Civil Procedure Commons^™

The Poor As A Suspect Class Under The Equal Protection Clause: An Open Constitutional Question, Henry Rose

Faculty Publications & Other Works

Both judges and legal scholars assert that the United States Supreme Court has held that the poor are neither a quasi-suspect nor a suspect class under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. They further assert that this issue was decided by the Supreme Court in San Antonio Independent School District v. Rodriguez, 411 U.S. 1 (1973). It is the thesis of this article that the Supreme Court has not yet decided whether the poor are a quasi-suspect or a suspect class under Equal Protection. In fact, the majority in San Antonio Independent School …