【雅思课外精读】美国采取措施保护LGBT员工在工作中不受歧视

　　【雅思课外精读】美国采取措施保护LGBT员工在工作中不受歧视 *注：本文摘自6月18日《经济学人》

　　LGBT rights性少数群体的权利

　　America’s Supreme Court protects LGBT workers against discrimination美国最高法院保护

　　LGBT员工不受歧视

　　A momentous 6-3 ruling一个重大的6比3裁决

　　1. WHEN ANTHONY KENNEDY retired in 2018, gay-rights supporters fretted overthe loss of a justice who had anchored four expansions of gay and lesbian rights. With his replacement by the more conservative Brett Kavanaugh, and President Donald Trump’s appointment of Neil Gorsuch 18 months earlier, LGBT activists worried the progress would come to a halt. On June 15th the Supreme Court allayed those fears with a momentous decision that protects gay and transgender people against discrimination in the workplace.

　　安东尼·肯尼迪曾四次支持扩大同性恋权利，他2018年退休的时候，人们担心同性恋权利得不到保障。继任安东尼·肯尼迪的是更加保守的布雷特·卡瓦诺(Brett Kavanaugh)和唐纳德·特朗普总统18个月前任命的尼尔·戈萨奇(Neil Gorsuch)， LGBT活动人士担心同性恋权利扩大的进程会停滞。6月15日，最高法院做出了一项重大决定，保护同性恋和跨性别者在工作场所不受歧视，这减轻了人们的担忧。

　　2. By a 6-3 margin, the court ruled that Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964—a provision that bars discrimination “because of” a number of characteristics including “sex”—prohibits firing or disfavouring workers on the basis of their sexual orientation or gender identity. The majority view was penned by Justice Gorsuch.

　　最高法院以6比3的票数裁定，1964年《民权法案》第七条禁止“因”包括“性别”在内的一系列特征而产生的歧视，禁止因员工的性取向或性别认同而解雇或歧视他们。戈萨奇法官起草了多数意见。 3. Roughly half of America’s states have laws of their own protecting gay and trans workers; the rest do not. So until the latest decision, known as Bostock v Clayton County, an employee in much of America could legally marry a member of the same sex over the weekend and be legally sacked for being gay when returning to work. Now some 8.1m LGBT workers across America will enjoy federal protection from discrimination when they clock in.

　　美国大约一半的州都有自己的法律保护同性恋和跨性别者；其余的州则不然。因此，直到最近波斯托克诉克莱顿县的裁决，美国大部分地区的雇员周末可以合法和自己的同性对象结婚，但是周一去上班就会被合法解雇。现在，全美约有810万LGBT员工受联邦法律保护，在工作场合不被歧视。

　　4. At the oral arguments last October, Justice Gorsuch leaned towards the LGBT plaintiffs’view. But he feared that a win for them might herald “massive social upheaval”. Now, as author of the majority opinion (attracting the votes of Chief Justice John Roberts and the four more liberal justices), his worries seem to have vanished. “Sex plays a necessary andundisguisable role” in an employer’s decision to fire a worker for being gay or transgender, he wrote, and that is “exactly what Title VII forbids”.

　　在去年10月的口头辩论中，戈萨奇法官倾向于支持LGBT原告。但他担心LGBT的胜利会带来“大规模的社会动荡”。现在，作为多数意见的作者(吸引了首席大法官约翰·罗伯茨和四位较为自由派法官的投票)，他的担忧似乎已经消失了。他写道，在雇主决定解雇同性恋或跨性别员工时，“性扮演着不可掩饰的角色”，而这正是《宪法第七条》所禁止的。

　　5. The matter was simple, he contended, involving “the straightforward application of legal terms with plain and settled meanings”. A host of Supreme Court precedents stand for the same principle. These include discrimination against mothers, sexual harassment against men and other types of workplace bias Congress may not have contemplated in 1964. No one might have imagined back then that Title VII would prohibit a boss from firing gay or trans workers because of their identity, but “major initiatives” like a civil-rights law often have “unexpected consequences”.

　　他辩称，其实很简单， “直接应用意义明确的法律术语”就行。最高法院的许多案例都支持同样的原则。其中包括对母亲的歧视、对男性的性骚扰，以及国会在1964年可能没有考虑到的其他类型的职场偏见。在当时，没有人会想到《宪法第七修正案》会禁止老板因为员工的同性恋或变性人的身份而解雇他们，但是像民权法这样的“重大举措”往往会产生“意想不到的后果”。

　　6. Justice Kavanaugh wrote a dissent admonishing the majority for legislating from the bench. “[W]e are judges,” he wrote, “not members of Congress.” For the more vituperative Justice Samuel Alito (joined in dissent by Justice Clarence Thomas), the “radical” result in Bostock is based on “preposterous” reasoning. Although the majority invokes the late Justice Antonin Scalia’s teaching that judges should pay heed only to the words of a statute, Justice Alito wrote, “no one should be fooled” by the ruling. Justice Gorsuch’s opinion is “like a pirate ship” sailing “under a textualist flag” but silently “updat[ing] old statutes so that they better reflect the current values of society”.

