John:
Today, the Georgia Supreme Court unanimously struck down the state’s licensing law for lactation care providers, becoming the third state to outright reject the federal courts’ extreme deference to economic regulation—all due to IJ’s strategic litigation.
In 2016, Georgia enacted a licensing requirement for lactation consultants that would have forced hundreds of women—including our client Mary Jackson—out of work. Even though Mary already has a voluntary private certification, the law would mandate her and all lactation care providers to take two years of college courses, complete an additional 300+ hours of clinical work, and pay for another expensive exam—all at the behest of a specially favored credentialing organization. And all this despite volumes of evidence that the new regime would do nothing to improve access to care for most mothers.
When we first launched this case, it was typical for Georgia courts to say there is really no such thing as the right to earn a living. After five years of litigation, IJ has transformed Georgia’s legal landscape such that the state’s supreme court not only recognizes that right, but now demands that restrictions on it be “reasonably necessary.” Importantly, this breaks with federal precedent that allows (or even requires) judges to rely on mere speculation to uphold laws for the purpose of favoring or protecting a group from economic competition.
