Running head: ACTIVITY RATIOS 1 ACTIVITY RATIOS 2 Activity Ratios Name Institution Activity Ratios for Columbus Regional Hospital Columbus Regional Hospital is one of the established healthcare facilities in Indiana State. Since its establishment, the hospital has been committed to the delivery of high quality, efficient and satisfactory healthcare services to all its clients. However, to provide world-class services, the facility has had to heavily invest in and properly manage its human and non-human resources. This justifies why he hospital has managed to survive for quite a long time. When it comes to financial management, the hospital’s management has demonstrated a commitment in usage. The records from the hospital’s activity ratios prove that the Columbus Regional Hospital is progressive. One of the most important indicators in the determination of the hospital’s progress is the asset turnover ratio. This is an activity ratio derived by comparing the company’s net sales to its total assets. From its financial statements, Columbus Regional Hospital has had an impressive result. The total assets for the 2011 and 2012 fiscal years stood at $ 345,782,576 and $331,609,111 respectively against a total revenue of $195.4 million in 2011 and $232.9 million from $195.4 in 2012. This is a clear proof that the hospital is performing well. The management has been efficiently utilizing the allocated resources to help in improving the hospital’s revenue. The other important activity ratio used in measuring the performance of Columbus Regional Hospital is fixed asset turnover ratio. As its name suggests, fixed asset ratio simply compares net sales to the fixed assets. During the 2011 and 2012 financial periods, Columbus Regional Hospital had a fixed assets were valued at $130,958,392 in 2011 and $ 130,538,382 in 2012. On the other hand, the hospital garnered total revenue of $195,403,003 in 2011 and $ 233,046,391 in 2012. This is clear evidence that the hospital is efficient in the use of its resources. It is for this reason that the facility increased the number of its patients from 241,774 in 2011 to 246,130 in 2012. This was a 19.2% increment in the number of admissions. It represented an increase in revenues from the Medicare, Medicaid, managed care plans and other programs. Last, but not least, the performance of Columbus Regional Hospital can be done using the age of plant ration. Age of plant ratio is a type of ratio that is used in the measurement of the age of a healthcare facility’s equipments by assessing the rate of depreciation of the said equipments. A thorough analysis of Columbus Regional Hospital shows that the facility is ahead of its plant age benchmark. An evaluation of the physical and technological threatening depreciation rate in the company because the life expectancy shows that there is no depreciation of the equipments. Meaning, the hospital has heavily invested in the equipments. However, to be on the ...

1. Running head: ACTIVITY RATIOS 1
ACTIVITY RATIOS 2
Activity Ratios
Name
Institution
Activity Ratios for Columbus Regional Hospital
Columbus Regional Hospital is one of the established
healthcare facilities in Indiana State. Since its establishment,
the hospital has been committed to the delivery of high quality,
efficient and satisfactory healthcare services to all its clients.
However, to provide world-class services, the facility has had to
heavily invest in and properly manage its human and non-human
resources. This justifies why he hospital has managed to survive
for quite a long time. When it comes to financial management,
the hospital’s management has demonstrated a commitment in
usage. The records from the hospital’s activity ratios prove that
the Columbus Regional Hospital is progressive.
One of the most important indicators in the determination of the
hospital’s progress is the asset turnover ratio. This is an activity

2. ratio derived by comparing the company’s net sales to its total
assets. From its financial statements, Columbus Regional
Hospital has had an impressive result. The total assets for the
2011 and 2012 fiscal years stood at $ 345,782,576 and
$331,609,111 respectively against a total revenue of $195.4
million in 2011 and $232.9 million from $195.4 in 2012. This is
a clear proof that the hospital is performing well. The
management has been efficiently utilizing the allocated
resources to help in improving the hospital’s revenue.
The other important activity ratio used in measuring the
performance of Columbus Regional Hospital is fixed asset
turnover ratio. As its name suggests, fixed asset ratio simply
compares net sales to the fixed assets. During the 2011 and
2012 financial periods, Columbus Regional Hospital had a fixed
assets were valued at $130,958,392 in 2011 and $ 130,538,382
in 2012. On the other hand, the hospital garnered total revenue
of $195,403,003 in 2011 and
$ 233,046,391 in 2012. This is clear evidence that the hospital
is efficient in the use of its resources. It is for this reason that
the facility increased the number of its patients from 241,774 in
2011 to 246,130 in 2012. This was a 19.2% increment in the
number of admissions. It represented an increase in revenues
from the Medicare, Medicaid, managed care plans and other
programs.
Last, but not least, the performance of Columbus Regional
Hospital can be done using the age of plant ration. Age of plant
ratio is a type of ratio that is used in the measurement of the age
of a healthcare facility’s equipments by assessing the rate of
depreciation of the said equipments. A thorough analysis of
Columbus Regional Hospital shows that the facility is ahead of
its plant age benchmark. An evaluation of the physical and
technological threatening depreciation rate in the company
because the life expectancy shows that there is no depreciation
of the equipments. Meaning, the hospital has heavily invested in
the equipments. However, to be on the safer side, the
management of the hospital should still consider making

3. additional investments in modern and developed facilities.
Brown v Board of Education (and progeny)
Brown v Board of Education
These (four) cases come to us from the States of Kansas, South
Carolina, Virginia, and Delaware. They are premised on
different facts and different local conditions, but a common
legal question justifies their consideration together in this
consolidated opinion.
In each of the cases, minors of the Negro race, through their
legal representatives, seek the aid of the courts in obtaining
admission to the public schools of their community on a
nonsegregated basis. In each instance, they had been denied
admission to schools attended by white children under laws
requiring or permitting segregation according to race. This
segregation was alleged to deprive the plaintiffs of the equal
protection of the laws under the Fourteenth Amendment. In each
of the cases other than the Delaware case, a three-judge federal
district court denied relief to the plaintiffs on the so-called
"separate but equal" doctrine announced by this Court in Plessy
v. Fergson (1896). Under that doctrine, equality of treatment is
accorded when the races are provided substantially equal
facilities, even though these facilities be separate. In the
Delaware case, the Supreme Court of Delaware adhered to that
doctrine, but ordered that the plaintiffs be admitted to the white
schools because of their superiority to the Negro schools.
The plaintiffs contend that segregated public schools are not
"equal" and cannot be made "equal," and that hence they are
deprived of the equal protection of the laws. Because of the
obvious importance of the question presented, the Court took
jurisdiction. Argument was heard in the 1952 Term, and re-
argument was heard this Term on certain questions propounded
by the Court. . .

4. Today, education is perhaps the most important function of state
and local governments. Compulsory school attendance laws and
the great expenditures for education both demonstrate our
recognition of the importance of education to our democratic
society. It is required in the performance of our most basic
public responsibilities, even service in the armed forces. It is
the very foundation of good citizenship. Today it is a principal
instrument in awakening the child to cultural values, in
preparing him for later professional training, and in helping him
to adjust normally to his environment. In these days, it is
doubtful that any child may reasonably be expected to succeed
in life if he is denied the opportunity of an education. Such an
opportunity, where the state has undertaken to provide it, is a
right which must be made available to all on equal terms.
We come then to the question presented: Does segregation of
children in public schools solely on the basis of race, even
though the physical facilities and other "tangible" factors may
be equal, deprive the children of the minority group of equal
educational opportunities? We believe that it does.
In Sweatt v. Painter (1950), in finding that a segregated law
school for Negroes could not provide them equal educational
opportunities, this Court relied in large part on "those qualities
which are incapable of objective measurement but which make
for greatness in a law school." In McLaurin v. Oklahoma State
Regents, (1950) the Court, in requiring that a Negro admitted to
a white graduate school be treated like all other students, again
resorted to intangible considerations: ". . . his ability to study,
to engage in discussions and exchange views with other
students, and, in general, to learn his profession." Such
considerations apply with added force to children in grade and
high schools. To separate them from others of similar age and
qualifications solely because of their race generates a feeling of

5. inferiority as to their status in the community that may affect
their hearts and minds in a way unlikely ever to be undone. The
effect of this separation on their educational opportunities was
well stated by a finding in the Kansas case by a court which
nevertheless felt compelled to rule against the Negro
plaintiffs:Segregation of white and colored children in public
schools has a detrimental effect upon the colored children. The
impact is greater when it has the sanction of the law, for the
policy of separating the races is usually interpreted as denoting
the inferiority of the negro group. A sense of inferiority affects
the motivation of a child to learn. Segregation with the sanction
of law, therefore, has a tendency to [retard] the educational and
mental development of negro children and to deprive them of
some of the benefits they would receive in a racial[ly]
integrated school system. Whatever may have been the extent
of psychological knowledge at the time of Plessy v. Ferguson,
this finding is amply supported by modern authority. Any
language in Plessy v. Ferguson contrary to this finding is
rejected.
We conclude that, in the field of public education, the doctrine
of "separate but equal" has no place. Separate educational
facilities are inherently unequal. Therefore, we hold that the
plaintiffs and others similarly situated for whom the actions
have been brought are, by reason of the segregation complained
of, deprived of the equal protection of the laws guaranteed by
the Fourteenth Amendment. . .
Because these are class actions, because of the wide
applicability of this decision, and because of the great variety
of local conditions, the formulation of decrees in these cases
presents problems of considerable complexity. On re-argument,
the consideration of appropriate relief was necessarily
subordinated to the primary question -- the constitutionality of
segregation in public education. We have now announced that
such segregation is a denial of the equal protection of the laws.

