensical. But so it's an area that really, because prisoners, they take it on the chin in ways that, and kids, I mean, in a sense, they're not so different. They're at the low end of the power totem pole. And so I just wanted to say that that work too was important, you know? And I'm sorry, and the thing about kids, I mean, it's just what's happening to kids in school, despite wonderful efforts here in Rhode Island and in other places, it's, to me, it's heartbreaking. You sort of pre-saged our question to you about the gender-appropriate facilities. So I'm gonna skip to criminal justice and just keep it going. Professor Ward, historically, gender-averse people have been targeted by legislation and by police enforcing that legislation, the most famous example being the Stonewall Riots. But police being called on or confronting people that appear queer is still rampant. Based on your experiences, what do you think needs to happen to build or rebuild trust between the LGBT community and law enforcement? Where do you begin? I mean, I think it's very, it's locale-specific. Some places are better and some places are worse than others. And, I mean, it sort of leads into the larger question of how we envision and manage policing in this country and how we envision and imagine the role, if any, of incarceration. And honest to be honest, I don't know where to begin. I mean, you know, and I'm sure that both professor whether it be in an attorney hell have experienced the same thing. I mean, sometimes you're just kind of reduced to saving one soul at a time, perhaps even if it's only your own. And so in terms of systemic change, I'm not the guy to ask. I wish I were. I wish I had the magic bullet, but maybe you other folks have something to say on that. So one of the things that I'm incredibly proud of at our institution is that we have a required class in the second year called Race in the Foundations of American Law. And we teach our students about prison abolition. And to me, that is when we're asking these questions about trust and policing, when we're asking questions about gender diverse people and the obstacles they face in the prison industrial complex, I at least like sleep better at night knowing that we have a class where we don't shy away from teaching students about prison abolition. We have a class on where that is part of what they read about just like they read cases, they read about prison abolition and we bring in speakers and I'm really, really proud of that. But to your point, systemic change is slow going and hopeless at times. But again, I at least feel like while going forward, maybe things will be better. Sam, did you wanna take the next question? Yeah, of course. And thank you for those thoughts too. It's definitely a hard place to even know where to start. And kind of like talking about housing and just like not just prisons, but public accommodations in general, Professor Weatherby, I know that that's one of your many areas of expertise. So could you please explain what a public accommodation is and the facilities that that term includes? And then as a part three, if that's not too much, why are they a hot button in anti-discrimination and anti-gender discrimination? Sure, I'd be happy to. So public accommodations are essentially businesses and other institutions that provide general public, the general public with goods and services. So we think about libraries, schools, gas stations, hotels, retail stores, movie theaters, all the places that we patronize on a daily basis, hospitals, and currently federal and state laws are designed to protect certain protected individuals, groups of individuals from discrimination to protect minorities access to places of public accommodation. So if a business or other institution in a jurisdiction that requires access to public accommodations fails to provide access equally, that's a violation of the anti-discrimination laws. For example, if a gas station has public restrooms, then those public restrooms are protected by that jurisdiction's public accommodation laws. So federal laws like Title VII, Title IX, prevent discrimination involving public accommodations. Well, your other question, I'm sorry, I forgot. Yeah, no problem at all. So then I think that's a great explanation for what public accommodations law and customs. So then why is this such a hot button topic for gender-adverse people and those rights? Right, so the court recently held that workplace anti-discrimination laws cover gender identity and sexual orientation and so far as Title VII prohibits discrimination in the workplace based on the term sex. But the court expressly made clear that it was not covering all areas of public accommodation. So there's still some question about whether this includes public restrooms and locker rooms. And so it kind of remains clear at least with respect to federal law how places of public accommodations should comply in terms of access to those facilities. But the bulk of anti-discrimination protections does come in terms of public accommodation laws from state and local laws. And I think most cities in the country now have some protections against discrimination in places of public accommodation on the basis of sex. So if you're in a state with a robust public accommodation law, then you have more grounds to challenge lack of access based on sexual orientation or gender identity. If you're in a jurisdiction that doesn't have as great of a law, then you're more at risk. And I think those are some of the issues that come up in this context. And then based on whoever's in power in terms of in Washington, for example, President Trump participated in restrictions on bathroom