Legal Protection of Sports Participation Opportunities in the United States of America

This article describes and compares the existing legal frameworks governing athletic eligibility rules and dispute resolution processes for Olympic, professional, college, and high school sports in the United States from both private law and public law perspectives. United States law does not recognize any constitutionally protected or fundamental right to participate in sports. Nevertheless, Olympic and professional athletes are provided a means to seek independent de novo review of eligibility decisions, usually through a system of private arbitration. In contrast, despite the significant benefits of participation in intercollegiate or interscholastic competition, U.S. courts almost uniformly refuse to recognize a legally protected interest in interscholastic or intercollegiate athletic participation absent a valid contractual right to play a sport and refuse to apply de novo review or more than very limited rational basis scrutiny of student　athlete eligibility determinations.