User:ImTheIP/Legal analysis of anti-BDS laws

As of 2020, the question of whether American anti-BDS laws are constitutional has not yet been settled in courts. Though many analysts believe that sooner or later there will be a legal showdown due to the controversial nature of the laws. The debate about the laws constitutionality focuses on two central issues:


 * Whether boycotts of Israel, and boycotts in general, can be considered a form of discrimination on the same level as discrimination based on gender, race, or similar attributes.
 * Whether political boycotts are protected speech. If so, laws designed to stop them could violate the First Amendment-protected freedom of speech.

The answer to the first question has implications for the answer to the latter; if the boycotts of Israel are discriminatory, the government could be free to enact laws against them.

In the following sections, those who claim that anti-BDS laws are constitutional are referred to as "proponents" and those that claim that they aren't are referred to as "critics".

Discrimination argument
Proponents argue that boycotts of Israel is a form of discrimination because they target a particular group (Israelis) with the intent of inflicting economic harm on it. Since there is no legal test for deciding whether a consumer boycott is discriminatory, the discrimination argument is based on laws regulating discrimination in other areas, such as employment, disability and housing. In particular, two doctrines in labor law has been referred to; disparate treatment or "discriminatory intent" and disparate impact. These laws weren't drafted to regulate political boycotts which limits their applicability but they have nevertheless been used to analyze whether boycotts of Israel are discriminatory.

Disparate treatment
Disparate treatment refers to decisionmaking based on a person's membership in a protected class. Proponents argue that BDS leaders call for Israel to cease exist as a "Jewish state" is anti-Semitic. Critics contend that the allegation is conflating anti-Zionism with anti-Semitism. Opposing Israel as a Jewish state is anti-Zionist but not anti-Semitic, they argue. Critics also point out that the organization that coordinates BDS, the Palestinian BDS National Committee (BNC), officially opposes anti-Semitism and encourages supporters to select boycott targets based on their complicity in Israel's human rights violations and likelihood of success, rather than on their national origin or religious identity.

Proponents notes that BDS singles out Israel for boycott while ignoring human rights abuses in other parts of the world. They argue that this focus is driven by animosity towards Jews or Israelis and that it is circumstantial evidence of discriminatory intent. They refer to the Working Definition of Antisemitism which gives "Applying double standards by requiring of it [Israel] a behavior not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation" as an example of anti-Semitism. The claim, which relies on the but-for test, a legal doctrine for establishing causality in discrimination cases, is that BDS wouldn't have boycotted Israel if it wasn't for its Jewish or Israeli identity. Critics counter that the but-for claim is not supported by evidence. They argue that since the majority of companies targeted for boycotts by the BNC are not Israeli companies, but foreign companies targeted for their complicity in the Israeli human rights violations, anti-Jewish or anti-Israeli animosity couldn't be BDS' motivation.

Critics reason that if political boycotts of countries were illegal discrimination, many current and historical boycotts would also be illegal discrimination. The US sanctions against Iran would be anti-Iranian discrimination and if singling out an entity for boycott is discriminatory, most political movements using boycotts would be discriminatory. The Anti-Apartheid Movement would have had to address the suffering of people in other African countries too, to escape the charge of singling out South Africa. Critics claim that is unreasonable.

Disparate impact
The disparate impact argument complements the disparate treatment argument by stating that the boycott harms Jewish or Israeli entities, even if that is not its intent. That is, the boycott is "fair in form, but discriminatory in operation." Critics argue that the disparate impact doctrine was developed with employment discrimination in mind and is not applicable to BDS and even if it was, the argument would fail. The plaintiff would have to show that the behavior has an adverse impact on Israeli or Jewish businesses. But the majority of companies targeted by BDS are not Israeli, making it difficult to argue that the boycott harms such entities.

Even if Jewish or Israeli business were disproportionately impacted by BDS' boycott, critics argue that BDS could defend its boycott as a "business necessity" because its goal, ending Israel's human rights violations, is legitimate. An objection could be that BDS should use other methods that does not affect third parties. But given the failure of the many political initiatives in ending Israel's human rights violations, BDS could argue that a boycott of Israel is one of the few remaining options.