and locker room usage by executive order overturning some of President Obama, his administration's executive orders. And it just depends at that level who's in the White House. So there's a lot there, but the court's jurisprudence at this point doesn't, it hasn't clarified that locker room and restroom usage in all places of public accommodation should be open and available to all. Thanks so much. You did a great job of contextualizing it and seeing up our next question for Attorney Hill. Professor Weatherby said, okay, but a lot of these protections are state protections. And so I guess our question is about Rhode Island. So there is a housing crisis in Rhode Island. It's a nationwide problem. It's also a local problem. In Rhode Island, are there any protections for tenants against discrimination for gender identity or expression? Are there any gaps in that protection? And what recourse is there if someone believes they're being discriminated against based on their gender expression or gender identity? So the short answer to that question is yes. It is illegal for a housing provider to discriminate against someone on the basis of their sex, sexual orientation, gender or gender expression in housing across a number of things, refusing to rent to them, charging them more, offering them different privileges or facilities, harassment, whether that be your neighbor harassing you if your landlord is aware of it and doesn't take any action to stop it, retaliation for making a complaint about unfair housing practice. And then of course the Federal Fair Housing Act has comparable protections. Yeah, there is an exception though. So there's something that we call the Mrs. Murphy exception. And Mrs. Murphy is this hypothetical little old lady who decides to rent out some of her house to tenants to make extra pocket money, this sort of fictional person. And so it's an exemption for housing accommodations that are owner occupied and fewer than four units. So if that happens to be your living situation, that person, your landlord, that property is not subject to the Fair Housing Practices Act. What I will say is there are a couple of exceptions to the exception. Discriminatory advertisement regardless of the type of accommodations is prohibited. You couldn't put an advertisement in the paper saying cisgender hetero people only. That would not be okay. And then there's also no exemption for race according to HUD. Obviously that doesn't help if you don't belong to a protected racial category and you are a gender diverse person. So the recourse though, if you believe this has happened to you and you're in a housing provider that's covered, you can make a complaint to the commission for human rights. You could make a complaint to HUD but they'd probably refer it to us. And that's a very simple thing to do. You can walk in and fill out a form. You can fill out a form on our website. You can send an email, you can call. Any way you wanna report that, you can make a report to us and we'll investigate that allegation. And there's a number of remedies that are available to you if you've been discriminated against on the basis of your sex or gender. Thanks. Yeah, attorney, what did you want? Or sorry, Paul. Yeah. I'm thinking about, there was a case recently in Colorado, a transgender person went to Jack Phillips, the guy who refused to bake a cake for the same sex wedding couple and asked him to bake her a birthday cake. And so far so good. And then she said, I want it to be pink and blue so far so good. And then she explained that that would symbolize for her transition, okay? And at that point, he said, no, I won't bake it, right? I'm simplifying the story, but that's the bottom line. So she went to court and she won both in the district court in Colorado, which has an anti-discrimination law that protects people on the basis of gender identity. And she won in the appeals court. It's now before the Colorado Supreme Court. My fear is that if it gets to the United States Supreme Court, she will not do well because the free exercise clause of the First Amendment is being used actively as a sword by a very, very, very well-funded group who call themselves Christian, although I would dispute the act of capability of that term, the lawyers defending freedom, the Beckett Foundation, all of these groups that are seeking to use religious beliefs as a basis for overturning the anti-discrimination laws. And that's their ultimate goal. So, I mean, this is a serious problem going forward, a serious problem going forward. I mean, it's not, we just in class discussed the 303 creative case where this woman wasn't even doing websites for marriage, for people getting married, but planned to do so in the future and feared that she would be violating the Colorado anti-discrimination law, which forbids discrimination against LGBT folks. And she won in the United States Supreme Court on the basis that she was being compelled to speak a message that violated her beliefs and sort of tagging along to that. The reason it was, it wasn't a free exercise claim, it was a free speech claim, but nevertheless, you get the idea, you know. And what the fallout of that is gonna be is yet to be determined, but it's the current composition of the Supreme Court has an agenda, I mean, I think there's no doubt about that. And when I talk about headwinds, that's a lot of what I'm thinking about. And so the times are perilous in that respect, because they may have lost their prestige, the Supreme Court, but they haven't lost their power. Sorry to get out my soapbox, but I'm pretty exercised about this. No, that's very well put, and especially as someone that's just younger earlier in