When the Boise State Broncos played the Notre Dame Fighting Irish last Saturday, the lightest lineman listed on their roster weighed 278 pounds. In fact, most of the linemen on the Boise State roster weighed 300 pounds or more.

Should these same young men be allowed to play on women's teams at Boise State? A case the Supreme Court should hear this term could answer that question.

On March 20, 2020, Idaho's Republican Gov. Brad Little signed the Fairness in Women's Sports Act. It included a simple, straightforward rule: "Athletic teams or sports designated for females, women, or girls shall not be open to students of the male sex."

The law made clear that it was referring to "the student's biological sex." Thus, the law would prevent a 6-foot, 7-inch, 310-pound offensive lineman on the Boise State men's football from also playing on the women's soccer team.

This is a reasonable and obvious restriction — that has been enacted into law by numerous states in addition to Idaho. But it nonetheless has been challenged based on the claim that it violates the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment.

"This case presents a simple question," says a brief presented to the Supreme Court on the governor's behalf by the Alliance Defending Freedom and Idaho's solicitor general and attorney general. "Does the Equal Protection Clause allow states to protect fairness and safety by reserving women's sports for females? Common sense says yes. The Ninth Circuit said no, holding that Idaho's Fairness in Women's Sports Act unlawfully discriminates based on sex and transgender status."

"On average, men are faster, stronger, bigger, more muscular, and have more explosive power than women," said the brief. "For female athletes to compete safely and excel, they deserve sex-specific teams."

"The NCAA, U.S. Olympic Committee, and 27 states have made the logical decision that preserving fairness and safety in women's sports requires that male athletes cannot compete against females no matter how the male athletes identify," said the brief. "The Court should not second-guess those legislative judgments and constitutionalize a requirement that males who identify as women must be allowed to compete against — and beat — female athletes in women's sporting events."

West Virginia is one of the states that like Idaho enacted a law that prohibits biological males from competing in women's sports. The Supreme Court will be reviewing this law in the case of West Virginia vs. B.P.J.

B.P.J., says a petition filed in this suit by the attorney general and solicitor general of West Virginia, was "a then-11-year-old biological male who identifies as female," who had "competed on the girls' cross country and track-and-field teams, routinely defeating and displacing female athletes" and who "argued that the law's biology-based distinction violated Title IX and the Constitution's Equal Protection Clause."

Thirty-one female athletes who had competed as women in the Olympics have filed a brief in these Idaho and West Virginia cases. They were joined in it by 93 other female athletes, coaches, sports officials and parents of female athletes.

"College women's teams do not play against college men's teams; the high school girls' basketball team does not play against the boys' basketball team," says their brief. "The individual men's and women's state champion in tennis do not play against each other to determine who is the actual champion. The women's Olympic sprint champion does not race the men's champion.

"This kind of competition is not allowed because we understand the result would almost always serve to humiliate women," they say.

"By allowing the laws passed by Idaho and West Virginia to stand, this Court can reaffirm that females have not lost their equal opportunity to compete in sports on a level playing field," they say. "By affirming states' rights — and constitutional obligations — to stand with girls and women, this Court can ensure that the basic right to be treated equally as a person born female is still the legal norm in the United States."

For the court to rule otherwise would be to ignore a basic biological fact — just as it did when, in Roe v. Wade, it ignored the basic biological fact that an unborn child is a human being.

There are two sexes and they are physically distinct, which makes it appropriate for them to compete on separate athletic teams.

But that does not stop girls from competing against — and being able to defeat — boys, including in the classroom, in the workplace, and in the Supreme Court of the United States.

To find out more about Terence P. Jeffrey and read features by other Creators writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators webpage at www.creators.com.

Photo credit: Dave Adamson at Unsplash