Free speech argument
Critics claim that anti-BDS laws are unconstitutional because participation in political boycotts is protected speech and the government cannot require citizens to relinquish First Amendment rights in exchange for government contracts. To show this, critics refer to NAACP v. Claiborne Hardware Co. which was about a NAACP-initiated a boycott against white merchants in Claiborne. The goal of the boycott was to pressure city officials to meet demands about racial integration. The Supreme Court in its decision found that boycotts to bring about political change occupies "the highest rung of the hierarchy of First Amendment values."

Proponents contend that boycotting is not per se expressive conduct equivalent to speech and therefore not protected speech. They view calling for a boycott as distinct from participating in one. The former would be protected speech, while the latter, which anti-BDS laws address, would not. Someone calling for a boycott of Israel would not be affected by anti-BDS laws as long as they themselves didn't boycott Israel. To them, Claiborne Hardware is irrelevant because it affirmed the right to call for a boycott but not to participate in one. This view was taken by the Arkansas district court that ruled on Arkansas Times LP v. Mark Waldrip. It argued that Rumsfeld v. Forum for Academic & Institutional Rights, Inc. (FAIR) was the controlling case, in which the Supreme Court ruled that the federal government could withhold funds from universities for refusing to give military recruiters access to school resources. Universities denying access to military recruiters is analogous to boycotting Israel, proponents argue. Since the Supreme Court ruled that denying access to military recruiters was not expressive conduct neither could boycotts of Israel be expressive conduct. Critics argue that the analogy doesn't hold because FAIR wasn't about boycotting and participation in a political boycott is "expressing something", thus expressive conduct.

Discarding Claiborne Hardware, proponents analogies anti-BDS laws with anti-discrimination laws which forbids government contractors from discriminating based on gender and similar attributes. Critics argue that the analogy is inappropriate because, for example, an employer refusing to hire gays is neither a political act nor expressive conduct. Even if a boycott has a discriminatory component, which the boycott ruled on in Claiborne Hardware had, it is still protected speech, critics assert.

Another objection to Claiborne Hardware is that the case was about the lawfulness of boycotts, but anti-BDS laws merely withdraws a privilege from boycotters; that of being eligible for government contracts. This argument runs afoul of the "unconstitutional conditions" doctrine, critics argue. The doctrine holds that the government "may not deny a benefit to a person on a basis that infringes his constitutionally protected interests — especially, his interest in freedom of speech." This doctrine was promulgated in two seminal Supreme Court cases; Pickering v. Board of Education and Elrod v. Burns. However, these cases involved existing business relations between private entities and the government. Whether the doctrine of "unconstitutional conditions" applies to situations where no existing business relationship exists has not been addressed by the Supreme Court.

Critics also refer to USAID v. Alliance for Open Society (2013) where the Supreme Court ruled that the government cannot require organizations to profess to a specific viewpoint as a condition for government funding. But anti-BDS laws coerces contractors bidding to profess to a specific viewpoint, namely of not boycotting Israel, which would be an unlawful "constitutional condition."

Other arguments
Proponents argue that the Tax Reform Act of 1976 and the Export Administration Act of 1979 which penalizes individuals and companies participating in "international boycotts" establishes a precedent. Critics offer two responses; first, Claiborne Hardware wasn't settled in 1979 so it wasn't yet clear that political boycotts were protected speech, second, these acts referred to boycotts organized by foreign nations but BDS is a grassroots initiative organized by civil society groups.

Another argument is based on Longshoremen v. Allied Int'l, Inc., where the Supreme Court held that a trade union that refused to unload cargo from the Soviet Union in protest against the country's invasion of Afghanistan had engaged in an illegal secondary boycott. Proponents claim that this case sets a precedent since it singled out a specific country and affected parties not directly involved in the dispute, just like boycotts of Israel do. Critics view Longshoremen as irrelevant because the case was about labor law and such boycotts have consistently been analyzed differently from boycotts by civil rights groups.

Cases
The following cases are often cited in analyses of the constitutionality of anti-BDS laws:


 * Hazen Paper Co. v. Biggins
 * McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green
 * NAACP v. Claiborne Hardware Co.
 * Legal Services Corp. v. Velazquez
 * USAID v. Alliance for Open Society (2013)