6. In order that we may have the full assistance of the parties in
formulating decrees, the cases will be restored to the docket,
and the parties are requested to present further argument on . . .
[the question of how these decisions are implemented]. The
Attorney General of the United States is again invited to
participate. The Attorneys General of the states requiring or
permitting segregation in public education will also be
permitted to appear as amici curiae upon request to do so . . .
It is so ordered.
Griffin v Prince Edward County (1964)
Despite Davis v County School Board of Prince Edward County
being one of the companion cases in Brown v. Board of
Education, Prince Edward County schools took even longer to
desegregate. The county's board refused to appropriate any
money to operate the schools, which closed rather than comply
with the federal desegregation order effective September 1,
1959. It was the only school district in the country to resort to
such extreme measures. White students took advantage of state
tuition vouchers to attend segregation academies (as discussed
below), but black students had no educational alternatives
within the county.
Finally, in 1963, Prince Edwards' schools were ordered to open,
and when the Supreme Court agreed to hear the county's appeal,
supervisors gave in rather than risk prison. Then in 1964, the
U.S. Supreme Court decided Davis v County School Board of
Prince Edward County and segregationists could appeal no
longer. However, when Prince Edward County's schools opened
on September 8, 1964, all but 8 of the 1500 students were black,
and observers noted the difference between the black children
sent elsewhere for education by the American Friends Service
Committee, and those who remained unschooled through the

7. hiatus and became the "crippled generation."
During the Prince Edward's public schools closure, white
students could attend Prince Edward Academy, which operated
as the de facto school system, enrolling K-12 students at a
number of facilities throughout the county. Even after the re-
opening of the public schools, the Academy remained
segregated, although it briefly lost its tax-exempt status in 1978
for its discriminatory practices. White students gradually drifted
back to the public schools as tuition crept higher. In 1986, it
accepted black students. Today it is known as Fuqua School.
Cooper v. Aaron
Opinion announced September 29, 1958
Opinion of the Court by THE CHIEF JUSTICE, MR. JUSTICE
BLACK, MR. JUSTICE FRANKFURTER, MR. JUSTICE
DOUGLAS, MR. JUSTICE BURTON, MR. JUSTICE CLARK,
MR. JUSTICE HARLAN, MR. JUSTICE BRENNAN, and MR.
JUSTICE WHITTAKER.
As this case reaches us, it raises questions of the highest
importance to the maintenance of our federal system of
government. It necessarily involves a claim by the Governor and
Legislature of a State that there is no duty on state officials to
obey federal court orders resting on this Court's considered
interpretation of the United States Constitution. Specifically, it
involves actions by the Governor and Legislature of Arkansas
upon the premise that they are not bound by our holding in
Brown v. Board of Education (1954), That holding was that the
Fourteenth Amendment forbids States to use their governmental
powers to bar children on racial grounds from attending schools
where there is state participation through any arrangement,

8. management, funds or property. We are urged to uphold a
suspension of the Little Rock School Board's plan to do away
with segregated public schools in Little Rock until state laws
and efforts to upset and nullify our holding in Brown v. Board
of Education have been further challenged and tested in the
courts. We reject these contentions.
The case was argued before us on September 11, 1958. On the
following day, we unanimously affirmed the judgment of the
Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, which had reversed a
judgment of the District Court for the Eastern District of
Arkansas. The District Court had granted the application of the
petitioners, the Little Rock School Board and School
Superintendent, to suspend for two and one-half years the
operation of the School Board's court-approved desegregation
program. In order that the School Board might know, without
doubt, its duty in this regard before the opening of school,
which had been set for the following Monday, September 15,
1958, we immediately issued the judgment, reserving the
expression of our supporting views to a later date. This opinion
of all of the members of the Court embodies those views.
The following are the facts and circumstances so far as
necessary to show how the legal questions are presented.
On May 17, 1954, this Court decided that enforced racial
segregation in the public schools of a State is a denial of the
equal protection of the laws enjoined by the Fourteenth
Amendment. Brown v. Board of Education. The Court
postponed, pending further argument, formulation of a decree to
effectuate this decision. That decree was rendered May 31,
1955. Brown v. Board of Education. In the formulation of that
decree, the Court recognized that good faith compliance with
the principles declared in Brown might, in some situations,
"call for elimination of a variety of obstacles in making the

9. transition to school systems operated in accordance with the
constitutional principles set forth in our May 17, 1954,
decision."
The Court went on to state:
"Courts of equity may properly take into account the public
interest in the elimination of such obstacles in a systematic and
effective manner. But it should go without saying that the
vitality of these constitutional principles cannot be allowed to
yield simply because of disagreement with them."
"While giving weight to these public and private considerations,
the courts will require that the defendants make a prompt and
reasonable start toward full compliance with our May 17, 1954,
ruling. Once such a start has been made, the courts may find
that additional time is necessary to carry out the ruling in an
effective manner. The burden rests upon the defendants to
establish that such time is necessary in the public interest and is
consistent with good faith compliance at the earliest practicable
date. To that end, the courts may consider problems related to
administration, arising from the physical condition of the school
plant, the school transportation system, personnel, revision of
school districts and attendance areas into compact units to
achieve a system of determining admission to the public schools
on a nonracial basis, and revision of local laws and regulations
which may be necessary in solving the foregoing problems."
Under such circumstances, the District Courts were directed to
require "a prompt and reasonable start toward full compliance,"
and to take such action as was necessary to bring about the end
of racial segregation in the public schools "with all deliberate
speed." Of course, in many locations, obedience to the duty of
desegregation would require the immediate general admission of
Negro children, otherwise qualified as students for their
appropriate classes at particular schools. On the other hand, a

10. District Court, after analysis of the relevant factors (which, of
course, excludes hostility to racial desegregation), might
conclude that justification existed for not requiring the present
nonsegregated admission of all qualified Negro children. In
such circumstances, however, the Court should scrutinize the
program of the school authorities to make sure that they had
developed arrangements pointed toward the earliest practicable
completion of desegregation, and had taken appropriate steps to
put their program into effective operation. It was made plain
that delay in any guise in order to deny the constitutional rights
of Negro children could not be countenanced, and that only a
prompt start, diligently and earnestly pursued, to eliminate
racial segregation from the public schools could constitute good
faith compliance. State authorities were thus duty bound to
devote every effort toward initiating desegregation and bringing
about the elimination of racial discrimination in the public
school system.
On May 20, 1954, three days after the first Brown opinion, the
Little Rock District School Board adopted, and on May 23,
1954, made public, a statement of policy entitled "Supreme
Court Decision -- Segregation in Public Schools." In this
statement, the Board recognized that
"It is our responsibility to comply with Federal Constitutional
Requirements, and we intend to do so when the Supreme Court
of the United States outlines the method to be followed. "
Thereafter, the Board undertook studies of the administrative
problems confronting the transition to a desegregated public
school system at Little Rock. It instructed the Superintendent of
Schools to prepare a plan for desegregation, and approved such
a plan on May 24, 1955, seven days before the second Brown
opinion. The plan provided for desegregation at the senior high
school level (grades 10 through 12) as the first stage.
Desegregation at the junior high and elementary levels was to
follow. It was contemplated that desegregation at the high

11. school level would commence in the fall of 1957, and the
expectation was that complete desegregation of the school
system would be accomplished by 1963. Following the adoption
of this plan, the Superintendent of Schools discussed it with a
large number of citizen groups in the city. As a result of these
discussions, the Board reached the conclusion that "a large
majority of the residents" of Little Rock were of "the belief . . .
that the Plan, although objectionable in principle" from the
point of view of those supporting segregated schools, "was still
the best for the interests of all pupils in the District."
Upon challenge by a group of Negro plaintiffs desiring more
rapid completion of the desegregation process, the District
Court upheld the School Board's plan, Aaron v. Cooper. The
Court of Appeals affirmed. Review of that judgment was not
sought here.
While the School Board was thus going forward with its
preparation for desegregating the Little Rock school system,
other state authorities, in contrast, were actively pursuing a
program designed to perpetuate in Arkansas the system of racial
segregation which this Court had held violated the Fourteenth
Amendment. First came, in November, 1956, an amendment to
the State Constitution flatly commanding the Arkansas General
Assembly to oppose
"in every Constitutional manner the Unconstitutional
desegregation decisions of May 17, 1954, and May 31, 1955, of
the United States Supreme Court,"
and, through the initiative, a pupil assignment law. Pursuant to
this state constitutional command, a law relieving school
children from compulsory attendance at racially mixed schools,
and a law establishing a State Sovereignty Commission, were
enacted by the General Assembly in February, 1957.

