Amicus Brief: Littlejohn v. School Board of Leon County

An issue that has developed in public education is school officials’ secret social-transitioning of children in alternate gender identities and deliberately withholding that information from parents. In this case, the school board of Leon County, Florida, established a comprehensive “Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Gender Nonconforming and Questioning Support Guide,” which specifically provided that: (1) parents are not to be informed when their children announce that they identify as transgender, and (2) children have a legally protected right to keep from their parents information regarding their gender identity and steps taken by the district to affirm that identity.

Operating according to that guidance, administrators met secretly with January and Jeffrey Littlejohn’s 13-year-old daughter to develop a “gender support plan” that permitted the child’s unilateral decision on what name and pronouns to use, which restroom to visit, and with which sex to lodge on overnight trips. The document also indicated that school staff would use a new name and “they/them” when referring to the child at school, but would use the child’s given name and “she/her” when talking to her parents, effectively deceiving the parents regarding what was going on at school. The Littlejohns sued in federal court, alleging a violation of their constitutional rights (1) to direct the upbringing of their children; (2) to make medical and mental-health decisions for their children; and (3) familial privacy. The district court granted the defendants’ motion to dismiss and the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed.

The Littlejohns are now seeking en banc (full court) review and the Manhattan Institute, having filed an amicus brief before the appellate panel, has now filed a brief supporting the en banc petition. We summarize medical research showing that social transition is not a neutral act but an active intervention. Its use on children and adolescents in schools falls squarely within parents’ fundamental right to guide their children’s healthcare. 

Ilya Shapiro is a senior fellow and director of Constitutional Studies at the Manhattan Institute. Follow him on Twitter here.

John Ketcham is a legal policy fellow and director of Cities at the Manhattan Institute.

Photo: Westend61 / Westend61 via Getty Images