　　卡瓦诺法官写了一份异议书，呼吁法官立法。“我们都是法官，”他写道，“不是国会议员。”对于和克拉伦斯·托马斯(Clarence Thomas)法官一起反对立法的塞缪尔·阿利托(Samuel Alito)法官来说，波斯托克案的“激进”结果是基于“荒谬”的推理。尽管大多数人援引已故大法官安东宁·斯卡利亚(Antonin Scalia)的教诲，即法官应该只关注法令的文字，但阿利托法官写道，“任何人都不应该被这项裁决愚弄”。戈萨奇法官认为，此次裁决 “像一艘海盗船”在“文本主义旗帜下”默默航行，默默“更新旧法规，以便它们更好地反映当前的社会价值”。

　　7. What are the broader implications of the ruling for LGBT rights? It depends whom you ask. Justice Gorsuch left open whether employers with religious objections to the gender identity or sexuality of their workers may one day claim an exemption from anti-discrimination laws. But his erstwhile concern about social upheaval is nowhere to be found in the majority opinion. Bostock is just about workplace rights, he wrote, not “sex-segregated bathrooms, locker rooms and dress codes”. The court does not “prejudge” these questions.

　　对LGBT权利的裁决有什么更广泛的影响?这取决于你问谁。戈萨奇法官没有明确表示，对员工性别认同或性取向持宗教异议的雇主是否有一天可以申请反歧视法的豁免。但他过去对社会动荡的担忧已不复存在。他写道，博斯托克案件涉及的是工作场所权利，而不是“性别隔离的卫生间、更衣室和着装规范”。法院不会预先判断这些问题。

　　8. Justice Alito’s 54-page jeremiad berated the majority for failing to grapple with the potential implications. Many federal laws bar sex discrimination, and the majority’s “brusque refusal” to contemplate how they will be altered by the Bostock ruling is “irresponsible”. What about transgender employees challenging health plans that “do not cover costly sex-reassignment surgery”? Or women who have suffered sexual assault, for whom viewing “the anatomy of a male in a confined and sensitive location such as a bathroom or locker room can cause serious psychological harm”? Or a transgender person’s desire to compete in a sporting “competition previously reserved for members of one biological sex”?

　　阿利托大法官在长达54页的长篇大论中指责多数派未能把握住潜在的影响。许多联邦法律禁止性别歧视，多数人“粗暴拒绝”考虑博斯托克裁决对这些法律的影响，这是“不负责任的”。跨性别员工挑战了“不包括昂贵的变性手术”的医疗计划怎么办？或者是遭受过性侵犯的女性提出“在一个狭窄敏感的场所，如卫生间或更衣室，观看一个男性的解剖，可能会造成严重的心理伤害”时要怎么办？或者一个跨性别者想要参加体育比赛的愿望如何实现？

　　9. Religious conservatives who helped elect Mr Trump and were cheered by his Supreme Court picks are shocked by Justice Gorsuch’s defection from the cause. Their dismay may do little to soften evangelicals’ support for Mr Trump in November, but the decision to stand up for gay and trans rights may undermine several of his administration’s policies targeting LGBT people. A recently announced regulatory change allowing doctors to deny health care to trans people under the Affordable Care Act is now under a cloud, as are moves to allow adoption agencies toshut out same-sex couples and let school districts discriminate against trans students.

　　曾帮助特朗普当选总统并因他的最高法院人选备受鼓舞的宗教保守派人士对戈萨奇大法官的背叛感到震惊。他们的沮丧可能不会削弱福音派在11月对特朗普的支持，但支持同性恋和变性人权利的决定可能会削弱政府针对LGBT人群的一些政策。最近宣布的一项监管改革，允许医生根据《平价医疗法案》(Affordable care Act)拒绝为跨性别人士提供医疗服务，允许收养机构将同性伴侣拒之门外、允许学区歧视跨性别学生的举措，现在都受到了质疑。

　　10. For now, Bostock seems bound to serve conservatives with an example of burnishing the image of the Supreme Court as a fair-minded tribunal. Chief Justice Roberts is particularly keen to rescue justices from the charge that they are merely politicians in robes. In 1989 Scalia joined the liberal side of the court to strike down a law banning flag-burning. That was his exhibit A of how his jurisprudence was rooted in law, not personal ideology. Justice Gorsuch, Scalia’s successor, now has a similar landmark.

　　目前而言，博斯托克案件似乎注定要成为改善最高法院作为一个公正法庭形象的例子。首席大法官罗伯茨尤其一心想将大法官们从“他们只不过是穿着长袍的政客”的指控中解救出来。1989年，斯卡利亚加入了最高法院的自由派阵营，推翻了一项禁止焚烧国旗的法律。这就是他的法理学如何植根于法律而非个人意识形态的证据。斯卡利亚的继任者戈萨奇法官如今也有了类似的名片。