12. The School Board and the Superintendent of Schools
nevertheless continued with preparations to carry out the first
stage of the desegregation program. Nine Negro children were
scheduled for admission in September, 1957, to Central High
School, which has more than two thousand students. Various
administrative measures, designed to assure the smooth
transition of this first stage of desegregation, were undertaken.
On September 2, 1957, the day before these Negro students
were to enter Central High, the school authorities were met with
drastic opposing action on the part of the Governor of Arkansas,
who dispatched units of the Arkansas National Guard to the
Central High School grounds and placed the school "off limits"
to colored students. As found by the District Court in
subsequent proceedings, the Governor's action had not been
requested by the school authorities, and was entirely
unheralded. The findings were these:
"Up to this time [September 2], no crowds had gathered about
Central High School and no acts of violence or threats of
violence in connection with the carrying out of the plan had
occurred. Nevertheless, out of an abundance of caution, the
school authorities had frequently conferred with the Mayor and
Chief of Police of Little Rock about taking appropriate steps by
the Little Rock police to prevent any possible disturbances or
acts of violence in connection with the attendance of the 9
colored students at Central High School. The Mayor considered
that the Little Rock police force could adequately cope with any
incidents which might arise at the opening of school. The
Mayor, the Chief of Police, and the school authorities made no
request to the Governor or any representative of his for State
assistance in maintaining peace and order at Central High
School. Neither the Governor nor any other official of the State
government consulted with the Little Rock authorities about
whether the Little Rock police were prepared to cope with any
incidents which might arise at the school, about any need for

13. State assistance in maintaining peace and order, or about
stationing the Arkansas National Guard at Central High
School." Aaron v. Cooper
The Board's petition for postponement in this proceeding states:
"The effect of that action [of the Governor] was to harden the
core of opposition to the Plan and cause many persons who
theretofore had reluctantly accepted the Plan to believe there
was some power in the State of Arkansas which, when exerted,
could nullify the Federal law and permit disobedience of the
decree of this [District] Court, and, from that date, hostility to
the Plan was increased, and criticism of the officials of the
[School] District has become more bitter and unrestrained."
The Governor's action caused the School Board to request the
Negro students on September 2 not to attend the high school
"until the legal dilemma was solved." The next day, September
3, 1957, the Board petitioned the District Court for instructions,
and the court, after a hearing, found that the Board's request of
the Negro students to stay away from the high school had been
made because of the stationing of the military guards by the
state authorities. The court determined that this was not a
reason for departing from the approved plan, and ordered the
School Board and Superintendent to proceed with it.
On the morning of the next day, September 4, 1957, the Negro
children attempted to enter the high school, but, as the District
Court later found, units of the Arkansas National Guard,
"acting pursuant to the Governor's order, stood shoulder to
shoulder at the school grounds and thereby forcibly prevented
the 9 Negro students . . . from entering,"
as they continued to do every school day during the following
three weeks.

14. That same day, September 4, 1957, the United States Attorney
for the Eastern District of Arkansas was requested by the
District Court to begin an immediate investigation in order to
fix responsibility for the interference with the orderly
implementation of the District Court's direction to carry out the
desegregation program. Three days later, September 7, the
District Court denied a petition of the School Board and the
Superintendent of Schools for an order temporarily suspending
continuance of the program.
Upon completion of the United States Attorney's investigation,
he and the Attorney General of the United States at the District
Court's request, entered the proceedings and filed a petition on
behalf of the United States, as amicus curiae, to enjoin the
Governor of Arkansas and officers of the Arkansas National
Guard from further attempts to prevent obedience to the court's
order. After hearings on the petition, the District Court found
that the School Board's plan had been obstructed by the
Governor through the use of National Guard troops, and granted
a preliminary injunction on September 20, 1957, enjoining the
Governor and the officers of the Guard from preventing the
attendance of Negro children at Central High School, and from
otherwise obstructing or interfering with the orders of the court
in connection with the plan. Faubus v. United States. The
National Guard was then withdrawn from the school.
The next school day was Monday, September 23, 1957. The
Negro children entered the high school that morning under the
protection of the Little Rock Police Department and members of
the Arkansas State Police. But the officers caused the children
to be removed from the school during the morning because they
had difficulty controlling a large and demonstrating crowd
which had gathered at the high school. On September 25,
however, the President of the United States dispatched federal
troops to Central High School, and admission of the Negro

15. students to the school was thereby effected. Regular army
troops continued at the high school until November 27, 1957.
They were then replaced by federalized National Guardsmen
who remained throughout the balance of the school year. Eight
of the Negro students remained in attendance at the school
throughout the school year.
We come now to the aspect of the proceedings presently before
us. On February 20, 1958, the School Board and the
Superintendent of Schools filed a petition in the District Court
seeking a postponement of their program for desegregation.
Their position, in essence, was that, because of extreme public
hostility, which they stated had been engendered largely by the
official attitudes and actions of the Governor and the
Legislature, the maintenance of a sound educational program at
Central High School, with the Negro students in attendance,
would be impossible. The Board therefore proposed that the
Negro students already admitted to the school be withdrawn and
sent to segregated schools, and that all further steps to carry out
the Board's desegregation program be postponed for a period
later suggested by the Board to be two and one-half years.
After a hearing, the District Court granted the relief requested
by the Board. Among other things, the court found that the past
year at Central High School had been attended by conditions of
"chaos, bedlam and turmoil"; that there were "repeated incidents
of more or less serious violence directed against the Negro
students and their property"; that there was "tension and unrest
among the school administrators, the classroom teachers, the
pupils, and the latters' parents, which inevitably had an adverse
effect upon the educational program"; that a school official was
threatened with violence; that a "serious financial burden" had
been cast on the School District; that the education of the
students had suffered "and under existing conditions will
continue to suffer"; that the Board would continue to need
"military assistance or its equivalent"; that the local police

16. department would not be able "to detail enough men to afford
the necessary protection"; and that the situation was
"intolerable."
The District Court's judgment was dated June 20, 1958. The
Negro respondents appealed to the Court of Appeals for the
Eighth Circuit and also sought there a stay of the District
Court's judgment. At the same time, they filed a petition for
certiorari in this Court asking us to review the District Court's
judgment without awaiting the disposition of their appeal to the
Court of Appeals, or of their petition to that court for a stay.
That we declined to do. The Court of Appeals did not act on the
petition for a stay, but, on August 18, 1958, after convening in
special session on August 4 and hearing the appeal, reversed the
District Court, 257 F.2d 33. On August 21, 1958, the Court of
Appeals stayed its mandate to permit the School Board to
petition this Court for certiorari. Pending the filing of the
School Board's petition for certiorari, the Negro respondents, on
August 23, 1958, applied to MR. JUSTICE WHITTAKER, as
"Circuit Justice" for the Eighth Circuit, to stay the order of the
Court of Appeals withholding its own mandate, and also to stay
the District Court's judgment. In view of the nature of the
motions, he referred them to the entire Court. Recognizing the
vital importance of a decision of the issues in time to permit
arrangements to be made for the 1958-1959 school year, we
convened in Special Term on August 28, 1958, and heard oral
argument on the respondents' motions, and also argument of the
Solicitor General who, by invitation, appeared for the United
States as amicus curiae, and asserted that the Court of Appeals'
judgment was clearly correct on the merits, and urged that we
vacate its stay forthwith.
Finding that respondents' application necessarily involved
consideration of the merits of the litigation, we entered an order
which deferred decision upon the motions pending the
disposition of the School Board's petition for certiorari, and

