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Originally Posted by Jeremy
Someone with some legal knowledge or a political science background, enlighten me.
Is it possible to sue the U.S. government in a class action lawsuit in the supreme court? It sounds pretty crazy, yes. But it amazes me first of all how this corrupt bill even passed. I think a group of winning players and even some big affiliates should look into this. I am fairly certain you could get private financial support from certain people or rooms.
After all there are many people who file taxes as professional gamblers that will now have not only their civil liberties, but also their livelihood stripped away. I know both players and affiliates who are good people and make an honest living in the poker industry who will now be left having to explain to their families why they can no longer pay the bills.
We can all sit here and bitch about everything on every poker board in the world, but that won't get anything accomplished, nor will it change a damn thing.
I think the PPA needs to look into something like this, because the fight to keep this bill from passing has failed due to one corrupt senator. Any thoughts.......
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I'm not exactly sure what you are looking to sue under; if you are asserting a constitutional claim, then it would either have to be that your substantive due process rights were violated or you were denied equal protection under the law.
The substantive due process clause of the constitution (5th amendment) guarantees that laws will be reasonable and not arbitrary and the Equal Protection clause (14th amendment, only explicitly applies to state action, not federal, but traditionally has been imputed to the federal government as part of due process clause) guarantees that similarly situated persons will be treated alike.
For a claim under Substantive Due Process, one must be denied a "fundamental right" for the court to apply a strict scrutiny standard (government must show law is necessary to promote a compelling or overriding interest), otherwise only a mere rationality standard is required (as long as the restriction is rationally related to any legitimate governmental purpose). So the bar is very low if you are only applying a rationality standard so you would have to show a fundamental right has been violated to apply a strict scrutiny standard and that seems unlikely. Fundamental rights include things like the rights relating to Voting, Privacy, right to Move Freely (i.e., travel), and all first amendment rights. The right to work in the industry of your choice or the right to play a certain game are not going to fall into this category.
For an equal protection claim to have any chance, you generally have to prove the class being discriminated against is a class of "suspect classification" or "quasi-suspect classification" such as race, national origin, gender, or legitimacy, which isn't the case here. So the equal protection claim would only be subject to the minimal scrutiny test so you would have to prove that the law is not "rationally related' to a legitimate government interest. So you're in the same boat as the substantive due process claim above.
So either way, as long as the government can show it has a legitimate interest and that interest is connected to the actual restriction applied, there is no valid claim. This is a difficult test to fail, and thus most governmental action examined under this standard will be upheld unless it is arbitrary and irrational (and the burden of proof is on the challenger under this standard)
Hope that makes some sense, it's a just a quick summary of how these claims are analyzed and the appropriate standards that would be applied, it is not intended to be a complete legal analysis.
Can you sue the U.S. government?
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