Jane Doe, et al. v. Montgomery County Board of Elections
Sep 09, 2008OUTCOME: Appellate win in defense of a civil rights law
After the County Council passed a civil rights law barring discrimination on the basis of gender identity, a small fringe group collected signatures seeking to have the law put on the November 2008 ba ... llot in a referendum. The local Board of Elections certified the referendum effort despite failure to comply with applicable state law. On behalf of a broad coalition of local voters and civil rights groups, I brought a lawsuit against the Board of Elections, seeking to invalidate the referendum. As part of our efforts, I supervised a team of volunteers that reviewed over 30,000 pages of signatures and other documents. Although a trial judge ruled that our action was brought too late, we appealed and in September, 2008, the Court of Appeals of Maryland ruled in our favor, invalidating the referendum and allowing the new anti-discrimination law to go into effect.