17. fixed September 8, 1958, as the day on or before which such
petition might be filed, and September 11, 1958, for oral
argument upon the petition. The petition for certiorari, duly
filed, was granted in open Court on September 11, 1958, and
further arguments were had, the Solicitor General again urging
the correctness of the judgment of the Court of Appeals. On
September 12, 1958, as already mentioned, we unanimously
affirmed the judgment of the Court of Appeals in the per curiam
opinion set forth herein:
"The Court, having fully deliberated upon the oral arguments
had on August 28, 1958, as supplemented by the arguments
presented on September 11, 1958, and all the briefs on file, is
unanimously of the opinion that the judgment of the Court of
Appeals for the Eighth Circuit of August 18, 1958, must be
affirmed. In view of the imminent commencement of the new
school year at the Central High School of Little Rock,
Arkansas, we deem it important to make prompt announcement
of our judgment affirming the Court of Appeals. The expression
of the views supporting our judgment will be prepared and
announced in due course."
"It is accordingly ordered that the judgment of the Court of
Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, dated August 18, 1958,
reversing the judgment of the District Court for the Eastern
District of Arkansas, dated June 20, 1958, be affirmed, and that
the judgments of the District Court for the Eastern District of
Arkansas, dated August 28, 1956, and September 3, 1957,
enforcing the School Board's plan for desegregation in
compliance with the decision of this Court in Brown v. Board of
Education, be reinstated. It follows that the order of the Court
of Appeals dated August 21, 1958, staying its own mandate is of
no further effect."
"The judgment of this Court shall be effective immediately, and
shall be communicated forthwith to the District Court for the

18. Eastern District of Arkansas."
In affirming the judgment of the Court of Appeals which
reversed the District Court, we have accepted without
reservation the position of the School Board, the Superintendent
of Schools, and their counsel that they displayed entire good
faith in the conduct of these proceedings and in dealing with the
unfortunate and distressing sequence of events which has been
outlined. We likewise have accepted the findings of the District
Court as to the conditions at Central High School during the
1957-1958 school year, and also the findings that the
educational progress of all the students, white and colored, of
that school has suffered, and will continue to suffer if the
conditions which prevailed last year are permitted to continue.
The significance of these findings, however, is to be considered
in light of the fact, indisputably revealed by the record before
us, that the conditions they depict are directly traceable to the
actions of legislators and executive officials of the State of
Arkansas, taken in their official capacities, which reflect their
own determination to resist this Court's decision in the Brown
case and which have brought about violent resistance to that
decision in Arkansas. In its petition for certiorari filed in this
Court, the School Board itself describes the situation in this
language:
"The legislative, executive, and judicial departments of the state
government opposed the desegregation of Little Rock schools
by enacting laws, calling out troops, making statements
vilifying federal law and federal courts, and failing to utilize
state law enforcement agencies and judicial processes to
maintain public peace."
One may well sympathize with the position of the Board in the
face of the frustrating conditions which have confronted it, but,
regardless of the Board's good faith, the actions of the other

19. state agencies responsible for those conditions compel us to
reject the Board's legal position. Had Central High School been
under the direct management of the State itself, it could hardly
be suggested that those immediately in charge of the school
should be heard to assert their own good faith as a legal excuse
for delay in implementing the constitutional rights of these
respondents, when vindication of those rights was rendered
difficult of impossible by the actions of other state officials.
The situation here is in no different posture because the
members of the School Board and the Superintendent of Schools
are local officials; from the point of view of the Fourteenth
Amendment, they stand in this litigation as the agents of the
State.
The constitutional rights of respondents are not to be sacrificed
or yielded to the violence and disorder which have followed
upon the actions of the Governor and Legislature. As this Court
said some 41 years ago in a unanimous opinion in a case
involving another aspect of racial segregation:
"It is urged that this proposed segregation will promote the
public peace by preventing race conflicts. Desirable as this is,
and important as is the preservation of the public peace, this
aim cannot be accomplished by laws or ordinances which deny
rights created or protected by the federal Constitution."
Buchanan v. Warley.
Thus, law and order are not here to be preserved by depriving
the Negro children of their constitutional rights. The record
before us clearly establishes that the growth of the Board's
difficulties to a magnitude beyond its unaided power to control
is the product of state action. Those difficulties, as counsel for
the Board forthrightly conceded on the oral argument in this
Court, can also be brought under control by state action.
The controlling legal principles are plain. The command of the

20. Fourteenth Amendment is that no "State" shall deny to any
person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.
. . . the prohibitions of the Fourteenth Amendment extend to all
action of the State denying equal protection of the laws;
whatever the agency of the State taking the action, or whatever
the guise in which it is taken. In short, the constitutional rights
of children not to be discriminated against in school admission
on grounds of race or color declared by this Court in theBrown
case can neither be nullified openly and directly by state
legislators or state executive or judicial officers nor nullified
indirectly by them through evasive schemes for segregation
whether attempted "ingeniously or ingenuously."
What has been said, in the light of the facts developed, is
enough to dispose of the case. However, we should answer the
premise of the actions of the Governor and Legislature that they
are not bound by our holding in the Brown case. It is necessary
only to recall some basic constitutional propositions which are
settled doctrine. Article VI of the Constitution makes the
Constitution the "supreme Law of the Land." In 1803, Chief
Justice Marshall, speaking for a unanimous Court, referring to
the Constitution as "the fundamental and paramount law of the
nation," declared in the notable case of Marbury v. Madison,
that "It is emphatically the province and duty of the judicial
department to say what the law is." This decision declared the
basic principle that the federal judiciary is supreme in the
exposition of the law of the Constitution, and that principle has
ever since been respected by this Court and the Country as a
permanent and indispensable feature of our constitutional
system. It follows that the interpretation of the Fourteenth
Amendment enunciated by this Court in the Brown case is the
supreme law of the land, and Art. VI of the Constitution makes
it of binding effect on the States "any Thing in the Constitution
or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding." . . .

21. It is, of course, quite true that the responsibility for public
education is primarily the concern of the States, but it is equally
true that such responsibilities, like all other state activity, must
be exercised consistently with federal constitutional
requirements as they apply to state action. . . The basic
decision in Brown was unanimously reached by this Court only
after the case had been briefed and twice argued and the issues
had been given the most serious consideration. Since the first
Brown opinion, three new Justices have come to the Court. They
are at one with the Justices still on the Court who participated
in that basic decision as to its correctness, and that decision is
now unanimously reaffirmed. The principles announced in that
decision and the obedience of the States to them, according to
the command of the Constitution, are indispensable for the
protection of the freedoms guaranteed by our fundamental
charter for all of us. Our constitutional ideal of equal justice
under law is thus made a living truth.
Gideon v Wainwright
Gideon v Wainwright (US Supreme Court, 1963)
MR. JUSTICE BLACK delivered the opinion of the Court.
Petitioner was charged in a Florida state court with having
broken and entered a poolroom with intent to commit a
misdemeanor. This offense [burglary] is a felony under Florida
law. Appearing in court without funds and without a lawyer,
petitioner asked the court to appoint counsel for him,
whereupon the following colloquy took place:
The COURT: Mr. Gideon, I am sorry, but I cannot appoint
Counsel to represent you in this case. Under the laws of the
State of Florida, the only time the Court can appoint Counsel to

22. represent a Defendant is when that person is charged with a
capital offense. I am sorry, but I will have to deny your request
to appoint Counsel to defend you in this case.
The DEFENDANT: The United States Supreme Court says I am
entitled to be represented by Counsel.
Put to trial before a jury, Gideon conducted his defense about as
well as could be expected from a layman. He made an opening
statement to the jury, cross-examined the State's witnesses,
presented witnesses in his own defense, declined to testify
himself, and made a short argument "emphasizing his innocence
to the charge contained in the Information filed in this case."
The jury returned a verdict of guilty, and petitioner was
sentenced to serve five years in the state prison. Later,
petitioner filed in the Florida Supreme Court this habeas corpus
petition attacking his conviction and sentence on the ground
that the trial court's refusal to appoint counsel for him denied
him rights "guaranteed by the Constitution and the Bill of
Rights by the United States Government." Treating the petition
for habeas corpus as properly before it, the State Supreme
Court, "upon consideration thereof" but without an opinion,
denied all relief. Since 1942, when Betts v. Brady, was decided
by a divided Court, the problem of a defendant's federal
constitutional right to counsel in a state court has been a
continuing source of controversy and litigation in both state and
federal courts. To give this problem another review here, we
granted certiorari. Since Gideon was proceeding in forma
pauperis, we appointed counsel to represent him and requested
both sides to discuss in their briefs and oral arguments the
following: "Should this Court's holding in Betts v. Brady, be
reconsidered?"
I
The facts upon which Betts claimed that he had been

