Supreme Court Limits Discrimination Suits (another 5-4)

[n2doc]

Supreme Court Limits Discrimination Suits


By DAVID STOUT
Published: May 29, 2007
WASHINGTON, May 29 — The Supreme Court ruled today, in a case of considerable interest to business and industry, that employers should be protected from lawsuits over pay discrimination linked to gender or race and based on decisions made or acts committed years ago.

Related
Text of the Decision
http://www.supremecourtus.gov/opinions/06pdf/05-1074.pdf
Voting 5 to 4 after apparently heated deliberations, the justices found in favor of the Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company and against Lilly M. Ledbetter, who worked for 19 years at the company’s plant in Gadsden, Ala., and was paid substantially less than men doing work at the same level.

The majority found against Ms. Ledbetter, saying she could not show that there had been intentional discrimination in the 180-day period before she complained to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in March 1998, shortly after she retired following an unwanted transfer. Goodyear’s argument that federal law protected the company from claims concerning discrimination that occurred before Sept. 26, 1997 — or 180 days before Ms. Ledbetter filed her E.E.O.C. action — was upheld.

Today’s ruling affirmed a decision by the United States Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit, in Atlanta, which overturned a Federal District Court jury’s award to Ms. Ledbetter. The jury had awarded her more than $3 million in back pay and compensatory and punitive damages, but the judge lowered the amount to $360,000 because of limits imposed by Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

The high court’s majority rejected the position of other federal appeals courts and the commission that the “paycheck accrual rule” should be followed, meaning that each pay period that fails to correct past discrimination should be regarded as a new incident of discrimination.

Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr., writing for the majority, said that “current effects alone cannot breathe life into prior, uncharged discrimination.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/29/washington/30scotuscnd.html

[n2doc]

1. Judge Ginsburg's dissent:

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg read part of her dissent aloud (itself an unmistakable sign of anger), and the tone of her opinion showed how bitterly she differed with the majority. She asserted that the effects of pay discrimination can be relatively small at first, then become far more serious as subsequent raises are based on the original low pay, and that instances of pay inequities ought to be treated differently from other acts of discrimination. For one thing, she said, pay discrimination is often not uncovered until long after the fact.

The majority’s holding, she said, “is totally at odds with the robust protection against workplace discrimination Congress intended Title VII to secure.” She said the majority “does not comprehend, or is indifferent to, the insidious way in which women can be victims of pay discrimination.”

“This is not the first time the Court has ordered a cramped interpretation of Title VII, incompatible with the statute’s broad remedial purpose,” she wrote. Her dissent was joined by Justices John Paul Stevens, David H. Souter and Stephen G. Breyer.

“Once again, the ball is in Congress’s court,” Justice Ginsburg wrote, expressing the hope that the lawmakers “may act to correct this parsimonious reading of Title VII.”

[HockeyMom]

2. Precisely why we HAVE to elect a Democratic President

the next election. The repercussions of Bush and his PRO BUSINESS agenda are already being felt. I won't even go into the religious or pro choice aspects of his new appointees.

I don't want my GRANDCHILDREN to have to live with all this.

[Neecy]

3. this was a disgusting ruling

Justice Ginsburg made the point that pay discrimination can't be proven in 180 days - often times it takes years for a woman to fall further and further behind the pay rates of men and lay out a comprehensive case for pay discrimination.

Another pro-corporatist ruling from the Roberts/Alito gang...big surprise.

[AX10]

4. This is why I will SUPPORT the Democratic Nominee 100%!

The Supreme Court. Do we really want another Sammy "The Bull" Scalito on the courts? A "man" who follows in the same traditions of "Il Duce"? A servant of the far right?
Vote Democratic!

[IChing]

5. Don't forget the gang of 14......7 democrats and 7 repubs

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gang_of_14

[AX10]

7. I was greatly disappointed by Daniel Inouye.

The other six I would expect to sell us out.
Robert Byrd needs to go. He is full of shit. He attacks Bush for his blatent abuses of power and then votes to confirm a justice who would be nothing but a rubber stamp for Bush to abuse his power? :wtf: Byrd said something about there not being enough religion in society, so Alito would vote to allow more religion in the public relm. :wtf: He needs to be replaced!

[napi21]

6. What in the hell is wrong with these guys?

The high court’s majority rejected the position of other federal appeals courts and the commission that the “paycheck accrual rule” should be followed, meaning that each pay period that fails to correct past discrimination should be regarded as a new incident of discrimination.

So they want somebody to file a law suit a week???? What kind of crap it that? Sure, load up the local courts with thousands or millions of baby law suits...that makes sense!

Hell, the damn idiots are voting against their own legal system!