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John Doe v. Kamehameha Schools

From dKosopedia

Category: Hawaii stub

The John Doe v. Kamehameha Schools lawsuit arose when an anonymous non-Hawaiian student applied to the school twice and was denied after he told the school that none of his grandparents had Hawaiian blood.

Eric Grant, an expert on constitutional law, and attorney John Goemans filed suit on behalf of the student in June 2003 seeking to overturn the admission policy on the basis that it violated the boy's federal civil rights. John Goemans successfully challenged the Hawaiian-only voting for the Office of Hawaiian Affairs in the Rice v. Cayetano case.

Nov. 17, 2004, Judge Alan Kay of the U.S. District Court tossed out a challenge to the school's Hawaiian-preference policy. Kay stated that the Kamehameha admissions policy provides "a legitimate remedial purpose of improving native Hawaiians' socioeconomic and educational disadvantages."

On Aug. 2, 2005, two out of three justices on a 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel ruled that the schools' admission policy constitutes "unlawful race discrimination." The judges said the private school's policy violates federal civil rights law.

The judges stated in their majority opinion that a race-neutral policy is consistent with the princess Pauahi Bishop's intent to help disadvantaged students of Hawaii as nothing in the will stipulates a native Hawaiian-only policy.

On Aug. 4, 2005, Kamehameha Schools rejected a proposal to allow a non-Hawaiian student to enroll in classes for his senior year.

Attorney General Mark Bennett asked and recieved permission from the appeals court to file a brief in support of the school's request for a rehearing.

The ruling was appealed by the Kamehameho Schools.

On December 5, 2006, by an 8-7 decision, a 15-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, overturned the court's three-judge decision that the Kamehameha Schools policy amounted to unlawful discrimination.

A Honolulu Advertiser article goes on to say:

The majority noted that the case, brought by a white student excluded from admission to the private school because of his race, was unique because Congress has singled out the plight of native Hawaiians as they have with Alaskan natives and American Indians.
The policy, the court ruled, "furthers the urgent need for better education of Native Hawaiians, which Congress has repeatedly identified as necessary."
Three of the dissenting judges wrote separately that civil rights law "prohibits a private school from denying admission to prospective students because of their race."
The Kamehameha Schools was established under the 1883 will of Princess Bernice Pauahi Bishop as part of a trust now worth about $6.8 billion.
Part of the school's mission is to counteract historic disadvantages Native Hawaiians face in employment, education and society.
The trust subsidizes tuition and is designed to reverse the economic and educational plight of Native Hawaiians and to help remedy some of the wrongs done during the U.S.-backed overthrow of the Hawaiian kingdom in 1893.
The nation's largest federal appeals court rehears cases with larger panels if the judges agree to do so. [1]

On March 1, 2007, attorneys for John Doe ask the U.S. Supreme Court to review the United States Courts of Appeals' Ninth Circuit ruling on December 5, 2006.

External Links

Retrieved from "http://localhost../../../j/o/h/John_Doe_v._Kamehameha_Schools_31e1.html"

This page was last modified 00:32, 4 June 2007 by dKosopedia user Jbet777. Based on work by dKosopedia user(s) Allamakee Democrat. Content is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License.


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