23. unconstitutionally denied the right to have counsel appointed to
assist him are strikingly like the facts upon which Gideon here
bases his federal constitutional claim. Betts was indicted for
robbery in a Maryland state court. On arraignment, he told the
trial judge of his lack of funds to hire a lawyer and asked the
court to appoint one for him. Betts was advised that it was not
the practice in that county to appoint counsel for indigent
defendants except in murder and rape cases. He then pleaded
not guilty, had witnesses summoned, cross-examined the State's
witnesses, examined his own, and chose not to testify himself.
He was found guilty by the judge, sitting without a jury, and
sentenced to eight years in prison. Like Gideon, Betts sought
release by habeas corpus, alleging that he had been denied the
right to assistance of counsel in violation of the Fourteenth
Amendment. Betts was denied any relief, and, on review, this
Court affirmed. It was held that a refusal to appoint counsel for
an indigent defendant charged with a felony did not necessarily
violate the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment,
which, for reasons given, the Court deemed to be the only
applicable federal constitutional provision. The Court said:
Asserted denial [of due process] is to be tested by an appraisal
of the totality of facts in a given case. That which may, in one
setting, constitute a denial of fundamental fairness, shocking to
the universal sense of justice, may, in other circumstances, and
in the light of other considerations, fall short of such denial.
Treating due process as "a concept less rigid and more fluid
than those envisaged in other specific and particular provisions
of the Bill of Rights," the Court held that refusal to appoint
counsel under the particular facts and circumstances in the Betts
case was not so "offensive to the common and fundamental
ideas of fairness" as to amount to a denial of due process. Since
the facts and circumstances of the two cases are so nearly
indistinguishable, we think the Betts v. Brady holding, if left
standing, would require us to reject Gideon's claim that the

24. Constitution guarantees him the assistance of counsel. Upon full
reconsideration, we conclude that Betts v. Brady should be
overruled.
II
The Sixth Amendment provides, "In all criminal prosecutions,
the accused shall enjoy the right . . . to have the Assistance of
Counsel for his defence." We have construed this to mean that,
in federal courts, counsel must be provided for defendants
unable to employ counsel unless the right is competently and
intelligently waived. Betts argued that this right is extended to
indigent defendants in state courts by the Fourteenth
Amendment. In response, the Court stated that, while the Sixth
Amendment laid down
no rule for the conduct of the States, the question recurs
whether the constraint laid by the Amendment upon the national
courts expresses a rule so fundamental and essential to a fair
trial, and so, to due process of law, that it is made obligatory
upon the States by the Fourteenth Amendment.
In order to decide whether the Sixth Amendment's guarantee of
counsel is of this fundamental nature, the Court in Betts set out
and considered
relevant data on the subject . . . afforded by constitutional and
statutory provisions subsisting in the colonies and the States
prior to the inclusion of the Bill of Rights in the national
Constitution, and in the constitutional, legislative, and judicial
history of the States to the present date.
On the basis of this historical data, the Court concluded that
"appointment of counsel is not a fundamental right, essential to
a fair trial." It was for this reason the Betts Court refused to
accept the contention that the Sixth Amendment's guarantee of

25. counsel for indigent federal defendants was extended to or, in
the words of that Court, "made obligatory upon, the States by
the Fourteenth Amendment." Plainly, had the Court concluded
that appointment of counsel for an indigent criminal defendant
was "a fundamental right, essential to a fair trial," it would have
held that the Fourteenth Amendment requires appointment of
counsel in a state court, just as the Sixth Amendment requires in
a federal court.
We think the Court in Betts had ample precedent for
acknowledging that those guarantees of the Bill of Rights which
are fundamental safeguards of liberty immune from federal
abridgment are equally protected against state invasion by the
Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. This same
principle was recognized, explained, and applied in Powell v.
Alabama, (1932), a case upholding the right of counsel, where
the Court held that, despite sweeping language to the contrary
in Hurtado v. California, (1884), the Fourteenth Amendment
"embraced" those "‘fundamental principles of liberty and justice
which lie at the base of all our civil and political institutions,'"
even though they had been "specifically dealt with in another
part of the federal Constitution." In many cases other than
Powell and Betts, this Court has looked to the fundamental
nature of original Bill of Rights guarantees to decide whether
the Fourteenth Amendment makes them obligatory on the
States. Explicitly recognized to be of this "fundamental nature,"
and therefore made immune from state invasion by the
Fourteenth, or some part of it, are the First Amendment's
freedoms of speech, press, religion, assembly, association, and
petition for redress of grievances. For the same reason, though
not always in precisely the same terminology, the Court has
made obligatory on the States the Fifth Amendment's command
that private property shall not be taken for public use without
just compensation, the Fourth Amendment's prohibition of
unreasonable searches and seizures, and the Eighth's ban on
cruel and unusual punishment. On the other hand, this Court in

26. Palko v. Connecticut, (1937), refused to hold that the
Fourteenth Amendment made the double jeopardy provision of
the Fifth Amendment obligatory on the States. In so refusing,
however, the Court, speaking through Mr. Justice Cardozo, was
careful to emphasize that
immunities that are valid as against the federal government by
force of the specific pledges of particular amendments have
been found to be implicit in the concept of ordered liberty, and
thus, through the Fourteenth Amendment, become valid as
against the states,
and that guarantees "in their origin . . . effective against the
federal government alone" had, by prior cases, been taken over
from the earlier articles of the federal bill of rights and brought
within the Fourteenth Amendment by a process of absorption.
We accept Betts v. Brady's assumption, based as it was on our
prior cases, that a provision of the Bill of Rights which is
"fundamental and essential to a fair trial" is made obligatory
upon the States by the Fourteenth Amendment. We think the
Court in Betts was wrong, however, in concluding that the Sixth
Amendment's guarantee of counsel is not one of these
fundamental rights. Ten years before Betts v. Brady, this Court,
after full consideration of all the historical data examined in
Betts, had unequivocally declared that "the right to the aid of
counsel is of this fundamental character." Powell v. Alabama,
(1932). While the Court, at the close of its Powell opinion, did,
by its language, as this Court frequently does, limit its holding
to the particular facts and circumstances of that case, its
conclusions about the fundamental nature of the right to counsel
are unmistakable. Several years later, in 1936, the Court
reemphasized what it had said about the fundamental nature of
the right to counsel in this language:
We concluded that certain fundamental rights, safeguarded by

27. the first eight amendments against federal action, were also
safeguarded against state action by the due process of law
clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, and among them the
fundamental right of the accused to the aid of counsel in a
criminal prosecution. . . The Sixth Amendment stands as a
constant admonition that, if the constitutional safeguards it
provides be lost, justice will not "still be done." Johnson v.
Zerbst, (1938). . .
The fact is that, in deciding as it did -- that "appointment of
counsel is not a fundamental right, essential to a fair trial" --
the Court in Betts v. Brady made an abrupt break with its own
well considered precedents. In returning to these old precedents,
sounder, we believe, than the new, we but restore constitutional
principles established to achieve a fair system of justice. Not
only these precedents, but also reason and reflection, require us
to recognize that, in our adversary system of criminal justice,
any person haled into court, who is too poor to hire a lawyer,
cannot be assured a fair trial unless counsel is provided for him.
This seems to us to be an obvious truth. Governments, both
state and federal, quite properly spend vast sums of money to
establish machinery to try defendants accused of crime.
Lawyers to prosecute are everywhere deemed essential to
protect the public's interest in an orderly society. Similarly,
there are few defendants charged with crime, few indeed, who
fail to hire the best lawyers they can get to prepare and present
their defenses. That government hires lawyers to prosecute and
defendants who have the money hire lawyers to defend are the
strongest indications of the widespread belief that lawyers in
criminal courts are necessities, not luxuries. The right of one
charged with crime to counsel may not be deemed fundamental
and essential to fair trials in some countries, but it is in ours.
From the very beginning, our state and national constitutions
and laws have laid great emphasis on procedural and substantive
safeguards designed to assure fair trials before impartial
tribunals in which every defendant stands equal before the law.

