Posted on Thursday, June 26, 2025
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by AMAC, Robert B. Charles
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0 Comments
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The U.S. Supreme Court just handed a major victory to conservatives – and to all Americans, especially to parents and children, in Skrmetti v. AG of Tennessee. AMAC aided in that victory with a compelling amicus brief, supporting parents, children, and the US Constitution.
In essence, the U.S. Supreme Court held that a Tennessee law that insists on protecting children against gender mutilation is fully supported by the Equal Protection Clause, 14th Amendment.
The High Court sided with those supporting the law, holding: “Every minor in the country deserves to have their fundamental right of bodily integrity protected by the State in which he or she resides.”
The Court concluded: “States that fail to do so along the arbitrary line of whether a child experiences or does not experience gender dysphoria violate that right and undermine the principle at the heart of the Equal Protection Clause.”
The reasoning was set forth earlier in the Court’s opinion, supported by AMAC and others in a compelling amicus: Children’s rights – and parents’ rights in children, plus the right of a state to protect their children – is inviolate.
Specifically, the Court tracked the arguments of the Respondent and AMAC amicus. “Children have the right not to have their bodies chemically or surgically altered in a way that interferes with natural development or destroys natural function, when not medically necessary.”
“Further, children not only have present rights to bodily integrity. They have the right not to have their development interfered with in a way that would prevent them from exercising their rights fully as adults. Tennessee sought to protect that right when it adopted…the law at issue in this case.”
The argument offered to the Court and recited by it was this: “The Court should rule for Respondents for several reasons. First, with the increasing concentration of power in the Federal Government and the concomitant conquest in the last several decades of areas of law traditionally regulated by the States, America has moved further and further from the federalist system established by the Constitution and the states that ratified it.”
“The desire to impose a one-size-fits-all policy for the entire nation may be politically popular on any number of issues, but it flies in the face of the Constitution. Caution and restraint are called for.” Notably, if this idea applies in one area, it applies in a thousand others.
“Second, the Constitution was ratified by the People through their states with an understanding that the vast majority of government work that impacts the daily life of the people would be carried out by state governments.”
While the 10th Amendment is not mentioned, the point is the same. The 10th Amendment, while balanced against the Supremacy Clause – which allows some federal laws, like Title 9, to dominate state law – is about reserving to states powers not explicitly given to the federal government.
The argument continued: “With the ratification of the Reconstruction Amendments, the Federal Government was empowered to take a more active role in protecting the fundamental rights of the people against State abuses.”
“However, the general relationship between the States and the Federal Government was not altered. The Federal Government remained a government of limited and enumerated powers, and States retained their general power to protect the basic rights of their citizens.”
“Finally, the Federal Government’s argument in this case that Tennessee is violating the Equal Protection rights of minors in the State experiencing gender dysphoria, if adopted, would turn the Equal Protection Clause on its head. For all these reasons, the Court should rule for Respondents.”
The Court was fully convinced, and not surprisingly. The interests of children in not being abused by the state, not being treated like experiments in a dystopian novel or nightmare, are very real, protected by the U.S. Constitution, as are the rights of their parents. AMAC’s amicus participation likely helped persuade the court and win the day.
Ironically, the battle in Tennessee was against a state that sought, for moral, legal, and social reasons to protect all children, legally disallowing genital mutilation within the state, while places like Maine not only allow it but encourage it, and then ignore established federal law to take established civil rights away from girls. Some states see the light, others push darkness.
Robert Charles is a former Assistant Secretary of State under Colin Powell, former Reagan and Bush 41 White House staffer, attorney, and naval intelligence officer (USNR). He wrote “Narcotics and Terrorism” (2003), “Eagles and Evergreens” (2018), and is National Spokesman for AMAC. Robert Charles has also just released an uplifting new book, “Cherish America: Stories of Courage, Character, and Kindness” (Tower Publishing, 2024).
Read full article here