their career, what the Supreme Court is currently doing and how they're behaving is definitely kind of throwing everything into a tailspin, as far as what we think that we can expect or what we think that we can ask for and ask for what we deserve as well. And those protections too, I kind of wanna shift to the category of employment. So just kind of a basic question, speaking to like balancing personal freedoms with somebody's just rights to not be discriminated against, is an employee getting fired for purposefully not honoring a co-worker's pronouns or a preferred name, a violation of free speech? Or on the other hand, could an employee claim discrimination by their employer if their co-workers are allowed to purposefully misgender them or call them by the wrong name? So I don't know if attorney Hill would, I see you unmute it. Sure, so I mean, as far as getting fired, that's really up to the employer. And a lot of times an employer will see that if an employee is harassing another employee, they're gonna try to manage their risk by firing that person. So, from an economic point of view, that may be how it plays out, but I don't, as far as is that discrimination, does that rise to the level of being like an unfair employment practice? I don't think it would happen from an isolated incident. You make one mistake where you dead named someone or you use the wrong pronoun, but if it's a purposeful ongoing that that could be harassment and that could be actionable under the Fair Employment Practices Act or Title VII, I think is right. And again, if the employer is aware that that's happening and has or provides cover or permission, then the employer could be liable for that employee's actions as well. So yeah, I think under the current state of the law, you could definitely be able to report that as harassment in the workplace. Can I add to that? So, I think it also depends on whether the employer is a private employer or a public employer. In the private context, employers can have policies, and this goes to your question about whether an employee can be terminated for failing to comply with a policy regarding pronoun usage or name usage. In the private context, I think it would be easier for the employer to terminate based on failure to comply with a workplace policy. In the public space, then we get into the, government actors cannot discriminate on the basis of religious belief and other things as Professor Ward spoke to earlier. And so we find ourselves in that tension between religious exercise and a policy that is to respect students, for example, in a public school, a public university setting, gender identity or expression. And so the courts are kind of all over the place in terms of how they handle this. Mary Weather versus Hartop is a case from the Sixth Circuit that dealt with a public professors, and this is an institution of higher education, right to refrain from complying with the university's policies regarding pronoun usage. And the issue became whether it was government speech under the government speech doctrine, and then whether there was a professor's academic freedom exception there and the court sided with the professor. And then in the K through 12 context, there's a case actually from 2023 in the Seventh Circuit that said that a school teacher's religious freedom exercise objection to complying with a school district policy regarding gender and pronoun usage was not a reasonable accommodation for his sincerely held religious beliefs. So it's kind of a patchwork of legal frameworks in terms of how the courts are dealing with this. And I think until we have some clear guidance from the Supreme Court, which I agree is not friendly to these issues, the courts of appeals are kind of all over the place. Can I ask you a follow-up question, Professor Weatherby? You teach in Arkansas and your scholarship focuses on emerging legal protections for transgender individuals. And I don't want to put you on the spot, but I also am really curious, how does that go together? Is there social pressure, are there other pressures to keep some of this work out of your classroom or however you wanna answer that you're comfortable? Sure, I can give you a pretty honest answer. When I moved here in 2013, the city of Fayetteville was undergoing a battle about local ordinance. This was before the Supreme Court took up the issue to extend anti-discrimination protections in the workplace, places of public accommodation and housing to folks in the LGBTQ community. And they asked me to draft an ordinance and I did. And I got death threats for working on that subject matter for being an advocate for the community, for speaking about it publicly. None of this came from my colleagues here at the law school that support me and encouraged me to engage in this work, but from individuals in the community. We have a very conservative, very deeply religious community. And some of the folks that Professor Ward spoke of earlier have a lot of money here in Arkansas. The Duggers are a big influence here. They have a, I don't know if you guys know who the Duggers are, but they were on the learning channel and had a reality TV show. And they've- Professor Wetterby, if you knew me even a little, you would not need to ask as I am addicted to reality TV. And the fact that you are bringing up the Duggers, both makes my heart sing and makes me feel bad for everyone listening, because all I want to do is ask you Dugger questions. Okay. Well, I'm so happy. There was a People magazine edition. This is back in 2013. I'll have to send it to you. And it was my face next to hers, Miss Dugger. And because she was sending out robo calls, there were robo calls