28. This noble ideal cannot be realized if the poor man charged with
crime has to face his accusers without a lawyer to assist him. A
defendant's need for a lawyer is nowhere better stated than in
the moving words of Mr. Justice Sutherland in Powell v.
Alabama:
The right to be heard would be, in many cases, of little avail if
it did not comprehend the right to be heard by counsel. Even the
intelligent and educated layman has small and sometimes no
skill in the science of law. If charged with crime, he is
incapable, generally, of determining for himself whether the
indictment is good or bad. He is unfamiliar with the rules of
evidence. Left without the aid of counsel, he may be put on trial
without a proper charge, and convicted upon incompetent
evidence, or evidence irrelevant to the issue or otherwise
inadmissible. He lacks both the skill and knowledge adequately
to prepare his defense, even though he have a perfect one. He
requires the guiding hand of counsel at every step in the
proceedings against him. Without it, though he be not guilty, he
faces the danger of conviction because he does not know how to
establish his innocence.
The Court in Betts v. Brady departed from the sound wisdom
upon which the Court's holding in Powell v. Alabama rested.
Florida, supported by two other States, has asked that Betts v.
Brady be left intact. Twenty-two States, as friends of the Court,
argue that Betts was "an anachronism when handed down," and
that it should now be overruled. We agree.
The judgment is reversed, and the cause is remanded to the
Supreme Court of Florida for further action not inconsistent
with this opinion.
Reversed.

29. Obergefell_Hodges
Obergefell v Hodges (2015)
These cases come from Michigan, Kentucky, Ohio, and
Tennessee, States that define marriage as a union between one
man and one woman. The petitioners are 14 same-sex couples
and two men whose same-sex partners are deceased. The
respondents are state officials responsible for enforcing the
laws in question. The petitioners claim the respondents violate
the 14th Amendment by denying them the right to marry or to
have their marriages, lawfully performed in another State, given
full recognition.
Petitioners filed these suits in United States District Courts in
their home States. Each District Court ruled in their favor. The
respondents appealed the decisions against them to the United
States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. It consolidated
the cases and reversed the judgments of the District Courts.
DeBoer v. Snyder, (2014). The Court of Appeals held that a
State has no constitutional obligation to license same-sex
marriages or to recognize same-sex marriages performed out of
State.
The petitioners sought certiorari. This Court granted review,
limited to two questions. The first, presented by the cases from
Michigan and Kentucky, is whether the 14th Amendment
requires a State to license a marriage between two people of the
same sex. The second, presented by the cases from Ohio,
Tennessee, and, again, Kentucky, is whether the 14th
Amendment requires a State to recognize a same-sex marriage
licensed and performed in a State which does grant that right.
Held: The 14th Amendment requires a State to license a
marriage between two people of the same sex and to recognize a
marriage between two people of the same sex when their
marriage was lawfully licensed and performed out-of-State.

30. 1. The history of marriage as a union between two persons of
the opposite sex marks the beginning of these cases. To the
respondents, it would demean a timeless institution if marriage
were extended to same-sex couples. But the petitioners, far from
seeking to devalue marriage, seek it for themselves because of
their respect—and need—for its privileges and responsibilities,
as illustrated by the petitioners’ own experiences.
2. The history of marriage is one of both continuity and
change. Changes, such as the decline of arranged marriages and
the abandonment of the law of coverture, have worked deep
transformations in the structure of marriage, affecting aspects of
marriage once viewed as essential. These new insights have
strengthened, not weakened, the institution. Changed
understandings of marriage are characteristic of a Nation where
new dimensions of freedom become apparent to new
generations.
This dynamic can be seen in the Nation’s experience with gay
and lesbian rights. Well into the 20th century, many States
condemned same-sex intimacy as immoral, and homosexuality
was treated as an illness. Later in the century, cultural and
political developments allowed same-sex couples to lead more
open and public lives. Extensive public and private dialogue
followed, along with shifts in public attitudes. Questions about
the legal treatment of gays and lesbians soon reached the courts,
where they could be discussed in the formal discourse of the
law. In 2003, this Court overruled its 1986 decision in Bowers
v. Hardwick, which upheld a Georgia law that criminalized
certain homosexual acts, concluding laws making same-sex
intimacy a crime “demean the lives of homosexual persons.”
Lawrence v. Texas. In 2012, the federal Defense of Marriage
Act was also struck down. United States v. Windsor. Numerous
same-sex marriage cases reaching the federal courts and state
supreme courts have added to the dialogue.

31. 3. The 14th Amendment requires a State to license a marriage
between two people of the same sex.
The fundamental liberties protected by the Due Process Clause
extend to certain personal choices central to individual dignity
and autonomy, including intimate choices defining personal
identity and beliefs. Courts must exercise reasoned judgment in
identifying interests of the person so fundamental that the State
must accord them its respect. History and tradition guide and
discipline the inquiry but do not set its outer boundaries. When
new insight reveals discord between the Constitution’s central
protections and a received legal stricture, a claim to liberty
must be addressed.
Applying these tenets, the Court has long held the right to
marry is protected by the Constitution. For example, Loving v.
Virginia (1967), invalidated bans on interracial unions, and
Turner v. Safley, (1987) held that prisoners could not be denied
the right to marry. To be sure, these cases presumed a
relationship involving opposite-sex partners, as did Baker v.
Nelson, a one-line summary decision issued in 1972, holding
that the exclusion of same-sex couples from marriage did not
present a substantial federal question. But other, more
instructive precedents have expressed broader principles. In
assessing whether the force and rationale of its cases apply to
same-sex couples, the Court must respect the basic reasons why
the right to marry has been long protected. This analysis
compels the conclusion that same-sex couples may exercise the
right to marry.
4. Four principles and traditions demonstrate that the reasons
marriage is fundamental under the Constitution apply with equal
force to same-sex couples. The first premise of this Court’s
relevant precedents is that the right to personal choice regarding
marriage is inherent in the concept of individual autonomy. This

32. abiding connection between marriage and liberty is why Loving
invalidated interracial marriage bans under the Due Process
Clause. Decisions about marriage are among the most intimate
that an individual can make. This is true for all persons,
whatever their sexual orientation.
A second principle in this Court’s jurisprudence is that the right
to marry is fundamental because it supports a two-person union
unlike any other in its importance to the committed individuals.
The intimate association protected by this right was central to
Griswold v.Connecticut, (1965) which held the Constitution
protects the right of married couples to use contraception,and
was acknowledged in Turner. Same-sex couples have the same
right as opposite-sex couples to enjoy intimate association, a
right extending beyond mere freedom from laws making same-
sex intimacy a criminal offense.
A third basis for protecting the right to marry is that it
safeguards children and families and thus draws meaning from
related rights of childrearing, procreation, and education.
Without the recognition, stability, and predictability marriage
offers, children suffer the stigma of knowing their families are
somehow lesser. They also suffer the significant material costs
of being raised by unmarried parents, relegated to a more
difficult and uncertain family life. The marriage laws at issue
thus harm and humiliate the children of same-sex couples. This
does not mean that the right to marry is less meaningful for
those who do not or cannot have children. Precedent protects
the right of a married couple not to procreate, so the right to
marry cannot be conditioned on the capacity or commitment to
procreate.
Finally, this Court’s cases and the Nation’s traditions make
clear that marriage is a keystone of the Nation’s social order.
States have contributed to the fundamental character of
marriage by placing it at the center of many facets of the legal

33. and social order. There is no difference between same- and
opposite-sex couples with respect to this principle, yet same-sex
couples are denied the constellation of benefits that the States
have linked to marriage and are consigned to an instability
many opposite-sex couples would find intolerable. It is
demeaning to lock same-sex couples out of a central institution
of the Nation’s society, for they too may aspire to the
transcendent purposes of marriage.
The limitation of marriage to opposite-sex couples may long
have seemed natural and just, but its inconsistency with the
central meaning of the fundamental right to marry is now
manifest.
5. The right of same-sex couples to marry is also derived from
the 14th Amendment guarantee of equal protection. The Due
Process Clause and the Equal Protection Clause are connected
in a profound way. Rights implicit in liberty and rights secured
by equal protection may rest on different precepts and are not
always co-extensive, yet each may be instructive as to the
meaning and reach of the other. This dynamic is reflected in
Loving, where the Court invoked both the Equal Protection
Clause and the Due Process Clause; and in Zablocki v. Redhail,
(1978) where the Court invalidated a law barring fathers
delinquent on child-support payments from marrying. Indeed,
recognizing that new insights and societal understandings can
reveal unjustified inequality within fundamental institutions
that once passed unnoticed and unchallenged, this Court has
invoked equal protection principles to invalidate laws imposing
sex-based inequality on marriage.
The Court has acknowledged the interlocking nature of these
constitutional safeguards in the context of the legal treatment of
gays and lesbians. This dynamic also applies to same-sex
marriage. The challenged laws burden the liberty of same-sex
couples, and they abridge central precepts of equality. The

