Nice catch. I would like to clarify one minor point, though. There's nothing inherently wrong, as a constitutional matter, with having "segregated" lounges at a public institution, if the segregation is by sex rather than race. "Separate but equal" bathrooms for blacks vs. whites are racist, abhorrent and unconstitutional, but "separate but equal" bathrooms for men vs. women are just dandy. Ditto for men's vs. women's lounges, men's vs. women's sports teams, etc. etc. In this case, the problem lies not with the "separate" part, but with that subsequent "but equal" component everyone seems to keep forgetting about (assuming, of course, that we can all agree that zero is not equal to one).

I hate to post two comments in a row, but I just noticed a curious anomaly: both the new version and the old, Google-cached version purport to have been last updated on April 18, 2001. Is this just sloppy editing, or a sly effort to cover up the past?

Also, seeing as the lounge is now open to BHWSA "members" rather than women per se, it would be interesting to know what BHWSA's membership criteria are. Can men join?

I'm no constitutional scholar, but the equal protection clause says nothing about race or gender. My layman's understanding is that in order for a state to enforce any kind of segregation, it needs to demonstrate both a compelling interest and that the policy is the least restrictive means to achieve that interest. Separate bathrooms are permitted for fairly obvious reasons; and sports teams are segregated because of the recognition that the strongest men are nearly always stronger than the strongest women. But the women's lounge exists primarily as a place for women to socially exclude the minority of male students at the law school, despite its supporters unconvincing attempts to claim that it is primarily motivated by some other purpose (see Renee Jansen in the comments here).

I don't know enough to know whether the traditional interpretation of the 14th amendment would actually permit this lounge, but I'd be surprised if it did, and I'd be interested in reading any decisions that should convince me otherwise.

My layman's understanding is that in order for a state to enforce any kind of segregation, it needs to demonstrate both a compelling interest and that the policy is the least restrictive means to achieve that interest.

That is the strict scrutiny standard, which applies to discrimination by suspect classes. Discrimination by sex is subject to intermediate review ("important" vs. "compelling" government interest, "substantially related " vs. "narrowly tailored"), meaning that a lot of stuff passes muster along gender lines that wouldn't pass muster if done according to race. Discrimination or segregation according to most other criteria (e.g., Mini-14 owners vs. AR-15 owners - I'm not making that one up) is subject to rational basis review, which amounts to little more than a rubber stamp.

It's interesting to me that Sharkansky's armchair legal analysis of equal protection doctrine was both wrong, as Xrlq pointed out, and circular since he supplies his own completely fictional "interest" while trivializing and discounting those more compelling interests taken into account by the initial supporters of the Boalt Women's Lounge.
Women did not outnumber men in law schools in this country until two years ago: discrimination against the male minority was a highly unlikely motive for the creation of a women's lounge. Add to this the pathetic means to achieve the supposedly discriminatory ends -- a couple of couches and some tea and munchies -- and I'm just not convinced that this is oppression worthy of such outrage.

Does Sharkblog and his tagalong band of chumps really care about the women's lounge as a safe place or or are they just trying to divert attention from Dean Dwyer's inexcusable behavior via counter attack on Boalt's Womens' Association? Also, for your information, men have always been invited to join BHWA. You can quash your "Feminist Cover Up" fantasies now.

It never ceases to amuse me that it's always the "liberals" like "discord" and "Republicans for Gluttony" who so boldly make ad hominem attacks and misstate the facts but decline to give their real names.

Men may or may not have always been invited to join the BHWA, but that's not the point. The point is they have always been excluded from the lounge. The BHWA now realizes that it's a P.R. problem to admit this because it's blatantly wrong to have a segregated lounge at a graduate school. So instead of admitting they were wrong and changing their policy, the BHWA covers up its discriminatory behavior, and its supporters try to discredit their critics by making anonymous ad hominem attacks. How pathetically typical.

Could you all get lives? The whole world has been man's private lounge for years.