with her voice on it, telling people not to support the ordinance and naming me, they called me the Jewish lawyer from New York. And so yeah, I got some hate mail. I got some death threats. We got the local police involved. And there were times where I felt unsafe. Having said that, a lot has changed in 10 years. A lot has changed, both for the better and for the worse. And I don't feel unsafe anymore. I mean, I did when I was really active and involved in the writing of the ordinance. We ultimately put the ordinance up for a vote, which I inherently disagree with, because you never want to put civil rights up for the majority of citizens to vote on other and on minority civil rights. But we felt like politically, that was the best way to get buy-in from the community. It actually passed. And we were very excited. And then it found, it was at the heart of a lawsuit after the legislature passed a law that prohibited municipalities from carving out broader and more expansive anti-discrimination protections for populations that weren't already covered by state anti-discrimination laws. So it was a long legal battle. But to your question, I feel supported by my colleagues. I feel supported by the university. I feel supported by my students. But it has been met with a lot of criticism. The bakers from Oregon who refused to bake a wedding cake for same-sex couple came to visit Fayetteville during this time. And it was an open rally. And I decided to go, I was gonna just sit in the back and listen. It's always good to listen to the opposition. I just wanted to hear what they had to say. And there were cameras there. And one of the individuals who was very active and involved with the duggers and their community that were opposing the ordinance came up to me and started screaming obscenities at me and telling me that I was advocating in my scholarship for cutting the genitals off of young children and just horrible things. And it made the nightly news. And the event happened to be in a church and they called the police and had me escorted out. So I had to call my Dean that night and say, Dean Leeds, I'm so sorry, but you may see me on the nightly news getting escorted out of a church. I'm so sorry. So I guess those are some of my personal experiences that shed light on the fact that these issues in this part of the country are highly controversial and people have very deep feelings about it. And we have a legislature that's very hostile. I think you can vote says legal hero and hero. Oh, not at all, not at all. But, and also it is the case I believe that the Arkansas legislature passed a law forbidding appropriate gender affirming care for teenagers and a federal judge appointed by Donald Trump, no less sensitive opinion striking down that law. So go figure. I know. So I was just gonna say on a personal note, I'm originally from Tulsa, Oklahoma, which is about 90 miles from Fayetteville and grew up in a similar religious environment as a child and would have been one of those people holding a sign in a church. When you're confronted with the evidence, when you're confronted with actual human beings, you can change your mind. I changed my mind. Other people can change their minds. So I think that's a point in engaging in the conversation. I think was it Professor Weatherby who said not to confront or try to change anyone's mind but to have the conversation with them? Yeah, I think it's just really important to have conversation and especially healthcare is one of maybe the hottest area in this topic which can really be saying something. So I know Professor Ward you had mentioned some cases about just healthcare decisions being scrutinized and even the broader theme of this panel, healthcare decisions can tend to fall under more resistance when they have to do with a person's gender. Like even if a woman wants to explore permanent birth control that hasn't had children yet, like that can be a very big obstacle to cross and particularly with transgender people that want to seek hormone replacement therapy and that's the decision between them and their doctor that the courts and legislature are intervening in. So I don't know if you wanted to continue that conversation a little bit more in depth at all. Well, just, I mean, it's a very fraught conversation but it's a long tradition. I mean, Pierce versus Society of Sisters is about a hundred years old now and the strong and Yoda versus Wisconsin, the right of parents to control or to supervise the care and upbringing of their children is no one, even the most right-wing person can deny that that's deeply rooted in tradition and part of substantive due process. So you would think it would be an easy case but I think one of the things that bothers me about the current trend in the Supreme Court is that just as a lawyer, I really detest bad craftsmanship and some of these cases that are coming down, they're just, they're making it up as they go along and if I had a student doing that, I'd give them, I'm a pretty easy grader but I'd give them a very bad mark. I just, I am proud of Judge Moody in the Eastern District of Arkansas who authored the opinion upholding the ban on Arkansas's ban on transgender affirming care and then the Eighth Circuit upheld that and that's huge for this part of the country and of course, the Sixth Circuit and the Eleventh Circuit went the opposite direction. So now we have a split in the circuits. And for the petition for cert, you know, in this or many in the Sixth Circuit case, so I don't know whether. I know and it's very scary. It's very, very scary post-dobs to think about what this court could do with that issue. Because they, I think Scrumetti cited dobs