34. marriage laws at issue are in essence unequal: Same-sex couples
are denied benefits afforded opposite-sex couples and are barred
from exercising a fundamental right. Especially against a long
history of disapproval of their relationships, this denial works a
grave and continuing harm, serving to disrespect and
subordinate gays and lesbians.
6. The right to marry is a fundamental right inherent in the
liberty of the person, and under the Due Process and Equal
Protection Clauses of the 14th Amendment couples of the same-
sex may not be deprived of that right and that liberty. Same-sex
couples may exercise the fundamental right to marry. Baker v.
Nelson is overruled. The State laws challenged by the
petitioners in these cases are held invalid to the extent they
exclude same-sex couples from civil marriage on the same terms
and conditions as opposite-sex couples.
7. There may be an initial inclination to await further
legislation, litigation, and debate, but referenda, legislative
debates, and grassroots campaigns; studies and other writings;
and extensive litigation in state and federal courts have led to
an enhanced understanding of the issue. While the Constitution
contemplates that democracy is the appropriate process for
change, individuals who are harmed need not await legislative
action before asserting a fundamental right. Bowers, in effect,
upheld state action that denied gays and lesbians a fundamental
right. Though it was eventually repudiated, men and women
suffered pain and humiliation in the interim, and the effects of
these injuries no doubt lingered long afterBowers was
overruled. A ruling against same-sex couples would have the
same effect and would be unjustified under the 14th
Amendment. The petitioners’ stories show the urgency of the
issue they present to the Court, which has a duty to address
these claims and answer these questions. Respondents’
argument that allowing same-sex couples to wed will harm
marriage as an institution rests on a counterintuitive view of

35. opposite-sex couples’ decisions about marriage and parenthood.
Finally, the First Amendment ensures that religions, those who
adhere to religious doctrines, and others have protection as they
seek to teach the principles that are so fulfilling and so central
to their lives and faiths.
8. The 14th Amendment requires States to recognize same-sex
marriages validly performed out of State. Since same-sex
couples may now exercise the fundamental right to marry in all
States, there is no lawful basis for a State to refuse to recognize
a lawful same-sex marriage performed in another State on the
ground of its same-sex character.
US v Alvarez
UNITED STATES v. ALVAREZ
SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
June 28, 2012
Justice Kennedy announced the judgment of the Court and
delivered an opinion, in which The Chief Justice, Justice
Ginsburg, and Justice Sotomayor join.
Lying was his habit. Xavier Alvarez, the respondent here, lied
when he said that he played hockey for the Detroit Red Wings
and that he once married a starlet from Mexico. But when he
lied in announcing he held the Congressional Medal of Honor,
respondent ventured onto new ground; for that lie violates a
federal criminal statute, the Stolen Valor Act of 2005.
In 2007, respondent attended his first public meeting as a board
member of the Three Valley Water District Board. The board is
a governmental entity with headquarters in Claremont,

36. California. He introduced himself as follows: “I’m a retired
marine of 25 years. I retired in the year 2001. Back in 1987, I
was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor. I got wounded
many times by the same guy.” None of this was true. For all the
record shows, respondent’s statements were but a pathetic
attempt to gain respect that eluded him. The statements do not
seem to have been made to secure employment or financial
benefits or admission to privileges reserved for those who had
earned the Medal.
Respondent was indicted under the Stolen Valor Act for lying
about the Congressional Medal of Honor at the meeting. The
United States District Court for the Central District of
California rejected his claim that the statute is invalid under the
First Amendment.
This is the second case in two Terms requiring the Court to
consider speech that can disparage, or attempt to steal, honor
that belongs to those who fought for this Nation in battle. See
Snyder v. Phelps, (2011) (hateful protests directed at the funeral
of a serviceman who died in Iraq). Here the statement that the
speaker held the Medal was an intended, undoubted lie.
It is right and proper that Congress, over a century ago,
established an award so the Nation can hold in its highest
respect and esteem those who, in the course of carrying out the
supreme and noble duty of contributing to the defense of the
rights and honor of the nation, have acted with extraordinary
honor. And it should be uncontested that this is a legitimate
Government objective, indeed a most valued national aspiration
and purpose. This does not end the inquiry, however.
Fundamental constitutional principles require that laws enacted
to honor the brave must be consistent with the precepts of the
Constitution for which they fought.
The Government contends the criminal prohibition is a proper

37. means to further its purpose in creating and awarding the
Medal. When content-based speech regulation is in question,
however, exacting scrutiny is required. Statutes suppressing or
restricting speech must be judged by the sometimes
inconvenient principles of the First Amendment. By this
measure, the statutory provisions under which respondent was
convicted must be held invalid, and his conviction must be set
aside.
I
Respondent’s claim to hold the Congressional Medal of Honor
was false. There is no room to argue about interpretation or
shades of meaning. On this premise, respondent violated
§704(b); and, because the lie concerned the Congressional
Medal of Honor, he was subject to an enhanced penalty under
subsection (c). Those statutory provisions are as follows:
“(b) False Claims About Receipt of Military Decorations or
Medals.––Whoever falsely represents himself or herself,
verbally or in writing, to have been awarded any decoration or
medal authorized by Congress for the Armed Forces of the
United States . . . shall be fined under this title, imprisoned not
more than six months, or both.
“(c) Enhanced Penalty for Offenses Involving Congressional
Medal of Honor.––
“(1) In General.––If a decoration or medal involved in an
offense under subsection (a) or (b) is a Congressional Medal of
Honor, in lieu of the punishment provided in that subsection,
the offender shall be fined under this title, imprisoned not more
than 1 year, or both.”
Respondent challenges the statute as a content-based
suppression of pure speech, speech not falling within any of the

38. few categories of expression where content-based regulation is
permissible. The Government defends the statute as necessary to
preserve the integrity and purpose of the Medal, an integrity and
purpose it contends are compromised and frustrated by the false
statements the statute prohibits. It argues that false statements
“have no First Amendment value in themselves,” and thus “are
protected only to the extent needed to avoid chilling fully
protected speech.” Al-though the statute covers respondent’s
speech, the Government argues that it leaves breathing room for
protected speech, for example speech which might criticize the
idea of the Medal or the importance of the military. The
Government’s arguments cannot suffice to save the statute.
II
“As a general matter, the First Amendment means that
government has no power to restrict expression because of its
message, its ideas, its subject matter, or its content.” Ashcroft
v. American Civil Liberties Union. As a result, the Constitution
“demands that content-based restrictions on speech be presumed
invalid . . . and that the Government bear the burden of showing
their constitutionality.” Ashcroft v. American Civil Liberties
Union, (2004) .
In light of the substantial and expansive threats to free
expression posed by content-based restrictions, this Court has
rejected as “startling and dangerous” a “free-floating test for
First Amendment coverage . . . [based on] an ad hoc balancing
of relative social costs and benefits.” United States v. Stevens,
(2010) Instead, content-based restrictions on speech have been
permitted, as a general matter, only when confined to the few “
‘historic and traditional categories of expression” Simon &
Schuster, Inc. v. Members of N. Y. State Crime Victims Bd.,
(1991). Among these categories are:
(1) advocacy intended, and likely, to incite imminent lawless

39. action, see Brandenburg v. Ohio, 1969)
(2) obscenity, see, e.g., Miller v. California, (1973) ;
(3) defamation, see, e.g., New York Times Co. v. Sullivan,
(1964)
(4) speech integral to criminal conduct, see, e.g., Giboney v.
Empire Storage & Ice Co., (1949) ;
(5) so-called “fighting words,” see Chaplinsky v.New
Hampshire, (1942) ;
(6) child pornography, see New York v. Ferber, (1982) ;
(7) fraud, see Virginia Bd. of Pharmacy v. Virginia Citizens
Consumer Council, Inc., (1976) ;
true threats, see Watts v.United States, (1969)
(8) and speech presenting some grave and imminent threat the
government has the power to prevent, see Near v. Minnesota ex
rel. Olson, (1931) , although a restriction under the last
category is most difficult to sustain, see New York Times Co. v.
United States, (1971).
These categories have a historical foundation in the Court’s free
speech tradition. The vast realm of free speech and thought
always protected in our tradition can still thrive, and even be
furthered, by adherence to those categories and rules.
Absent from those few categories where the law allows content-
based regulation of speech is any general exception to the for
false statements. This comports with the common understanding
that some false statements are inevitable if there is to be an
open and vigorous expression of views in public and private

