By Hyosoon Yim
Parents of seven Illinois high school athletes (lead plaintiff Lisa Moore and six others) filed a lawsuit on December 12, 2020, against Jay Robert Pritzker (Governor of Illinois) and the Illinois High School Association (IHSA). The plaintiffs are claiming violation of the equal protection clause enshrined in the Illinois Constitution, resulted from the defendants’ arbitrary and unfair series of disaster declarations, executive orders, rules, and regulations. Moore and the other plaintiffs are seeking a primary and permanent injunction barring Pritzker and the IHSA from enforcing the COVID-19 policy that prohibits interscholastic high school sports for the winter 2020-2021 season.
Pritzker made a disaster declaration for the State of Illinois and invoked the clause of the Illinois Emergency Management Act, 20 ILCS 3305/7 (IEMA), which granted him thirty days of limited emergency powers. Since the first disaster proclamation issued on March 9, 2020, Pritzker has reissued this disaster proclamation every thirty days through December 11, 2020. Based on the granted power, he decreed the Restore Illinois Plan, re-imposed Tier 3 mitigation by Executive Order 2020-73. The Illinois Department of Health has issued rules and regulations that enforce the cancellation of high school football, basketball, and hockey for the winter 2020-2021 season. The IHSA supervised and regulated its member schools’ interscholastic activities under the Executive Order.
The plaintiffs contend that the re-imposition resulted in harm and damages to their children. According to the 9-page complaint filed in the Lasalle County Circuit Court (State of Illinois), Trevor Till, the son of lead plaintiff Lisa Moore, committed suicide on October 21, 2020. Trevor was a cross-country and track athlete at Seneca High School. Lisa Moore stated, “he was devastated that he didn’t have his senior year track and pole vaulting season” (p.3) and argued Governor Pritzker’s restrictions on high school sports programs were a proximate cause of Trevor’s suicide. Other plaintiffs asserted that their children could find no way to contact college recruiters due to the restrictions, and they lost their opportunity for college scholarships.
The plaintiffs also point out that there is no fair or acceptable justification for banning high school sports when allowing college and professional athletes to play the same sports. Although there may be several exceptions, the ages of athletes who play interscholastic football, basketball, and hockey sports in high school are between the ages of 14 and 17, while the athletes who play the same sports in college or professional leagues are between the ages of 18 and 29. The plaintiffs attached the COVID-19 Hospitalization and Death by Age released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). According to the attached report, the COVID-19 virus infection rate, broken down by age group, indicates 23.3 percent of cases for the 18 to 29-year-old age group, whereas it shows 8.3 percent for the 5 to 17-year-old age group.
It is now up to the judge to rule on the violations of the equal protection clause enshrined in the Illinois Constitution, alleged by the plaintiff. The plaintiffs argue their rights based on the Constitution and laws of the State of Illinois that prohibit limiting the freedom of one group while not restricting other groups unless there is a “rational basis for doing so in accomplishing a legitimate governmental interest” (p.2). It would be critical for the judge to decide if collegiate and professional sports leagues’ comparative advantage in disease control capabilities should be regarded as “the rational basis” (p.2) in accomplishing pandemic control at the governmental level.
A further issue could arise from the reliability of statistical data suggested by the plaintiffs. Some scholars contend that using non-legal materials such as statistical data is a golden opportunity for lawyers who desire to support their assertions, especially for novel policy-related cases. On the other hand, opponents of non-legal materials point out that interpretation of statistical data can be varied depending on the reader’s belief, purpose, or ideology (Margolis, 2000). Focusing on whether the attached data in the current case can be accepted by the judge as reliable extra-legal facts, taking advantage of the “legal realist movement” (Lynch, 2004; p.65), will be a crucial point for the spectators of this case.
The current case is interesting since this is the first case that challenges the Governor’s COVID-19 restrictions on an equal protection basis under the State of Illinois Constitution. Several lawsuits have been filed against Pritzker over his restrictions since the first issue of the COVID-19 disaster proclamation. However, few have met with success, including a federal lawsuit against the IHSA withdrawn in early October and recent decisions of the Illinois Circuit and Appellate Courts addressing the Governor’s powers. Many people, including youth sport and government stakeholders, are paying close attention if the current case would be the milestone of future claims regarding pandemic restrictions in youth sports.
Hyosoon Yim, a doctoral student at Florida State University, studies health and well-being promotion through Sport Involvement, Sport Analytics, and Sport for Development Theory.
References
Lynch, K. J. (2004). Best friends-Supreme Court law clerks on effective amicus curiae briefs. JL & Pol., 20, 33.
Margolis, E. (1999). Beyond Brandeis: Exploring the Uses of Non-Legal Materials in Appellate Briefs. USFL Rev., 34, 197.
