Christine M. Owen v. Liberty University, et al.

Title IX is a federal civil rights law that only applies to colleges and universities who voluntarily choose to seek and accept federal funding in order to attract more students, for which those institutions in turn reap significant financial benefits from those students’ tuition and other fees. When issues of sexual harassment ' or discrimination arise, students at public institutions are automatically afforded due process and other constitutional rights and protections that students at many private institutions are barred from by conflicting court precedents in the various circuits. Some circuits in which Title IX policies and procedures are published and disseminated (as required by federal law), regard public student handbooks as contracts that are binding on both those students and their institutions. Some circuits, however, unwittingly interfere with Title IX laws and regulations by deeming private university students’ handbooks (the only place such universities publish and disseminate their grievance policies) as not binding on those universities. This raises discrimination and equal protection violations against an entire class of students in some circuits, as well as between public versus private institutions.