Noah Feldman, Columnist

Sex Versus Gender In Carolina Bathroom Case

The law bans discrimination based on chromosomes. Courts will have to figure out whether that's enough.

May 11, 2016 at 12:45 PM UTC

Noah Feldman is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist. A professor of law at Harvard University, he is author, most recently, of “To Be a Jew Today: A New Guide to God, Israel, and the Jewish People."

Battleground.
Photographer: Sara D. Davis/Getty Images

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North Carolina and the federal government are suing each other over whether the state’s new transgender bathroom regulation violates federal civil rights laws. The cultural stakes are clear: the two governments have sharply different ideas about the acceptance of transgender people. But what about the legal stakes?

The legal problem in the case is whether the North Carolina law, which bars transgender people from restrooms, locker rooms and changing rooms, violates the provision of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 that prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex.1462915129434