as, you know, it's just right. Yeah. The other case that they cite all the time is the case that I did before the United States Supreme Court Hurley versus the Hurley case, which the gift that keeps on giving. I mean, it's just, you know. On the other hand, you might get a surprise like Bostock. Yes. So, you know, because that was not the way that I expected that case to go. I mean, best summarized is saying, well, duh, of course it protects people who are gender diverse. Me too, I thought, oh, that's crazy. That's never gonna happen. Yeah. You never know, but I mean. There's my internal optimism. We might all be surprised. Let's hope. I'm fortunate there's a lot of. You needed yourself to say something positive. Like, wow, thank you. Okay, in Hyde Park, working class district of Boston, there is now being built a repurposed elementary or junior high school called Pride Housing for LGBT seniors, okay? With the full support of the government, you can't of course say it's only for LGBT folks, but it's a welcoming, wonderful grassroots development. I mean, the courts may be doing what they're doing, but people are changing. They're not changing as fast as we want. The voices of, let's go back to some mythical time in the 50s. By the way, I lived through the 50s and it was not a day at the beach, okay? Those voices are not the majority of Americans. And so, in any case, we've got to keep doing our thing, don't we? I mean, what else, you know, so. I think that that's a good place for me to sort of ask our last question and to hear your final thoughts, pushes for enhanced legal protection for gender diverse people are almost always met with claims that the vindication of gender diverse people's rights are against their freedom of speech, freedom of religion, public welfare as a whole. And the law has been balancing these sometimes competing or seemingly competing interests. And so I'm sort of interested in your take on each of you on how this is evolving and what we should be looking forward to, what is to come? We spend a lot of time sort of in the educational space, not just studying the past and thinking about now, but thinking about when you're out in practice, what are we gonna look for? So if maybe we could go Attorney Hill, Professor Ward and Professor Weatherby in order and just, you know, how are we, how is this balancing act happening and what do we have to look for on this? Can I ask to pass it off to someone else so I can take a minute to think about that question? Absolutely, Professor Ward, you're up. One of the reasons that I'm so passionate about issues of gender identity and gender fluidity is because I think, you know, almost any movement can be co-opted. You know, the partially successful, partially failed cultural revolution of the 60s was in many ways co-opted. But one of the things about gender is it's much, much, much, if that, I believe sincerely that this gender rigidity needs to be loosened, okay? For the benefit of everybody, for men, for women, for people that identify all along the spectrum and that that's the reason why it's so virulently resisted in certain quarters, but I think it's the truth. And I think if we kind of get over it, we'll all be a lot happier. That may be a very simplistic answer, but I think that the way that we've conceptualized, I hate to use the word, but it's true. Patriarchy is an enormous, it's so omnipresent that it's the sea that we swim in and we can't recognize it. But on the other hand, the amount of harm and that rigid belief holds is a real stumbling block on every level from the environment to social tolerance to you name it. So, and I mean, I take hope in the fact that I do think it's reality that I think that humans are a lot more diverse than we would like to imagine. And that as we slowly come to get our heads around that, all of us, that is the way forward. I mean, will there be storms between here and there? Of course, but so I guess I'm a short-term pessimist at a long-term office. Optimist, I guess that's how I would characterize myself. All right, and then, yes, I, okay, whoever unmute it first. Oh, it's either way. Do you want me to go? Go ahead. Professor Weatherby. Sure, I think I can't help but think just live and let live, you know? Nobody is hurting anybody else. There's no harm involved for individuals who are gender diverse or gender fluid to just be themselves. And I think that's where we find the animus embedded in these claims of offense or imposition on someone's religious exercise. And so I don't know. I guess I find that, you know, when it's shrouded in this guise of religious freedom or religious exercise, there's really more to it. It's crafted an animus. And then the only other thing I'll say, and this is not really adding all that much, but progress is so much, two steps forward, one step back or even one step forward, two giant steps back. And, you know, we see that even with abortion, with the Dobs case. I mean, that was a major, major step back for reproductive rights, for autonomy in personal decision making when it comes to healthcare decisions. And, you know, hopefully that will change. But sometimes when we see these decisions come out of the court and it feels so helpless, it's good to look at the arc of progress and know that, you know, things hopefully will change. Again, with social and cultural acceptance, more tolerance, more exposure. I mean, when I came to Arkansas in 2013, I had a student who saw me at a coffee shop and I was sitting with a friend who identifies as female and is transgender, had been through the transitioning process. And the student came over to me and said hi, and I introduced the student to my friend. And