Counterintuitive Consequence of the Day

Would passage of a new Equal Rights Amendment mean that Providence College could reinstate its baseball team? Ilya Somin of the Volokh Conspiracy thinks it’s a possibility…

As currently interpreted by courts and federal administrative agencies, [Federal law] essentially requires universities to have equal numbers of male and female sports teams, regardless of the amount of interest that male and female students have in athletics. This is a fairly obvious gender classification and one that probably won't survive strict scrutiny under the ERA.

In the late '90s, Providence found itself in a familiar bind. Women accounted for 59 percent of its students, yet they were only 43 percent of student athletes. The school was facing a peer review by the NCAA, and it needed to show quick "progress" toward gender equity. Providence simply had too many male athletes, and the easiest course of action was to cut some men's programs to bring its numbers into line. In the fall of 1998, the administration announced that the 1999 season would be the last for the school's 78-year-old baseball team. After 2002, Providence would no longer support men's golf or tennis. Not one new women's team would be created, but the male-female ratio would still be greatly improved.