US Supreme Court rules pay claims must be filed shortly after discriminatory decision; Ledbetter v Goodyear, 5/29/07

May 29, 2007: In Led­bet­ter v. Goodyear Tire & Rub­ber Com­pa­ny, 550 U.S. 618, 128 S. Ct. 2162 (2007) (Find­Law site opin­ion), the Unit­ed States Supreme Court, in a 5–4 deci­sion, issued an impor­tant deci­sion in a sex dis­crim­i­na­tion case under Title VII of the Civ­il Rights Act of 1964, which sub­stan­tial­ly lim­it­ed the time peri­od avail­able to assert a claim for pay dis­crim­i­na­tion. The Supreme Court affirmed the deci­sion of the Eleventh Cir­cuit in Led­bet­ter v. Goodyear Tire and Rub­ber Com­pa­ny, Inc., 421 F.3d 1169 (11th Cir. 2005).

Ledbetter’s Claims of Sex Discrimination and Lower Pay, and the Trial Result

LillyLedbetter Led­bet­ter filed a charge of sex dis­crim­i­na­tion with the EEOC in 1998 and then lat­er in the year retired. She claimed that, years ear­li­er in her career at Goodyear, male super­vi­sors gave her bad per­for­mance reviews com­pared to what men received. She claimed that Goodyear award­ed rais­es based on those per­for­mance reviews, so that her pay rais­es were reduced as a result of the dis­crim­i­na­to­ry per­for­mance reviews.

Led­bet­ter went to tri­al and per­suad­ed the jury that the per­for­mance reviews, years before she filed her EEOC charge, were dis­crim­i­na­to­ry based on her sex, and the jury found her rights had been vio­lat­ed and award­ed her dam­ages based on her low­er pay­checks through­out her career. The tri­al judge entered a “judg­ment” in Led­bet­ter’s favor based on the jury’s ver­dict. So Led­bet­ter won at tri­al on her sex dis­crim­i­na­tion claim under Title VII. The Eleventh Cir­cuit Court of Appeals threw out the jury ver­dict and tri­al court judg­ment for Led­bet­ter, and entered a judg­ment in favor of Goodyear, based on her fail­ure to file her EEOC charge with­in 180 days of when the per­for­mance reviews had been con­duct­ed. The Unit­ed States Supreme Court affirmed, mean­ing that Goodyear won.

The Problem for Ledbetter Under Title VII Limitations Provisions

Here was the prob­lem for Led­bet­ter: Title VII of the Civ­il Rights Act, which gov­erns sex dis­crim­i­na­tion in the work­place under fed­er­al law, says that an employ­ee must file a charge of dis­crim­i­na­tion with­in 180 days (or, depend­ing on the state, 300 days) after the dis­crim­i­na­tion occurred about which the employ­ee is com­plain­ing. The Courts, in exam­in­ing when the dis­crim­i­na­tion occurred (for pur­pos­es of fig­ur­ing out when that 180 day “clock” starts to run), have focused on the “dis­crete” employ­ment “deci­sion” that caused some con­se­quence (usu­al­ly pay check-relat­ed) for the employ­ee. Based on when Led­bet­ter filed her EEOC charge in 1998, for it to be time­ly, she had to be com­plain­ing about “deci­sions” which occurred with­in the 180-day win­dow pre­ced­ing the charge. But the dis­crim­i­na­to­ry eval­u­a­tions had occurred years before that, even though the reduced pay­checks about which she com­plained con­tin­ued into that 180-day window.

US Supreme Court: Ledbetter Loses Because She Didn’t File Her Complaint Quick Enough

The US Supreme Court held that, in a sit­u­a­tion where a deci­sion (such as a per­for­mance review) was made that dis­crim­i­nat­ed against a female employ­ee by pay­ing her less, the employ­ee was required to file a charge of dis­crim­i­na­tion with the EEOC with­in 180 days of when the deci­sion was made and com­mu­ni­cat­ed to her. That, for Led­bet­ter, would have been with­in 180 days after the bad per­for­mance reviews were con­duct­ed and the results were com­mu­ni­cat­ed to her. Since she did not file EEOC her charge until years lat­er, the charge was not time­ly under Title VII. The con­se­quence is that she los­es all rights under the EEOC charge process, and she los­es all rights to file suit on the same claims in Court under fed­er­al law.

The US Supreme Court’s deci­sion was a 5–4 vote that illus­trates the ide­o­log­i­cal divide on the Court. The 5 vote major­i­ty con­sist­ed of the “con­ser­v­a­tive”; block on the Court (Ali­to, Roberts, Scalia, Kennedy, and Thomas), and the 4 vote dis­sent con­sist­ed of the “lib­er­al” block on the Court (Gins­burg, Stevens, Souter, and Brey­er).

The Backlash, and Congress Overrules the Supreme Court

The deci­sion got a great deal of press atten­tion, being both praised (Kiplinger Busi­ness Resource Cen­ter) and con­demned (New York Times Edi­to­r­i­al). The crit­i­cism of the deci­sion gen­er­at­ed polit­i­cal move­ment for Con­gress to revise the law to undo the deci­sion (NYT edi­to­r­i­al and sto­ry dis­cussing those efforts). On April 24, 2008, the bill that would have over­turned the deci­sion failed to receive the 60 votes required in the Sen­ate to begin con­sid­er­a­tion of the bill (NYT Arti­cle), so the bill died for the time being.

But then after the Novem­ber 2008 elec­tion, where the Democ­rats gained seats in the Sen­ate, Con­gress passed, and Pres­i­dent Oba­ma signed into law (on Jan­u­ary 29, 2009), the Lil­ly Led­bet­ter Fair Pay Act (Pub. L. 111–2, sec.1, 123 Stat.5), which over­turns the US Supreme Court’s deci­sion in Led­bet­ter v. Goodyear Tire & Rub­ber Co., 550 U.S. 618 (2007). You can review the his­to­ry of the law on the Library of Con­gress THOMAS site.

For Supreme Court Groupies

The US Supreme Court’s deci­sion in Led­bet­ter is a good oppor­tu­ni­ty to study the sig­nif­i­cance of and con­tro­ver­sy gen­er­at­ed by the US Supreme Court’s deci­sions. Read the press accounts when the deci­sion was issued from the New York Times and the Wash­ing­ton Post. You can also lis­ten, on the Oyez site, to the oral argu­ment in the case before the Supreme Court, and the announce­ment at the Supreme Court of the deci­sion and dis­sent. Or read the tran­script of the oral argu­ment. You can also read the briefs in the case at FindLaw.com. Read a sum­ma­ry of the deci­sion in the Har­vard Law Review.

Drew M. Capuder
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