Public schools are an arm of the government. The check on their power resides in the courtroom. It is long-settled law in America that the government cannot discriminate against people because of the color of their skin. We call this equality under the law, and it is enshrined in the Fourteenth Amendment and in our civil rights laws. “Classifications of citizens solely on the basis of race are by their very nature odious to a free people whose institutions are founded upon the doctrine of equality,” the Supreme Court has declared. “They threaten to stigmatize individuals by reason of their membership in a racial group and to incite racial hostility.” It was to defend these principles that a brave teacher in Evanston, Illinois, represented by the Southeastern Legal Foundation, where I am general counsel, recently filed a lawsuit in federal court to stop Evanston/Skokie School District 65 from discriminating against its teachers and students on the basis of race through illegal and unconstitutional teacher training, classroom curriculum, and overall policies. The lawsuit became necessary after the Biden administration withdrew, without explanation or legal justification, the Department of Education’s January 2021 finding that the school district’s policies and procedures violated Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.