I could see the students like, you know, I could see the wheels turning in her head. And it was a pleasant interaction. And then that Monday she came to my office and she said, was that person transgender? I've never met one before. Those were her exact words. And I said, yes. But she's just a human, like all of us. And she kind of, she was like, oh, okay, you know. But she had never been exposed before. And I guess I'm hoping that with this generation, with more exposure, more tolerance, we will see that forward progress. And I guess that comes from my eternal optimism too. So that's all I'll say. And who knows what will happen in the future. But I think the more we talk about the issues, the more we respect each other in civil discourse, the more tolerance and acceptance and understanding will come. And hopefully then the law will follow. I don't have a lot of eternal optimism. But one of the things you said is like, who is harmed? And I think the harm is people with a tremendous amount of privilege, feeling uncomfortable. And I think the way forward is us all getting proximate with our own biases and being more comfortable, being uncomfortable. And I don't see how as we get moved forward any other way. So Attorney Hill, your predictions for the future? So I mean, I feel like it's set up as kind of a false dichotomy that you can either have people's rights vindicated or you can have free religion and free speech. You know, you can believe whatever you want. There are no laws saying that you can't believe in lizard people or that birds aren't real or whatever other wild conspiracy theory. I think what bothers me is the religious preference. It's not religious freedom. It's preference for a really particular lens of viewing Christianity or other conservative religious movements. And what I would like to see in addition to kind of the courts getting back to, you can believe whatever you want, but we can still enforce these neutral laws that are applicable across the board to everyone. And I would also like to see people who are religious people of other persuasions, the religious left as they say, or people who don't belong to older conservative movements coming out to say, well, I'm religious and this doesn't, I have the freedom to practice my religion too. And this doesn't infringe on my religious freedom. So I think those two things are what I hope to see in the future and in this area of gender equity. Very well put, thank you to each of you. I love the themes of tailwinds and headwinds and steps forward and steps back and just respecting each and every person. And I'm a transgender man, I'm a Christian man and I sleep just fine at night. So I think it's important to find the helpers and for people to speak up and look out for each other. So again, personally, thank you, Professor Weatherby, Professor Ward, Attorney Hill for your time today and for such a, oh, and kind of back to you. And for such a productive, I'm your appearance, sorry. Oh, excellent. Yeah, we could go for much longer and this has been a very productive conversation. So thank you each again for attending this panel today and I will pass it over to the editor-in-chief of the Law Review, Stephanie Fisher. Thank you so much. Thank you. Hello everyone, thank you so much to our esteemed participants and our dedicated attendees and to all of our future viewers. As we come to the conclusion of this virtual symposium event, I would like to extend my sincere gratitude to you all. Your presence here today has made the event a success and your active engagement in these enriching discussions has been so inspiring to all of us. In today's interconnected world, technology has enabled us to come together from diverse corners of the country to share insights, knowledge and expertise. This symposium has served as a platform today for a collaborative exchange of ideas despite these physical distances separating us. I want to emphasize that the ideas shared and the connections made during this symposium are not bound by the confines of this webinar. Furthermore, because of this format, you're able to view the entire webinar event on our YouTube channel. I would like to again thank the Roger Williams University School of Law and Staff, particularly Chelsea Horne, for helping us to organize this event. I'm also especially grateful to our justice for all editor, Hilary Levy-Freedman and our justice for all research and development editor, Andrea Stalen. For everything they did to fill this event with such passionate and informed speakers, thank you so much. Today, we had the pleasure of hearing from a panel focusing on Title IX and from Zakiya Thomas from the ERA Coalition and from a panel focusing on transgender rights, all of which are critical issues in ensuring justice for all. The Law Reviews Justice for All issue is very young, approaching only its third year, but we have the highest hopes for what it can achieve and we are even more hopeful for what you, the attendees can achieve. I'd like to conclude with a few quotes to iterate that point far more eloquently than I ever could. Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced, James Baldwin. The justice for all issue is committed to facing critical issues that need to be changed. And finally, remember, change will not come if we want for some other person or some other time. We are the ones that we have been waiting for. We are the change that we seek, Barack Obama. If you attended today or you're watching this reporting, you are the change we seek and you are the people we have been waiting for. I hope you found today informative, instructional and inspiring and we thank you for supporting our mission.