Catherwood LibraryILR School

Following decades of legal debate and ambiguity, the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled that Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act prohibits discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, and that protection against discrimination on the basis of “sex” encompasses sexual orientation. The decision in Zarda v. Altitude Express has been enthusiastically received by the LGBT community and hailed as a welcome, if not delayed, push for legislative action. Given that there is currently no legislation to protect members of the LGBT community from employment discrimination in the US on a national level, this ruling follows in a tradition of courts finding more and more that sexual orientation is a basis for a Title VII violation, hopefully indicating a trend in accepting a broader definition of discrimination.