Gender & Sexuality Law Blog

Suzanne B. Goldberg is clinical professor of law and director of Columbia Law School’s Gender & Sexuality Law Center. Her Sexuality & Gender Law Clinic authored “Open Service and Our Allies: A Report on the Inclusion of Openly Gay and Lesbian Servicemembers in U.S. Allies’ Armed Forces.”  Here is her op-ed piece in Stars and [...]

As mentioned in a previous post, the government has moved to have the Log Cabin Republicans’ suit challenging DADT, which is pending before the 9th Circuit, put on hold in light of the enactment of the Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell Repeal Act of 2010.  The government’s position is that: This Court should now suspend the [...]

With President Obama’s signature on December 22nd of the Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell Repeal Act of 2010, one might wonder about the status of the legal challenge to DADT now pending in the 9th Circuit?  Does the passage of the law render the challenge moot?  Or are there ongoing reasons why the 9th Circuit should [...]

With President Obama’s signature putting the end of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell today, one might think: finally!  Lesbians and gay men can now serve their country openly and as patriots just like heterosexuals.  What is more, since the U.S. military is the country’s largest employer, the repeal of DADT should be seen as a victory [...]

The twin horizons of many people and organizations in the lesbian and gay community – achieving marriage equality and repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell – seem like obvious civil rights goals.  They both enshrine official, legally sanctioned discrimination against gay men and lesbians.  Yet as sites for the elaboration of a free-self, military services [...]

The Supreme Court today denied the Log Cabin Republican’s appeal to lift the stay of Judge Virginia Phillips’ ruling that “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” violated the constitutional rights of gay and lesbian persons who sought to serve openly in the U.S. military. Here’s the order:

Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, at a press conference in connection with diplomatic and defense meetings held in Australia, urged that DADT be repealed by Congress during its lame duck session in December.  With the Pentagon’s long awaited “study” of the wisdom of repeal of DADT forthcoming in December, the Obama Administration and Congressional Democrats [...]

Tanya L. Domi is an Adjunct Assistant Professor of International and Public Affairs at Columbia University, who teaches about human rights in Eurasia and is a Harriman Institute affiliated faculty member. Captain Domi served for fifteen years in the U.S. Army as an enlisted soldier and commissioned officer.  She posted the following on the Blog [...]

The 9th Circuit just issued an order staying a lower court decision finding the Don’t Ask Don’t Tell law unconstitutional.  The order is here.  This means that the law will remain in place until such time as the 9th Circuit rules otherwise on the case. Two judges on the three judge panel reasoned that a [...]

Less than 24 hours after district court judge Virginia Phillips denied the Obama Administration’s motion to stay the implementation of her order to suspend the ban on out lesbians and gays serving in the military, a three judge panel of the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals granted the stay “temporarily in order to provide this [...]