con law: march 30 2010 class notes

us railroad v. fritz.
1. current and 25 years
2. 25+ years
3. less than 25 years

analysis:
if this is to be something other than just "no review" then it should matter what congress is up to when they did the review/ enacted the act. the reasoning is of a pattern in sorts: rational basis review is pretty low and generalized in this case. when congress enacted this

plyer v. doe
there are immigrant kids who are denied funding for public education in TX.
the classes status is that they're illegal immigrants.
seems morally troubling for the state to hammer these kids for the sins of the father. to allow the gov't to do something cruel for rational basis doesn't seem right. additionally, education, though not a fundamental right, is mentioned in the 14th amd't and it is historically and traditionally a factor of our ideas of equality.... education is an american sorting system.

is this in furtherance of the federal gov't policies? absolutely not - in fact, the gov't gives special statuses to kids brought over as illegal immigrants

TX says "we're saving money". US says "keeping the kids out of the classroom does cost less to educate but eventually will cost more to have adults who are illiterate."


romer v. evans

washington v. davis

all of this is about rational basis review. at the end you can point to certain "blips" but until there is a new kind of review created, that is not as severe as strict scrutiny.