40. conversation, expression the seeks to guarantee. . . The
erroneous statement is inevitable in free debate.
The Government disagrees with this proposition. It cites
language from some of this Court’s precedents to support its
contention that false statements have no value and hence no
First Amendment protection. These isolated statements in some
earlier decisions do not support the Government’s submission
that false statements, as a general rule, are beyond
constitutional protection. That conclusion would take the quoted
language far from its proper context. . .
These quotations all derive from cases discussing defamation,
fraud, or some other legally cognizable harm associated with a
false statement, such as an invasion of privacy or the costs of
vexatious litigation. In those decisions the falsity of the speech
at issue was not irrelevant to our analysis, but neither was it
determinative. The Court has never endorsed the categorical
rule the Government advances: that false statements receive no
First Amendment protection. Our prior decisions have not
confronted a measure, like the Stolen Valor Act, that targets
falsity and nothing more. . .
The Government thus seeks to use this principle for a new
purpose. It seeks to convert a rule that limits liability even in
defamation cases where the law permits recovery for tortious
wrongs into a rule that expands liability in a different, far
greater realm of discourse and expression. That inverts the
rationale for the exception. The requirements of a knowing
falsehood or reckless disregard for the truth as the condition for
recovery in certain defamation cases exists to allow more
speech, not less. A rule designed to tolerate certain speech
ought not blossom to become a rationale for a rule restricting it.
. .
As our law and tradition show, then, there are instances in

41. which the falsity of speech bears upon whether it is protected.
Some false speech may be prohibited even if analogous true
speech could not be. This opinion does not imply that any of
these targeted prohibitions are somehow vulnerable. But it also
rejects the notion that false speech should be in a general
category that is presumptively unprotected.
III
The probable, and adverse, effect of the Act on freedom of
expression illustrates, in a fundamental way, the reasons for the
Law’s distrust of content-based speech prohibitions.
The Act by its plain terms applies to a false statement made at
any time, in any place, to any person. It can be assumed that it
would not apply to, say, a theatrical performance. . . Still, the
sweeping, quite unprecedented reach of the statute puts it in
conflict with the First Amendment. Here the lie was made in a
public meeting, but the statute would apply with equal force to
personal, whispered conversations within a home. The statute
seeks to control and suppress all false statements on this one
subject in almost limitless times and settings. And it does so
entirely without regard to whether the lie was made for the
purpose of material gain.
Permitting the government to decree this speech to be a criminal
offense, whether shouted from the rooftops or made in a barely
audible whisper, would endorse government authority to
compile a list of subjects about which false statements are
punishable. That governmental power has no clear limiting
principle. Our constitutional tradition stands against the idea
that we need Oceania’s Ministry of Truth. (See e.g. 1984
George Orwell) Were this law to be sustained, there could be an
endless list of subjects the National Government or the States
could single out. Where false claims are made to effect a fraud
or secure moneys or other valuable considerations, say offers of

42. employment, it is well established that the Government may
restrict speech without affronting the First Amendment. But the
Stolen Valor Act is not so limited in its reach. Were the Court
to hold that the interest in truthful discourse alone is sufficient
to sustain a ban on speech, absent any evidence that the speech
was used to gain a material advantage, it would give
government a broad censorial power unprecedented in this
Court’s cases or in our constitutional tradition. The mere
potential for the exercise of that power casts a chill, a chill the
First Amendment cannot permit if free speech, thought, and
discourse are to remain a foundation of our freedom.
IV
The previous discussion suffices to show that the Act conflicts
with free speech principles. But even when examined within its
own narrow sphere of operation, the Act cannot survive. In
assessing content-based restrictions on protected speech, the
Court has not adopted a free-wheeling approach, . . . but rather
has applied the “most exacting scrutiny.” Turner Broadcasting
System, Inc. v. FCC, (1994). Although the objectives the
Government seeks to further by the statute are not without
significance, the Court must, and now does, find the Act does
not satisfy exacting scrutiny. . .
But to recite the Government’s compelling interests is not to
end the matter. . . the Government’s chosen restriction on the
speech at issue be “actually necessary” to achieve its interest.
There must be a direct causal link between the restriction
imposed and the injury to be prevented. The link between the
Government’s interest in protecting the integrity of the military
honors system and the Act’s restriction on the false claims of
liars like respondent has not been shown. Although appearing to
concede that “an isolated misrepresentation by itself would not
tarnish the meaning of military honors,” the Government asserts
it is “common sense that false representations have the tendency

43. to dilute the value and meaning of military awards.” It must be
acknowledged that when a pretender claims the Medal to be his
own, the lie might harm the Government by demeaning the high
purpose of the award, diminishing the honor it confirms, and
creating the appearance that the Medal is awarded more often
than is true. Furthermore, the lie may offend the true holders of
the Medal. From one perspective it insults their bravery and
high principles when falsehood puts them in the unworthy
company of a pretender.
Yet these interests do not satisfy the Government’s heavy
burden when it seeks to regulate protected speech. The
Government points to no evidence to support its claim that the
public’s general perception of military awards is diluted by
false claims such as those made by Alvarez.
The lack of a causal link between the Government’s stated
interest and the Act is not the only way in which the Act is not
actually necessary to achieve the Government’s stated interest.
The Government has not shown, and cannot show, why counter
speech would not suffice to achieve its interest. The facts of
this case indicate that the dynamics of free speech, of counter
speech, of refutation, can overcome the lie. Respondent lied at a
public meeting. Even before the FBI began investigating him for
his false statements “Alvarez was perceived as a phony,” Once
the lie was made public, he was ridiculed online, his actions
were reported in the press, and a fellow board member called
for his resignation. There is good reason to believe that a
similar fate would befall other false claimants.
The remedy for speech that is false is speech that is true. This is
the ordinary course in a free society. The response to the
unreasoned is the rational; to the uninformed, the enlightened;
to the straight-out lie, the simple truth. See Whitney
v.California, (1927) (Brandeis, J., concurring) (“If there be time
to expose through discussion the falsehood and fallacies, to

44. avert the evil by the processes of education, the remedy to be
applied is more speech, not enforced silence”). The theory of
our Constitution is “that the best test of truth is the power of the
thought to get itself accepted in the competition of the market,”
Abrams v. United States, (1919) (Holmes, J., dissenting). The
First Amendment itself ensures the right to respond to speech
we do not like, and for good reason. Freedom of speech and
thought flows not from the beneficence of the state but from the
inalienable rights of the person. And suppression of speech by
the government can make exposure of falsity more difficult, not
less so. Society has the right and civic duty to engage in open,
dynamic, rational discourse. These ends are not well served
when the government seeks to orchestrate public discussion
through content-based mandates.
. . . the Government claims that “many false claims will remain
unchallenged.” The Government provides no support for the
contention. And in any event, in order to show that public
refutation is not an adequate alternative, the Government must
demonstrate that unchallenged claims undermine the public’s
perception of the military and the integrity of its awards system.
This showing has not been made.
It is a fair assumption that any true holders of the Medal who
had heard of Alvarez’s false claims would have been fully
vindicated by the community’s expression of outrage, showing
as it did the Nation’s high regard for the Medal. The same can
be said for the Government’s interest. The American people do
not need the assistance of a government prosecution to express
their high regard for the special place that military heroes hold
in our tradition. Only a weak society needs government
protection or intervention before it pursues its resolve to
preserve the truth. Truth needs neither handcuffs nor a badge
for its vindication.
In addition, when the Government seeks to regulate protected

45. speech, the restriction must be the “least restrictive means
among available, effective alternatives.” There is, however, at
least one less speech-restrictive means by which the
Government could likely protect the integrity of the military
awards system. A Government-created database could list
Congressional Medal of Honor winners. Were a database
accessible through the Internet, it would be easy to verify and
expose false claims. It appears some private individuals have
already created databases similar to thisand at least one data-
base of past winners is online and fully searchable. The
Solicitor General responds that although Congress and the
Department of Defense investigated the feasibility of
establishing a database in 2008, the Government “concluded
that such a database would be impracticable and insufficiently
comprehensive.”
The Government may have responses to some of these
criticisms, but there has been no clear showing of the necessity
of the statute, the necessity required by exacting scrutiny.
* * *
The Nation well knows that one of the costs of the First
Amendment is that it protects the speech we detest as well as
the speech we embrace. Though few might find respondent’s
statements anything but contemptible, his right to make those
statements is protected by the Constitution’s guarantee of
freedom of speech and expression. The Stolen Valor Act
infringes upon speech protected by the First Amendment
The judgment of the Court of Appeals is affirmed.
It is so ordered.