Reed v. Reed

The case that made Ginsburg, Ginsburg.

It involves the use of the equal protection clause to override a section of Idaho's Probate Code.

- From Wikipedia: 

Sally and Cecil Reed were a married couple who had separated because they were in conflict over which of them would be designated as administrator of the estate of their deceased son. Each filed a petition with the Probate Court of Ada County, Idaho, asking to be named. Idaho Code specified that "males must be preferred to females" in appointing administrators of estates and the court appointed Cecil as administrator of the estate, valued at less than $1,000. Sally Reed was represented at the Supreme Court by Idaho lawyer, Allen Derr, who argued that the Fourteenth Amendment forbids discrimination based on sex.

After a series of appeals by both Sally and Cecil Reed, the Supreme Court considered the case and delivered a unanimous decision that held the Idaho Code's preference in favor of males was arbitrary and unconstitutional.

The Supreme Court ruled for the first time in Reed v. Reed that the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment prohibited differential treatment based on sex.

Because the Idaho Code made a distinction based on sex, the court reasoned that "it thus establishes a classification subject to scrutiny under the Equal Protection Clause" and using the generic standard of scrutiny—ordinary or rational basis review—asked "whether a difference in the sex of competing applicants for letters of administration bears a rational relationship to a state objective."

Chief Justice Burger's opinion said:

To give a mandatory preference to members of either sex over members of the other, merely to accomplish the elimination of hearings on the merits, is to make the very kind of arbitrary legislative choice forbidden by the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment; and whatever may be said as to the positive values of avoiding intrafamily controversy, the choice in this context may not lawfully be mandated solely on the basis of sex.

What is probate law? 

- Click here.