Not long after the one-year anniversary of Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation as a Supreme Court justice, he and his eight associates will devote one entire day to three cases which will determine the future of LGBTQ and women’s rights under the law. On October 8, the Court will hear oral arguments in three cases concerning protection from discrimination based on sex under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The justices’ decision could return American workplaces to the era of rotary phones, casual sexism, and closeted identity. Should these three workers lose, then all workers could be subject to the stereotypes harbored by their employers about how men and women should appear, behave, and identify. Getting fired for not conforming would again be completely legal.

“These are the single most important set of explicitly LGBT cases to ever reach the Supreme Court,” said Chase Strangio, a staff attorney at the ACLU, part of the team representing one of the plaintiffs who faced sex discrimination at work. “More than Lawrence, more than Obergefell, more than Masterpiece,” he added, citing prior cases concerning same-sex sex, same-sex marriage, and discrimination based on sexual orientation in public accommodations. That’s in part, said Strangio, because taken together, these cases encompass both sexual orientation and gender—they explicitly include all LGBTQ people.

Title VII is a powerful legal tool, especially in the majority of U.S. states without LGBT-inclusive anti-discrimination laws. While “you can still be fired for being LGBT in 26 states” has become a useful shorthand for advocates who want to convey how far LGBT rights have yet to come, it’s one that risks overlooking Title VII protections—even if those cases are difficult to win (which is especially true for trans people). This confusion about workers’ rights may be one reason why the Title VII cases haven’t ignited the same kind of attention as marriage equality did just a few years ago.



But on the morning of oral arguments in these cases, Housing Works, a group fighting AIDS and homelessness, is planning an action at the court, including civil disobedience. “Our transgender, non-binary and gender non-conforming brothers, sisters and siblings shouldn’t have to depend on this patchwork of state laws when their livelihoods and freedom to live their lives are on the line,” wrote Housing Works co-founder and CEO Charles King in an email to The New Republic.



The activists who come to the court on October 8 may be putting their bodies on the line just as so many women’s rights activists did to oppose Justice Kavanaugh’s confirmation. “Our national LGBTQIA family has been under a series of attacks under this current administration,” wrote Kiara St. James, co-founder and executive director of New York Transgender Advocacy Group, who are co-sponsoring the action. These communities, often conceived of as separate, are facing the same serious threats. This administration, said St. James, “has been exact and intentional in stripping many recently hard-won protections in the workplace and healthcare.”